Health Update January 2025

Hello Friends, Fans, and Family;

It’s been an interesting couple of years for my health. I last talked about it in July 2024.

In short, I’ve been dealing with:

  • Pain in both my forearms
  • Dizzyness
  • Fatigue
  • Brain Fog
  • Tingling in my hands and feet
  • Numb and tingling on my left cheek
  • Blurry vision in my left eye
  • Pain in the joints of my hands and feet

Arms and Spine

I am doing exercises and stretches to help avoid pain. It still there in my arms but it’s manageable. I sometimes get pain in my neck that radiates down, but I double up my exercises and it usually goes away within a week.

Migraines

This is the big one. I’m currently taking Amitriptyline to try and prevent the migraines. So far I’ve been on it for two months with an escalating dose, and it hasn’t done much beyond make me sleepy and have terrible dry mouth. If this doesn’t work, there are other drug options.

I am starting to identify my triggers better. I know the following will trigger me:

  • Big change in caffeine consumption (If I have no coffee or if I have 4+ cups)
  • Alcohol (I noticed it with red wine and with cream liqueurs but I’m just cutting it all out.)
  • Changes in eating routine (If I don’t eat every 2-3 hours I start to feel faint and it can trigger)
  • Changes in sleep patterns. (Especially if the change is often)
  • Fluorescent lights
  • Strong smells (Mostly anything floral or going close to a soap store in the mall. Although someone had a poutine at work and the smell lasted all day. I loved the smell but ouch)
  • Changes of 10+ degrees in the weather and rainstorms. (I have no control over this one.)

Stress doesn’t seem to make the migraine worse but it does make the side effects worse. I had a really stressful day in December and for the next two weeks the muscles in my hips hurt like they were on fire. It’s caused by the migraine, the brain, and the two causing muscles to tense too far (probably what happened to my arms.)

I see my doctor on Wednesday and we’ll see what happens. I think this is a long haul.

Allergies

I have restarted my allergy shots and one week hasn’t cured me yet. I’ll be taking them weekly for 22 weeks. My allergist’s office prefers that I do the shots elsewhere so I’m thinking of going to an Appletree near my house on my lunch break.

Neurodiversity

As I mentioned in Friday’s post, I am Autistic and have ADHD. This explains a lot about how I burn out and how drained I feel in certain situations. It, with the migraines, explains a lot of why I feel like crap at certain times.

I’m not sure how this interacts with my other health issues but I’m sure that they interact and make things more complicated.

Sleep apnea and asthma

I have taken an asthma test and I am scheduled for a sleep test this summer. Hopefully these will be eliminated as concerns.


In Conclusion

Despite everything on this list, I feel better than I have in years. With my doctor’s help and hopefully finding the right thing to help with my migraines I should be even better by next year.

Stay safe and be kind,

Éric

I am Autistic

Hello Friends, Family, and Fans;

A few years ago I started looking into getting diagnosed with ADHD and/or Autism.

Last year I was diagnosed by a quick online service with Inattentive ADHD. I found out afterward that most employers and insurance companies don’t accept the results of this sort of testing.

I decided that I wanted to know and got tested properly. As you can guess from the title I was diagnosed as Autistic. I’m considered level 1 which isn’t a cool RPG system but just means that I need little to no support in day to day life. (Until recently it was called Asperger’s after a Nazi-Eugenicist).

I was also diagnosed as ADHD mixed type, suspected Dysgraphia, and Rejection sensitive dysphoria.

A small build your own booknook that I got for Christmas. It was a lot of fun to make. If you’re wondering why I put this in the post, its for reach and because I`d say books are one of my special interests.

It’s been almost a month and I’m still processing what it means. Currently, I’m relieved to be able to look back at times where I thought I was broken and understand that I wasn’t. So much of my life makes more sense now that I know.

The more I learn about Autism and ADHD, the more I feel better about myself. I’ve spent so long being told I was lazy, unreasonable, not applying myself, melodramatic, picky, annoying, or just weird. Over forty years of being told things like that, it starts to become part of your own inner monologue. My whole life, I’d wonder why certain things were so hard for me and those were the only answers. Now I have a better one, and I need to start being kinder to myself.

It’s a disability, and I’m starting to understand how it affects me and my life.

The big take away, for now, is understanding that I’m not broken but I am disabled.

Feel free to ask me any questions.

Stay safe and be kind,

Éric

Health Update 2 Steps forward 1 back

Hello Everyone,

Since my last update I’ve started physio, exercises, and occupational therapy. It’s only been a week, but it feels like a lot of effort for little gain. I’m going to continue because at least it’s completely covered by WSIB. The people are nice but everything feels fast.

I saw a pain doctor. He was rushed and said I should continue what I’m doing and gave me some exercises that are the same as the kinesiologist has been doing. I’m glad he didn’t give me any pills. I’m already dealing with a lot of mind fog, I don’t want to deal with any more.

I had called my doctor to try and talk to him about MS and I managed to get an appointment. He said I had a lot of the symptoms but that the neurologist should have caught it. (Same guy who told me I was too young and should just ignore it.) However since I have the symptoms he has referred me to get an MRI. It’ll image my brain, neck, and back to make sure. This should help diagnose MS or any form of cancer.

My father died of brain cancer and my grandmother of leukemia, so I’m trying not to panic at the idea.

Reality Sucks, or Yes, I am disabled

I’m starting to come to the realization that I’m disabled.

My energy levels, lung capacity, and overall strength have never fully recovered from covid in February 2020. I’m told it’ll get better, but it’s a slow process.

Add to that the dizziness and fatigue I’ve been feeling since last year and it means I’m not in good shape or feeling well. In short, I’m disabled.

It’s frustrating me because I am physically able to do almost anything I need to but I start getting tired and pained quickly. If I push myself too far, I start to get dizzy and clumsy. Just setting up my backyard, with lots of help from the kids, left me feeling horrible for two days after. Headache, inability to think, pain everywhere, short of breath, fatigue, and extra pain in my arms.

I’ve been experiencing something similar with picketing but that’s a different post.

Accepting that I’m disabled means I need to start finding my limits and living inside them. Once I know what’s wrong, I can hopefully work up to increasing activity. For now, I’ll have to be extra careful with gardening.

So that’s my update, it’s all over the place but I’m okay and things are moving. Let’s hope it’s in the right direction.

Éric