ice cream at dawn…
…or a little before dawn, actually.
I’ve been having a difficult week or so. After deciding to come off my medication following my annoying coffee spilling habit, I’d been slowly reducing my dose for about a month. Around two weeks ago I came off completely and for a few days all seemed fine. Then I woke up one day feeling very spacey and absent, nothing too awful really and if this was all that coming off the tablets was going to do to me then I wasn’t going to complain (especially as I was able, with a little care, get a cup of hot liquid to my lips without flinging it around the room.) Then quite suddenly last Saturday I woke up feeling as though someone had kicked me in my balls. Not very pleasant. I got up thinking it would pass. It didn’t. I developed stomach cramps, diarrhea, neausa, and I just could go to sleep. I began to hear conversations in my head that weren’t happening. Bizarely I couldn’t bear to be see the colour blue (particularly unfortunate you’d realise if you’d seen my bedroom).
Thankfully I’m beginning to feel more human again. A couple of Nurofen at last make me feel a lot better. I can sleep for most of the night. In fact last night, even though I found myself awake in the early hours it suddenly wasn’t the nightmare it had been. I could sit and read comfortable. I treated myself to a bowl of ice cream (which I’ve been craving all week) and sat surfing. I found this site via ME/CFS/CFIDS Watch. Jodi Bassett has suffered from ME for almost a decade. She experiences the sort of nausea and pain everyday that I have had for only a week. I can’t imagine how she copes. Sitting there last night, slowly enjoying my ice cream, I suddenly felt extremely lucky. I am extremely lucky…
September 30th, 2005 at 9:48 pm
gawd, that sounds very unpleasant and scary! glad you’re feeling better anyway
October 1st, 2005 at 1:13 am
Hope you’ll feel better soon, Michael. K
October 1st, 2005 at 2:12 am
gosh Michael, so sorry you had such a rough patch. hope you feel better soon.
z aka vickij
October 1st, 2005 at 12:42 pm
You poor old devil. I wondered where you’d been … makes me wonder how I’d cope with coming off the wretched things. I keep putting it off though I know there is an alternative —- Lemon balm & St John’s Wort.
Hope you continue to feel OK and can get back to jollier things than struggling to feel well enough to be creative
October 1st, 2005 at 1:15 pm
Hi Michael,
Not good eh? Sorry to hear you can’t stand the sight of BLUE!
Seriously though, looking on the bright side, I experienced these very symptoms for the last few years, culminating in an almost constant state of migraine, but have faith - miracles can and do happen [I’m not religious by the way!]. For me, after a fortnight solid of migraine [they usually only came for 2-3 days, once or twqice a week], taking way too much Maxalt [Rizatriptan] to get through, I practiced a healing visualisation / self hypnosis on www.paulmckenna.com where I visualised myself freed from the five years of illness, and running along the beach with my surfboard and a big smile on my face. The next day, my partner bought me a new longboard [hadn’t surfed for most of 4 1/2 years], and I took to the water, breaking all the rules of M.E. - surfed for 1 to 1 1/2 hours for almost every day of the last 8 weeks, and have more energy than ever before. But the real amazing thing - not a single migraine, not a headache, if I feel a bit buggy, I just go in the sea, and then feel way better all day. If I can’t get in the surf, I go in the sea for a swim [in wetsuit]. This works for me too. Try it - be like one of those old guys you see that swim in the sea every day, and are still going at 90 - it’s proof it works!
Sorry for long post - please edit freely, just had to show the hope -
yours happily and healthily,
Blue
October 1st, 2005 at 6:14 pm
yikkes michael sounds horrid I’m glad you are feeling a bit better. I like the last suggestion for making you feel better super indulgence in something you enjoy…
October 2nd, 2005 at 8:10 am
Glad those awful symptoms only stuck around for a week. Hope they don’t return!
It’s so good for you to count yourself lucky. I know whenever I practice gratitude, I feel much healthier and happier.
And indulging in ice cream once in a while always works!
October 3rd, 2005 at 10:49 pm
I had to withdraw from Paxil recently, after about six weeks developed tremors and new-to-me weird headaches. I already have migraines, but these headaches were different.
Coming off Paxil felt horrible. I’ve since heard people refer to this as “Paxil flu”. I felt uncomfortably unreal and extra sick.
But the weird headaches and tremors stopped. Now I am back to my usual migraines and CFIDS/FMS. Who would have ever guessed that this would feel like success?
Best wishes to you.
October 7th, 2005 at 9:53 am
Lost track of what happened with your blood pressure investigation, but as someone who was at 230/140 before discovery and management was put in place, I know Nurofen (or any ipobrufen) is not good for people with B.P. issues.
Also have had similar experience with drawing/cartooning when there has been variation with the SSRI I use.
Best wishes, from someone from the land of the long black Vegemite.