Happy fun day of medical goodness!
2002-Oct-10, Thursday 10:28 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ssurgulWow. Who knew one person could possibly have so very much fun at two Dr.'s visits on the same afternoon!
Allergist went well enough. Got shot in both arms, yet again (4 1/2 months of this shit down, another 5.5+ years to go! Yay!) and this time at least had minimal reactions on both sides. Next escalation in dosing. Only another 4-6 months to go to hit maintenance dose and it becomes once a month. Wow, and to think I almost gave up last week when Dr. Mengala's assistant managed to hit the nerve cluster on my left arm, and actually put it to sleep for about 15 minutes.
Then came Dr. Dopp, my all time favorite GP. He's so cool. He actually has a pay-as-you-can program, to ensure you can continue healthcare without insurance. That will likely become rather important in the coming months. I managed to develop a series of small, odd, pinkish-brownish growths along the right side of my groin. They look kind of like moles, kind of not. Fearing the worst, and having been exposed to warts, I had cut off all sexual contact directly until I found out what they were. "They're not like any warts or even VD I've seen...." quoth the Dr. Well, that's a relief. "When in doubt, freeze 'em!" What a relief, part 2, I thought. Can I say that putting liquid nitrogen that close to one's genitals is definitely an experience? Imagine those nice needles they inject the allergens into your arm with randomly poking your groin for the next few hours as the skin dies and is reborn, and the mole-things start the healing process.
Possible causes for the growths: a very odd seeming genital wart reaction. Possible but unlikely. (Only known exposore to such was prior to outbreak and warts are typically virulent primarily with overt symptoms. Also, hadn't played sexually with that person for far more than standard gestation period). An extension of the curious rash that gets my hands from time to time. More probable but unknown. A symptom of stress. Possible, perhaps very much so, but difficult to diagnose until stress is removed -- Hooray for end of November! Bacterial infection of hair folicle. Possible but unknown likelihood. The freezing treatment will probably treat all these. But even if it doesn't, he also gave me a nifty topical cream.
Finally, to add to my growing pharmacy at home, I ended up getting some new and exciting anti-depressants. For those that don't know, my last experience with Rx grade anti-depressants didn't turn out very well at all. He gave me up to a 12 week supply of Celexa, another SSRI. There goes my 5-HTP sleeping pills -- don't really feel like running the risk of seratonin toxicity and all. Hopefully, since I'm starting at the lowest dose for now, I'll be able to more readily evaluate the effects, and see if even this 'small' dose (10mg) is effective in at least offsetting some of the effects. Time will tell.
Oh, yeah, and on a happier, more cheerful note, Red Dragon is truly fucking amazing. Seen it multiple times, and the Red Dragon just keeps getting cooler. ;)
Allergist went well enough. Got shot in both arms, yet again (4 1/2 months of this shit down, another 5.5+ years to go! Yay!) and this time at least had minimal reactions on both sides. Next escalation in dosing. Only another 4-6 months to go to hit maintenance dose and it becomes once a month. Wow, and to think I almost gave up last week when Dr. Mengala's assistant managed to hit the nerve cluster on my left arm, and actually put it to sleep for about 15 minutes.
Then came Dr. Dopp, my all time favorite GP. He's so cool. He actually has a pay-as-you-can program, to ensure you can continue healthcare without insurance. That will likely become rather important in the coming months. I managed to develop a series of small, odd, pinkish-brownish growths along the right side of my groin. They look kind of like moles, kind of not. Fearing the worst, and having been exposed to warts, I had cut off all sexual contact directly until I found out what they were. "They're not like any warts or even VD I've seen...." quoth the Dr. Well, that's a relief. "When in doubt, freeze 'em!" What a relief, part 2, I thought. Can I say that putting liquid nitrogen that close to one's genitals is definitely an experience? Imagine those nice needles they inject the allergens into your arm with randomly poking your groin for the next few hours as the skin dies and is reborn, and the mole-things start the healing process.
Possible causes for the growths: a very odd seeming genital wart reaction. Possible but unlikely. (Only known exposore to such was prior to outbreak and warts are typically virulent primarily with overt symptoms. Also, hadn't played sexually with that person for far more than standard gestation period). An extension of the curious rash that gets my hands from time to time. More probable but unknown. A symptom of stress. Possible, perhaps very much so, but difficult to diagnose until stress is removed -- Hooray for end of November! Bacterial infection of hair folicle. Possible but unknown likelihood. The freezing treatment will probably treat all these. But even if it doesn't, he also gave me a nifty topical cream.
Finally, to add to my growing pharmacy at home, I ended up getting some new and exciting anti-depressants. For those that don't know, my last experience with Rx grade anti-depressants didn't turn out very well at all. He gave me up to a 12 week supply of Celexa, another SSRI. There goes my 5-HTP sleeping pills -- don't really feel like running the risk of seratonin toxicity and all. Hopefully, since I'm starting at the lowest dose for now, I'll be able to more readily evaluate the effects, and see if even this 'small' dose (10mg) is effective in at least offsetting some of the effects. Time will tell.
Oh, yeah, and on a happier, more cheerful note, Red Dragon is truly fucking amazing. Seen it multiple times, and the Red Dragon just keeps getting cooler. ;)
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antidepressants...
on 2002-Oct-11, Friday 10:03 am (UTC)What are you doing about the 'therapy' side of the equation? (You remember what happened the last time a doctor gave you an antidepressant without giving you any kind of support -- I may be annoyed with you on some levels, but I certainly don't want to see you get suicidal... and since this is one of the things that I felt you would most benefit from, it would make no sense for me to be anything other than encouraging.)
Be well.