Damn skippy it gets you in, Ceejaytee. I’m so sorry that you’re having to go through this. I know this thread is in fun and all, but I’m also hoping to educate people. Maybe this will make people think twice about making fun of people who different.
It’s repetitive strain injury (& technically I shouldn’t post to the boards till I get a voice thing sorted, but I’m kinda attached to the few shreds of sanity I have) & I shouldn’t type, so no working, but I’m kinda attached to eating and living in a house…
The sheaths of the tendons (I have a nasty habit of getting tendons & ligaments the wrong way round, so it could be the other one) get damaged & inflamed & since the blood supply there isn’t good, they take a long while to heal - whilst getting redamaged every day by more typing…it can lead to nerve damage if the inflamed tendons trap the nerve due to swelling.
Mine is in my hands, wrists, arms, but you can get it elsewhere (tennis elbow & housemaid’s knee are examples before they thought of a tla for it…).
I wear splints on my arms to support my wrists as that helps, but I get odd looks sometimes. However, when I’m wearing my splints, I won’t shift my trolley out of the way in the supermarket just cos some jerk is in a hurry (not deliberately obstruct, I have manners…) - everyone can see I have a problem with my arms then & so I don’t have to worry about people thinking that I’m the jerk in a hurry!
This is hopefully the right crowd for this rant. 
I think the thing I hate most about my disease is that no one can tell I’m sick. I don’t LOOK like it. I can be in the midst of a terrible lupus flare, which means I have no energy and literally every bone in my body hurts, and I look fine. So I can’t take off work.
I also need y’all to kick me in the ass to go back to the doctor. I’ve been in remission for…4 years? now. However, I think it’s coming back. I’m tired as hell all the time again, and my joints are acting up. I could find out by one blood test, but I’m scared to…it’s like I don’t want to admit that it’s back. Remission is a funny thing…I think I managed to fool myself that it was gone forever. And it never will be.
OOOHHH me, me. Can I join?
On my mother’s side. Both my maternal grandmother AND grandfather died from breast cancer. My mother has already had a radical mastectomy. I have to go in for a mamogram every year. And although I have yet to get it, the odd are very high that at least one of these boobs will go someday. Fortunately my personality and brains are not attached to them.
Now for those of you wondering–yes men can and do get breast cancer. Beside my grandfather having it, one of my pastors has had a mastectomy for breast cancer and is doing his part in educating the world about this problem. Men if you find a lump, don’t ignore it. Seek ye a doctor.
Excuse me while I take Tatertot out back and beat the stuffins out of her. Just kidding…
Seriously, THAT is part of the problem, people thinking the words “migraine” and “headache” are somehow interchangeable. They ARE NOT.
Let’s see, when you have a headache, do you shiver and shake, while at the same time, sweat profusely? Do you vomit everything, even water? Does it feel like your head is in a vise, with someone pounding your temple with a sledge hammer? Do you get dizzy? Does it feel like someone has stabbed you in the eye with a fork? Well, if not, then you have a plain old headache.
I take Imitrex for the pain, which sometimes works and sometimes doesn’t. I also take 150 mgs of Atenolol (a beta blocker) and 50 mgs of Verapamil (a calcium channel blocker) everyday. Together, they seem to be helping reduce the number of migraines. I also have some lovely little pills with codeine, which REALLY help with the pain.
Ooooh, I’d love to hear it. I have two wonderful (not) childbirth stories! One’s about a C-Section!
I work with a support group and charity for a little known autoimmune disease. Many of them report the same thing as Falcon - that it’s hard because they often don’t look sick. Also, many people tend to think that if they haven’t heard of something, it can’t be that bad… Wrong! On the other side are the people who hear autoimmune, think AIDS and then stop thinking. They treat people like plague carriers when they have nothing that can be transmitted! I learn so much from these people, and from you all, about what it takes to be a real human being. I wish you all the very best!
tatertot: thank you.
My philosophy is to remain upbeat, which occasionally involves cracking wise. My treatment is a regular fact of life, and not the be all and end all. I’m currently on recurrence number one but I’m not (currently thought to be) terminal or anything, so it’s simply a matter of riding it out.
If I hurt anyone’s feelings with my irreverence, I’m sorry. My family constantly tells me I don’t take it seriously enough, but I really can’t do that.
YES! Sign me up again, please!
Ice cream sundaes for everyone signed up, my treat. Extra whipped topping on request. Strawberry, chocolate, pineapple, kewi toppings. Anthracite, no sugar ice cream for you so that you can join in the feed-fest.
We can wallow in a big dallop.
tatertot said:
Thanks, Tater. Chocolate is fine–I eat candy anyway. (Yes, I know better–it’s poison for me. No, I’m not stopping.)
Hey, can I be migrain suffer number 2? And yeah Kinsey aren’t cat scans the best?
I have had a lingering migrain for two weeks and it sent me to the emergency room last thursday. My pharmacy is not going to refill my script for amytryptiline until I see my doctor. That is why it is still lingering.
Sassy, if you don’t mind what disease is it? My son suffers from ITP. His white cells get confused and eat his platelets, and then he doesn’t clot, and then we get big bruises and have to worry about brain hemorrage. We have to go an hour away for treatment which is a four hour IV. He also suffers from Thalasemia B Minor. We still have to learn and deal with that one yet. He’s only just four years old this month, and we have been dealing with this for two years now. Maybe an honorary memeber?
I don’t remember the thread, but I think it was Biggirl who had the unknown now know problem. I am pretty sure that my second reason belongs there but I will let you all know anyway.
I have had this unknown pain in my right side for over a year. Appendix is gone, and so is the galbladder so it is not them. I have had ultrasounds and radiation die cat scans and they can find nothing. Went in and had a scope done. Lots of pain with that, but nothing there.
My ob/gyn thinks that it is something with my right ovary. Now I have to wait for results of the pap, and then they are talking biopsy.
Scared? Hell yes I am! Should I be? Who knows.
Some people are under the belief that the doctors can find nothing wrong, so it is all in my head.
fierra: My sympathies are with you. My mother has a milder version of what you have, we think it’s caused by years of picking up toddlers (she’s a day care worker).
Falcon: Get to the doctor! You’re just driving yourself nuts not finding out. If it’s back, you can deal with it…not knowing is not doing yourself any favors, because I suspect that you are too smart a cookie to live in denial, and you’ll just wind up hating yourself for being scared.
deb2world: How bout you and Nika be on the CDSS Pep Squad? Frankly, I don’t ever want the two of you to be full members of this club.
Kinsey: I know what you mean. My first migraine knocked me on the ass, puking, extreme sensitivity to stimuli, eye flashes. Thankfully, I don’t get them very often any more, it’s been at least a year. I think in my case it was my job that triggered them. I’m glad you’ve found somethings that help.
PS Do you jealously hoard your pain medications, knowing that getting a refill is a pain in the patooie? Once MisterTot took one of my Tynenol 3 (for a hangover, the twerp) and I just about killed him.
JBirdman: I can understand your attitude, what else to do but laugh? Right now I’m healthy, but the stigma of having Hep B weighs heavily on me. Like I said, my Mother in Law won’t eat food I prepare or even use the toilet in my house. When I stayed at their house, she wouldn’t let my BIL use the extra bathroom (he had to use hers) because that was the one I was using. It hurts, but I’m not going to let myself be dragged down.
Anthracite: Welcome back!
MysterEcks: Are you my father? He’s diabetic (type II) and I can’t believe the junk he eats. An entire pint of Cherry Garcia is too much for him, but he eats it. I know I’m here to support not lecture, but be careful, okay?
Kricket: You can be Migraine Girl #2. I’m so sorry to hear about your son…poor little angel. Give him a big hug and kiss from me tonight, okay? And, are you in a lot of pain? Damnit, I half-saw a report on a disease like that that affects women…it’s hard to recognize so it’s “in their mind”. Let me search the Dateline, 20/20 kinds of sites and see if I can find it. Arghhh! Usually I’m so good about remembering things…but it sounds like what you describe.
I’m gonna go sit over there with Internet Legend and discuss better eating habits, meds and stress reduction techniques (outbreak-free for a while now) while tatertot processes applications…
oh…yeah, also…add onto my application the migraines I have suffered since toddlerhood…
I consider it socially stigmatizing because people DO think it’s just a headache and that I am a wimp…
Does asthma count? I was certainly socially stigmatized as a child, because my mother kept taking me to the same doctor, who was not knowledgable in any way regarding lung diseases, and so prescribed one after another abysmal treatment (most of them failures), while a childhood friend of mine with a real doctor got an inhaler. Most stigmatizing was the 30 minutes I had to spend on a “breathing machine” - in class - whenever I had an attack. And forget PE.
Finally, I got on Primatene Mist, which was like a miracle - but for the side effects of enlarging your heart … I was on that for about 15 years, so my heart is probably about to explode. Mmmmm, epinephrine.
After a few days in a hospital six years ago, I finally got a specialist who put me on some appropriate asthma medicine (did you know you can prevent attacks? I didn’t for 20 years).
So can I be in the clique?
Sign me up as migraine girl number 3. You know what I hate? People who try to press medication on me when I have just a little headache. They tell me not to be a martyr. Hah! Thi s little ache? It’s not worthy of spending money on.
I’ve become a master at controlling/ignoring lesser pain.
I also have an RSI, which is why I take long abscences (that doesn’t look like it’s spelled correctly) from this board.
I have an aunt who’s paranoid schizophrenic. I’m manifesting lesser symptoms, but I can’t afford to see a psychiatrist for testing (the symptoms I have are also symptoms of a few other things, including sleep disorders.)
And, of course, the clinical depression.
And people wonder why I can’t hold on to a full time job.
Kricket: Check your e-mail.
Dylan: Congratulations on being outbreak-free! Perhaps we ought to start a sub-chapter exclusively for migraine-sufferers. Just a suggestion…but have you thought about not letting Dewt make the coffee anymore? It might help.
Jean Grey: That must have been so rough as a kid. Now I feel bad about faking asthma to get out of PE (I still can’t believe coach didn’t check our health forms). I’m so glad that you found something that helps. Welcome to our happy little diseased clique!
Sou Na: You snuck in while I was typing! Welcome to the clique. And I’m sure I don’t need to tell you this, but I will: Get thee to a psychiatrist. Pronto. Most communties have a low cost/sliding scale psychaitric care clinic. Are you eligible for medicaid (you said you weren’t working regularly)? This can not be ignored. If you need help in finding a place, I’m sure us Dopers will be glad to help you out. There is a Mentally Ill Doper’s Thread started by Old Scratch, have you checked it out? Perhaps someone in there will have experience in finding affordable psychiatric care. I hope it’s just the depression, but better safe than sorry.
Ooops…when I said “just the depression”, I wasn’t meaning to downplay depression, I’m just hoping that it’s strictly depression, instead of being a symptom of one more illness. I’m not explaining myself very well am I? I do mean well, ya know…
hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha. ahem. I now make the coffee…but for clarification purposes…he uses a tablespoon because he drinks out of a cup the size of a beer stein…
this is soooooo exciting…I have never been part of a ‘clique’ before…do I get a membership card?..do we get to have our own dopefests?
Suo Na. I know you didn’t ask, but I notice that you are in the So. Cal. area. Trying calling Loma Linda Medical Center. They have a Psychiatric clinic. They should either be able to take you for a pay as much as you can or else refer you to a clinic in your area that offers that kind of payment plan. Good luck.