I kind of wrote about this yesterday, but it was buried at the end of a very long post and I have therapy today so it needs to be written about. My medical team, (which includes my psych), think that my antidepressant might be the cause of my chronic relapsing pancreatitis. On one hand, this is excellent news. I mean, if it’s true and I can stop the pancreatic flares then I wouldn’t be in the hospital every month and nauseated all of the time. Quality of life. On the other hand, I’ve been stable on my current meds since I started on that antidepressant. I’ve literally tried ten or fifteen of ..read more

I normally do not write album reviews so this will not really be one of those. I just listened to part of Taylor Swift’s new album and I’m so excited. She really experimented with the “wall of sound” thing and it’s pretty amazing. I dig it. I also love how she was able to throw all of her feelings on to it. She didn’t really give interviews or show how she was feeling about her breakup. She just put it in her music. Amazing. She really is an amazing lyricist, even if there are people who don’t enjoy the style of her music. Image from Pexels ..read more

Please excuse the broken clock and the ugly 1990’s wallpaper border on the kitchen walls. No one has any energy to fix these things. Behind me is the doorway to the infamous basement stairs. Notice how it’s closed and dead bolted. Mom won’t be falling down those again soon… Meanwhile, I had to take my friend to the emergency room this morning for her headache that won’t let up. Personally, I think her neurologist is useless. He wrote her a prescription for some steroids and ordered some scans and is available in August. Really? August? I asked my friend to get a referral to the better health ..read more

I am so thankful for my friend who has been staying here and for my family. I am so sick today. My friend has a headache that will not quit. She has been in the emergency room twice for it. She talked to her neurologist today and he put her on some steroids, so I’m praying that they help. If they don’t, I’m taking her back to the emergency room if I have to do it kicking and screaming… I don’t know how she is mustering the energy to brown the hamburger for sloppy Joe’s, but honestly I feel as though I’m about to throw up despite three rounds of anti nausea medications, so I couldn’t do it. My ..read more

Describe a decision you made in the past that helped you learn or grow. I’ve had bipolar disorder for a long time. Decades. It wasn’t until the past, maybe five years, that I started working on being the boss of it instead of the victim, though. What I mean is that for most of those decades, I spent a lot of time swirling in a tornado of emotions and circumstances that I felt like I could not control. It was terrible. I talked to therapists. It never seemed to help. Finally, someone came into my life that pointed out that I wasn’t participating in evidence based therapy. I needed CBT. I nee ..read more

What place in the world do you never want to visit? Why? I thought long and hard about this one. There are places I would love to go, and places I would hesitate before going to, but probably nowhere I would never go. I am an adventurer at heart. I might want a security team or a research team or something like that depending on where I’m going, but I would probably still go. I suppose the only thing that might stop me is somewhere like North Korea where my tourism dollars would go to prop up a regime with a horrific human rights record. There’s literally nothing I could do to help the peop ..read more

I didn’t make it hard. I am in the hospital again with pancreatitis. For real. Stress and lack of sleep seem to be the culprit this time. I am not sure how to get better from that to be honest. I feel soooooooo guilty for being sick, though. My friend has been washing stuff at my house so I would have some clean clothes to change into. I know I should have been capable, but I was honestly so overwhelmed and exhausted I couldn’t get to it. She was at the emergency room yesterday at the same time I was though because her headache was not improving… It’s such a cluster ..read more

What is your favorite restaurant? I’ll be honest. I’m not really a princess when it comes to dining. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy fine dining as much as the next person, but I do not enjoy the check. My personal favorite places to eat are little “dive bars” as we call them in the U.S. These places can usually be found on main streets of small towns. Dusty old drinking establishments that have been around since the dawn of time. They usually have a tiny kitchen that tosses out basic things like hamburgers and fried things. Usually, those hamburgers are amazing. The conversation with the local ..read more

I got 14 hours of sleep! It’s some kind of miracle! I talked to my psych yesterday about how things have been at my house and how I haven’t been sleeping. She agreed that I needed sleep and prescribed me something on a short term basis to help me relax at night to help me get to sleep. It’s not like a hypnotic because I don’t do well with those, but just an anti anxiety thing. It sort of worked, in fairness, because I was still basically hysterical from lack of sleep by the time I crashed, but whatever. I stayed asleep and slept. I’m so grateful to my friend who got up early this morning with ..read more

What are 5 everyday things that bring you happiness? Things that are making me happy today: 1) I woke up and got coffee with my friend who is staying to help my family. She’s doing much better today emotionally and physically so I’m grateful for that. A day and a half of rest really helped her. 2) I have a psych appointment today and I can talk to her about my meds that might be causing pancreatic flares and also about helping me through this acute stress time. 3) I also have therapy again today! Yay! I’m always happy to see my therapist and process things with her. Things have been so stre ..read more