Close... but no cigar

So its been a few days since I stopped taking my sleeping pills before bed. That first night wasn't too bad. Saturday into Sunday was a little worse. Sunday into Monday was pretty bad, and last night was officially terrible. I'm back to tossing and turning and just giving up on sleep at about 4am. This morning I crawled out of bed to a very familiar thought/feeling... HOW am I going to do this? I just simply cannot go back to sleeping 1-2 hours per night. Seminary is about to start in a few weeks and no... NO, this cannot be happening. I'm going to try the Benadryl again and see if that helps a bit. If it doesn't I suppose we'll move up to Unisom again, and if that doesn't do the trick... well, my Dr.and I may have to have a sit down about TTC safe sleeping pills because I refuse to go down this road again.

I'll keep you all updated. Ben and I are going on our Stake Youth Conference trip to Nauvoo tomorrow and will be back Staurday. We'll see how I survive that. Hopefully sheer exhaustion will help me sleep those nights! :/

This is it... no turning back now!

Tonight I will attempt for the first time in a little over 3 months to sleep without the aid of drugs. Wait, that didn't sound right, did it? ;P Ok, let me rephrase that, without the help of my little green friend, the sleeping pill. The Lupron should be pretty much almost out of my system since I would be due for a 7th shot on Tuesday but will instead be starting Femara again. My migraines and headaches have been steadily declining for the past 2 weeks SO I'm hopeful the insomnia will be gone as well. Of course, I've been told that these nasty side effects can linger for months unfortunately... That would be utterly sucky, but I really have no choice in the matter, as my little green good-sleep pill is classified as a class D drug which is a big no-no for me now that we're starting up Femara again. Wish me luck... I would hate to go back to only getting 1-2 hours of sleep per night, especially since Seminary is starting back up in about a month... yikes! :/

My blindness update

So a few days ago I wrote about my frustrations with my suckier eyesight, all courtesy of the Lupron. Today I had one of the doctors refract me (I know I was supposed to wait 6 weeks but after seeing my autorefractor readings it kinda scared me) and whoa... my eyes have changed a quite a bit... I knew I wasn't going crazy! I am now officially a toric contact lens wearer, ugh... I was hoping never to have to cross that threshold, but unfortunately my astigmatism is now high enough to make it so that I can't see squat in standard lenses. My myopia (nearsightedness)has also gotten worse, hooray.. not. So yeah, Alex is getting new glasses and contacts. There is always a chance my sight could change back again, but for now I just can't see out of my current Rx so we'll deal with the change (if it happens at all)when it happens. *sigh*

All together now!

Happy Last-Lupron-Shot Day to me!
Happy Last-Lupron-Shot-Day to me!
Happy Last-Lupron-Shot-Day to Alex!
Happy Last-Lupron-Shot-Day to meeeeeeee!
And may I never need moooooooooooooooore!!!


Woohoo, I made it! I survived! Thanks to all that have been so supportive during this crazy time of hotflashes, moodswings, hairloss, short-term memory loss, grumpiness due to migraines, and oh the insomnia... You guys the are the best! Especially Ben, he had to put up with this day in and day out for the past 6 months, you're my hero baby! :)

Single digits are GREAT!

Look at my ticker! I am officially down to single digits on DAYS left until my last shot, hooray! I'm SO excited!!!

That is all, just had to point that out and do a little happy dance! ;)

Where's Jasper Hale when you need him?

Each Lupron shot is usually followed by a week or two of almost constant migraines. This makes for a grumpy Alex, but I can usually keep a professional demeanor at work, migraine or not. However, today my "patience of a saint" (as my co-wrokers like to call it) snapped. A very rude patient was really nasty to me and made some not-so-nice comments (the kind that make you feel really stupid and degraded) that coupled with my splitting headache and nausea made me crack. She actually made me cry! We were so busy and hectic that I didn't have time for a full blown breakdown, but never in the year that I've worked there have I wanted to whack someone upside the head SO bad as I did today. I was a bit embarrassed by the fact that she actually got to me so bad that I cried, but I'm just going to chalk it up to the Lupron and migraine. I just had to take a few deep breaths and go on about my business. I'm feeling better now, but boy... she really pushed my buttons. Grrr... Too bad I didn't have Jasper around to take control of the situation! ;)

For those of you that have no idea who Jasper Hale is or why that picture is hillarious... well, sorry, not going to tell you. Go read Twilight!!!

5 down, 1 more to go!

Today I got my 5th Lupron shot which means I'm officially down to my LAST one next month, wooooooooooooohoooooooooooooooo!!!
My ticker is even excited for me, apparently, because it's changed from a monthly countdown to one in DAYS!

That's all. :)

4 down, 2 to go!

Today I went in and got my 4th Lupron shot, yipee! I'm starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel now! The first 2 weeks after each shot are always the hardest (insomnia-wise especially) so I'm a bit weary about tonight, but we'll see. Let's hope my little green pills continue to work!

New Moon update:

WEREWOLVES? Oh come ON now... If I were Bella I'd just check myself into the nearest psychiatric ward and beg them to drug me up and make me forget everything... *sigh* THIS is why you NEVER ever move to little podunk towns, sheesh...

Off I go to continue plowing through this...

Sleep = Happy Alex :)

So last Sunday I finally crumbled. While trying to get up to get ready for church I completely LOST it and had a HUGE meltdown! I was tired of living on 2 hours of sleep day after day after day and it finally just caught up with me and I exploded! Poor Ben... I cried for what seemed like hours, feeling like the world was just going to crumble to bits, everything seemd SO hopeless, and I was sure I was just going to die, LOL! (Yes, 3 months of little to no sleep sure does make me a bit mellodramatic!) Ben helped calm me down, went to church and informed Bishop, and then came home and made me call Dr.Goff to tell him what was going on. I had been resisting this b/c I was afraid of being put on Ambien for so long. But clearly something HAD to be done... I just couldn't go on like this. So I called and my doctor prescribed me something else (woohoo!) that is non-addictive and doesn't have all the crazy side effects Ambien seems to have on people. I got a blessing from Bishop and Ben and then was told by Bishop that I was to take a few days off of teaching Seminary until I was well-rested.
Now here I am almost a week later, and boy do I feel SO much better! I love my little green pills! I am still waking up a lot at night, but I can now just roll over and go back to sleep! The world is a much happier place for me now and everyone has been commenting on how different I seem. Its amazing what a little sleep can do for you, lol. Now I can make it through the 2nd 1/2 of my Lupron treatment, phew!

How sleep deprivation affects Alex

The other morning (Friday,I believe?)after a particularly sleepless and frustrating night (see previous post) in which I got maybe 2 hours of sleep, was elbowed in the face by Ben and then had to listen to Sirius puking all night (now that its spring he likes to eat grass and make himself sick)I sat up in bed at 5am and threw a hissy fit. Ben has no recollection of this, but I pretty much reverted to being 2 again and sat there crying, pounding my fists, and kicking my feet. I did NOT want to get up and go teach Seminary. That is how tired I was... Just now I found this video on YouTube and just about pee'd my pants. This is almost exactly what I did.

I......need.....SLEEP....zzzz....zzzz...zzzz....

Since I got my 3rd shot on Tuesday I have gotten *maybe* 2 hours of sleep per night. I am teetering on the verge of insomnia-induced insanity. Cherry Coke has been the only thing keeping me awake at work this week and I am paying for it dearly, as caffeine is one of the worst things for Endo and causes a lot of pain. I'm in a catch-22... stay awake and not get fired or no pain? Hmm.... I don't know how I will survive the next 6 weeks of Seminary, but I guess I will have to. I can't give up on my kids now, you know? Maybe I'll have to take my doctor up on the whole Ambien thing... Its probably time, now that I'm starting to forget whole chunks of my day and can carry on conversations with someone and have little to no recollection of it mere minutes later. Probably not a good sign, huh?

Happy "Half-Way-Done Day" To Me!!!

Today I got my 3rd Lupron shot, WOOHOO!!! That means 3 down, 3 more to go... I am half way there!!! I was talking to my nurse today and she commented on how well I was taking this treatment. I laughed and told her thats because she doesn't have to put up with me 24/7, especially late at night (when I'm a grump) and early the next morning (when I'm an even bigger grump!)Poor Ben... he's such a saint for not having strangled me by now, heehee. This insomnia is definitely not bringing out the best in me, but I'm trying REALLY hard to stay away from the Rx sleeping pills (Ambien)because no matter how much they say its not habit forming, I just don't trust that... Seminary will be over here in about 6 weeks or so, which means I'll get to sleep in 2 more hours every day. If I can just hang on a little longer I'll be good to go... I think... I hope? :P Wish me luck peoples!

WOOHOO!

I got my 2nd Lupron shot yesterday, so 2 down, 4 more to go!!! (See my pretty ticker?Heehee) Next month I get to say I'm 1/2 way done, yippy! So far, so good. I have to say that other than my insomnia problems, I really am not having as bad of a time as I thought I would. I know its still relatively early in my treatment and things *could* get worse, but for right now I'll take it! Now if only I could manage to squeeze in a couple of more hours of sleep every night... This whole running on 3-4 is just not cutting it. zzzzzzzzz.......zzzzzzzzzzzz..........zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz....

Just when I was starting to forget...

... about how nasty Lupron can be to my body, I get this phonecall today from the Oncologist at my specialty/mail-order pharmacy. She was wanting to set up my next month's dose and shipment, but first has to remind me and make *sure* I understood the ramifications of this drug. Pretty much five minutes of "Are you aware this is posion they'll be injecting you with and that you can suffer various undesirable side effects such as: (insert looooooooooong list)?" I do believe I'll receive this same phonecall month after month, because I had to listen to the same shpeal last time too. I know they're just doing their job, but I almost wanted to say, "Um yeah- I get it... My hair is falling out, I can't sleep at night, I have become uncomfortably familiar with what my menopausal family members/friends call 'personal summers', and I'm sure with each coming month I'll become aqcuainted with all the other side effects! Please, don't rub it in..." Oh wells, c'est la vie!

It has begun

So I'm a week out from my first shot, and without a shadow of a doubt... yes, I've started feeling some of those nasty side effects. Yesterday I was at work and all of a sudden I was on fire. My co-worker said I turned beet red (and ya'll know I do not turn red easily... I was apparently born without the ability to blush or even look a bit flushed?) and while I couldn't see myself right then and there, I sure did feel like I had smoke bellowing out of my ears! I'm quickly learning that dressing in layers is a must and that having a freezer nearby (you know, to stick your head in!) comes in handy! :)
Other than that, it hasn't been too bad. Headaches and knee pain have popped up a few times this past week, but nothing unbearable. Probably what bugs me the most is not being able to sleep very well... Every morning I wake up around 4am and no matter how hard I try, I cannot fall asleep again! This really stinks since I have to get up at 5am every day to go teach Seminary... that last precious hour that could be spent sleeping just taunts me... grrr...

Loopy on Lupron- Month 1

I received my first Lupron shot yesterday... It was all a bit anti-climatic after all the hoops I had to jump through just to get the darn medicine in the first place! It took almost a month to get it approved and mailed to my doctor, but yesterday was the BIG day, finally. I went up there on my lunch break and my nurse gave it to me and it was all over in like 5 seconds. I'm not sure when all the crazy side effects are supposed to start, but I *think* I may have had my first bout with the hot-flashes/nightsweats last night... I wasn't able to sleep very much and kept waking up super hot... then falling asleep and waking up cold... then hot... then cold... etc. I even had a dream that I was in some building that was filling up with lava (no clue where it was coming from) and when I got to the roof, it was raining super hot mud outside! I was trapped and about to burn alive when I woke up... drenched in sweat. Nice, huh? We'll see what this month brings... I'll be sure to keep you all updated on my crazy happenings.
Oh, and on the positive note... I got permission last night to stay on my Metformin throughout my Lupron shots. Why is this so great? Well... I put on 20+ lbs while on all of my lovely fertility drugs and was having a REALLY hard time losing weight. After my surgery I was put on the Metformin and was able to lose it all, yippy!!! Some women have been known to gain like 50 lbs on Lupron ( YIKES!!!) and when I heard that I just about died... hopefully the Metformin will keep me from blowing up, I really like being able to squeeze back into the wardrobe I haven't been able to wear for over a year! :)