(no subject)
Tuesday, June 19th, 2007 08:36 amWhen you've spent the last seventeen years dealing with health issues you have no "objective" confirmation of--no abnormal tests to point to, no grossly misplaced body parts, in short, no way to convince any determined doubters that the problems you're describing are not entirely imaginary--it is oddly comforting when you finally get a diagnosis that comes with some clear, objective abnormality. While I'm not one of the many fibromyalgia patients who constantly say "I wish I had cancer so people would take me seriously for a change!" I do understand the feeling. So yesterday after seeing a doctor who gave me what was by that point one of the least-unexpected diagnoses I've ever gotten, I was almost cheerful on the long bus ride home. The fact that the bus was nicely air-conditioned probably helped, too.
Unfortunately, looking up info about the prescription drug my doctor wanted to try first as well as various other therapies available made me somewhat less cheerful. I know that not everyone develops the popular side effects for each drug. Come to think of it, at least one drug in the class is one I took in the early '90s with no noticeably bad effects (or noticeable benefits, for that matter). Still, I grew tired of the pharmacological trial-and-error games years ago and am not looking forward to playing them again this year. Oh well.
So anyway, the EEG earlier this month confirmed that my brain keeps doing things it shouldn't. My new diagnosis: seizure disorder (a.k.a. epilepsy). Though the preliminary report on this month's test doesn't make it clear (to me, at least) where all the abnormal activity was, the report from last year states that the majority of those spikes were in the left temporal area--and what I've heard about temporal lobe epilepsy does explain some things rather too well. On the plus side, my nice, normal MRI indicates that there's no structural damage, so there are at least some things I don't have to be concerned about.
Still no idea why I've got this abdominal pain going on, though. That's actually got me more disturbed than anything else does at the moment. Well, that and my continued lack of air-conditioning now that summer is attacking in full force. I'd like to place an order for cool, breathable air, please.
Unfortunately, looking up info about the prescription drug my doctor wanted to try first as well as various other therapies available made me somewhat less cheerful. I know that not everyone develops the popular side effects for each drug. Come to think of it, at least one drug in the class is one I took in the early '90s with no noticeably bad effects (or noticeable benefits, for that matter). Still, I grew tired of the pharmacological trial-and-error games years ago and am not looking forward to playing them again this year. Oh well.
So anyway, the EEG earlier this month confirmed that my brain keeps doing things it shouldn't. My new diagnosis: seizure disorder (a.k.a. epilepsy). Though the preliminary report on this month's test doesn't make it clear (to me, at least) where all the abnormal activity was, the report from last year states that the majority of those spikes were in the left temporal area--and what I've heard about temporal lobe epilepsy does explain some things rather too well. On the plus side, my nice, normal MRI indicates that there's no structural damage, so there are at least some things I don't have to be concerned about.
Still no idea why I've got this abdominal pain going on, though. That's actually got me more disturbed than anything else does at the moment. Well, that and my continued lack of air-conditioning now that summer is attacking in full force. I'd like to place an order for cool, breathable air, please.
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