My arms begin to resemble those of an inept addict

[drwex]

Yes, it's more health stuff. Skip away - I shan't be offended.


I knew I was pushing myself with the amount of social I did on Sunday. But the lure of a fabulous event celebrating the start of a new phase of life for two wonderful people was worth it. So I tired myself out and I ate a bunch of things that weren't well-considered. Or maybe it was just coincidence. No regrets, anyway.

This one started like the others, with an early AM (3:30) wake-up, bathroom trip and general badness. I decided I wasn't going to wait around for this to get out of hand, so I took Benadryl straight off, then lay in bed feeling the drug and my body battling it out while my various thought processes raced around in differing degrees of panic.

After about an hour I passed out. Woke up more or less normal time very groggy and disoriented. Benadryl does that to me. So do these "episodes." Choose your cause.

After a lot of brainless waffling I decided that it made as much sense to go in to work as to sit around at home, so I headed to the office. I called my doc after dropping K off and told the secretary I needed to talk with him.



Lahey how do I loathe thee? Let me count the ways:
1. Telling me my doc will be in after 10 AM and he'll call then when in fact you know he won't do callbacks until after 1 PM.
2. A complete and total lack of ability to spell my last name. Despite repeatedly having it spelled to you. For godssakes people, I know it's an unusual name, but it's only nine frelling letters. Combinatorial and repeated f-ups of the name don't amuse me, especially when you're trying to look things up by a name you can't spell. No shit you're not finding the records for "Adam Greenblat" whoever he might be.
3. A communication system that seems to consist entirely of writing paper notes that get dropped on peoples' desks with no follow-up to see if they've been read. Left hand has no clue what right hand is doing.

The latest instance of this involves a failure to communicate to me that I do not need paperwork to go in for the blood test (the lab knows I'm coming and how much blood to draw and what to send it out for testing of) but I do need paperwork for the stool samples. Getting that latter involves me on Monday with all the lack of sleep and cramps and fatigue standing glowering at no fewer than three separate departments (the reception desk != the doctor's secretary != the nursing station) all of whom were supposed to communicate about getting these tests set up.

Eventually I glower enough at the desk that they walk me back to the secretary at whom I glower enough until she walks me to the nurse's station, who have no clue what she's asking about and SHE glowers at them until they hand her a massive paper filing book in which she's able to discover that they've misfiled the piece of paper that would have told them what to do to get me what I need. I neglect to mention that if she'd done more than just toss the paper on their overcluttered desk and walk away we might not be standing around staring frostily at each other.



The last set of tests all came back negative. The next round is more blood work testing for celiac disease, my doctor's theory based on something he saw in the abdominal X ray series, and stool samples testing for cryptosporidium or other parasitic infection, my latest shot-in-the-dark. Neither my doc nor I believe the other's theory, and he absolutely disbelieves my secondary theory, which is that I've got some kind of mold infection. I realize that latter is a complete wild-ass guess, but I am allergic to dietary molds in general (beer, soft cheeses, some wines) and histamine reactions aren't listed in the celiac symptomatology.

I find myself reciting Holmes's dictum that when you have eliminated the impossible whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.

On the plus side he's trying to get me an appointment with a GI specialist and isn't happy with the "in a few months" answer he got to his first request. If the current round of tests comes up negative he says he'll use that as leverage, basically saying "we've run out of options - take a look at this NOW."

Comments

[rdhdsnippet.livejournal.com]

Ugh. Good luck! :( I hope you're at least feeling a little bit better.

[drwex]

Yeah, it's a definitely setback from this past Fri/Sat when I was feeling almost normal. But I consider the avoiding-another-trip-to-the-ER to be a win.

[hlmt.livejournal.com]

Poor the you. =( *hugs*

[drwex]

Thanks babe.

[mud-puppy.livejournal.com]

Sorry your having such a rough time of it lately *hug* I've had my own saga of GI issues for years that were eventually labeled Irritable Bowl Sydrome by my PCP. I saw a bunch of different doctors, including a GI doc, all of which told me the same thing, IBS.

A friend of Matt's who went through similar issued suggested I see an allergy doc at the Marino Center, Dr. Alex Bingham. His theory is that otherwise healthy adults can suffer chronic candidiasis primarily caused by diet. OH, and candidiasis can be tested for, but most labs don't do the kind of special testing required. A disclaimer though, most of the medical establishment doesn't agree with Dr. Bingham on this, so he's in the minority and considered on the fringes.

Anyways, to make a long story short I went through a crazy elimination diet about two years ago and lost 45lbs in the process! I also went through what I can only describe as withdrawal symptoms, full body aches, nausea, diarrhea, headaches, etc., for about a week and eventually came out the other side feeling great! It meant cutting out processed sugar, wheat, soy, egg, dairy fermented foods, basically anything with mold.

I discovered that wheat (although I'm not a celiac), soy and especially processed sugars were causing me all or most of the IBS symptoms of years past. When I don't eat those foods, I'm essentially IBS-free.

Anyways, this may not apply to your situation, but since you mentioned your theory of dietary mold allergies, I thought it might be helpful. I highly recommend Dr. Bingham! If you think it might be allergies he might be worth a try.

I hope you figure it out soon!

[drwex]

Yeah, allergist is #2 on my list after GI guy to go see. The key concern is that there are a number of things that can trigger severe histamine reactions but that aren't allergies. I don't want to be treating the symptoms unless I know there's no other root cause.

My brother had IBS and at one point his diet was down to steak and jell-o. Seriously. So I'm familiar with what I might have to do.

[sykotropic.livejournal.com]

I too had multiple histamine reactions and some IBS symptoms. After a similar elimination diet I narrowed my allergies down to wheat, egg whites, dairy and mold (which lucky usually ties in with the dairy so its easy to avoid). If you have any access to doctors who practice integrated medicine I would highly recommend using them. If not, I'd be happy to ask our docs for recs in your area. I would offer one caveat when it comes to allergists--make sure they are open to holistic practices. Otherwise they push a lot of meds.

By adjusting my diet and adding 1-2grams of Omega 3s to my diet daily I am asthma free (no steroids for 5+ years) and have no other symptoms when I stick to my diet, which sounds hard to do but isn't if you don't eat processed foods.

[taura-g.livejournal.com]

I'm sorry this has been so frustrating babe. Hopefully they will narrow it down more quickly.

[ariesd.livejournal.com]

On the plus side he's trying to get me an appointment with a GI specialist and isn't happy with the "in a few months" answer he got to his first request.

In what world is that acceptable?

Sorry, that just has the suck written all over it.

[drwex]

In our current world of rationed "free market" healthcare. Aren't you glad we didn't get that horrible socialized medicine?

(Aside: while I was trying to browbeat the front desk into solving my problem Monday I got to watch an exchange between a nice little old couple and the appointment secretary. The gist seemed to be that they couldn't get in to see the doc they wanted until August because it was an unscheduled "general exam". The secretary plaintively explained that if the woman would have another episode of severe back pain then she could get them in to see the doc next week, but since she wasn't in extreme pain right that moment the best that could be arranged was August.)

[klingonlandlady.livejournal.com]

Yeesh! Good luck...

[cutieperson]

nothing says you have to go to the GI they recommend. i have often found it is easier to get appointments by casting a wider net, or just a net of my own, as doctors (or groups when it comes to big practices) tend to do all their referrals to one specialist. imagine how overloaded that person gets when multiple people are doing such things.

[drwex]

It's true, and I don't have a problem with going over my doctor's head if I feel he's not responding. But in this case I think he's sketching out a reasonable plan. I doubt they'd give ME better treatment coming from the outside than they'll give him. Doctors are like other professionals - they trade favors. If my doc wants me to see a GI specialist sooner rather than later then he probably has access to more levers than I do.

[cutieperson]

right, but my point is that, secretly, doctors rarely have those levers and even when they do they don't push them. it is the secretaries making the appointments 99% of the time, NOT the doctors. thus, making the call yourself puts *you* in contact with the human on the other end of the line who has the power to juggle schedules, slide you into a canceled slot, or suggest colleagues of the doctor who might have a more lenient schedule.

and i would have to agree with the person above that it does not sound at all reasonable to wait three months to figure out something that is affecting you this much if there is any way of avoiding it.

[donnad.livejournal.com]

Oh man, sounds horrible.
It certainly sounds like something you may be eating. Try keeping a food diary, write down everything you eat, down to the last jelly bean. And keep track of any symptoms you may have. After two or three instances, compare the diet on the days you were ill. I had to do this to figure out my migraine triggers a while back and more recently again to figure out what was triggering some of my GI issues. Turns out I have sensitivities to durum and soy.

I will say, with my GI issues the doctors were at a loss too. So I did a little research and started the food diary. Now I just avoid the things that I have bad reactions to.

Good Luck, hope youare feeling better soon.

[mrw42.livejournal.com]

I know that this is absolutely none of my business, and I am not a doctor, nor do I play one on TV...

But, has your doctor checked your gallbladder? I know two different people who were forced to suffer bizarre digestive symptoms for months before they were finally diagnosed with gallbladder problems. I don't think that would explain the histamine reaction, though...

Good luck with this. I know it must be extremely frustrating that they can't figure out what is happening.

[drwex]

Yes, gall bladder was actually one of the first things checked, especially since I'm at about the same age as my father when he had his gall bladder removed. Both the CT and X rays showed clean on the gall bladder.

[sweetmmeblue.livejournal.com]

And the blood test for it showed normal levels as well.

[drwex]

I can ask my doc but I don't think they did a blood test for that. They did a bunch of blood tests for liver function.

[kjc007.livejournal.com]

Just another point of info.

I and at least 3 other people got diarrhea from Sunday's potluck.

I have IBS (or something; I don't have the energy to figure out what exactly) and am prone to diarrhea, but Monday's event was clearly something considerably more extreme and short-term.

[sweetmmeblue.livejournal.com]

Hrm, might be interesting to figure out what you ate. The flaw in blaming Sunday's potluck is that he and I shared all the food on his plate except for one. If it was that one then we might have a trigger.

[drwex]

Maybe. Or as kjc points out it might have been something that only affected people who are prone to such things. Thanks for the info - that's a good data point to have!

[sweetmmeblue.livejournal.com]

The suggestion of us trying to reach the GI specialist ourselves might not be bad. If you can get me the name and number see if I can do that voodoo that I do so well on them.

[drwex]

I've got the name and number on that random appointment paper that showed up. I'll call them and see what other info I can get about this guy/appt.

[mrf-arch.livejournal.com]

Ugh. I'm sorry this thing keeps coming back to haunt you.