Back to Glandular Fever 2001

So far so good today. Managed to produce an exploratory scatterplot (as much as I despise statistics - sadistics)! But my left arm feels a bit numb and tingly today. I feel soooooooo exhausted. Time for a rest today and it is a gorgeous sunny day.

I want to go an buy cards for Morva and Wendy at Emergency Psych Services (EPA) who helped me get through that awful crisis day where I couldn't feel my pulse, I was dying - yet I couldn't sit still - racing around the room - pawing at myself - 'get it out - get it out'. I want to do something really special for ***** too but it might take a while to think of something unique and extra special.

Despite being knackered according to ***** I am 200% better than Monday already!

22nd Sept 2001

Oh boy bad morning. I'm shaking, my head spinning and burning. I feel faint - I'm going to pass out. Ok, ok I've been through this before and came out of it ok. I feel better if I sit still on my bed with my legs crossed and my head in my hands.

I'm so upset - I thought I was doing so well. What if I faint and don't wake up? I need to be able to go back to work, to study - Oh God...I have so much to do, but no strength. I feel like there is no end to this - please stop - I have a life to live.

Had a cup of coffee - first in over a week - maybe that wasn't such a good idea.

I had a sleep for two hours - woke up tired but made a start on an assignment. I've been told...no ordered not to. Regretfully I agree.

Don't feel good at all today.

• I'm choking
• I'm hot
• Limbs feel numb

All this and I'm lying in bed in partial sun. I'm really scared.

My doctor has told me that with glandular fever (GF) I have to decide on each day if it is a good day or not and pace myself according to that.

I keep thinking about Angela D'Audney's brain tumour and how she would have been dead with 10 days if it hadn't been found. I guess I don't have any neurological symptoms (not really convinced that I don't).

Glandular Fever
Ghastly
Lethargic
Angry
Neurosis
Debilitating
Unable
Languid
Afraid
Restless

Fucked
Exhausted
Vicious
Emaciated (went from 62 to 55 kg with two weeks)
Rampant

***** has gone to the rugby and now I am scared I will pass out and die while he's out. This is stupid, I don't feel that much different to other times and I've coped (just) the last couple of days at home alone.

Please please help me I'm beyond scared. So fatigued but cannot rest.

Arrrgggghhhhh nervous poohs. Have had a big cry - feel a bit better after loo and cry.

Sunday 23rd Sept 2001

So far so good...oaty pancakes with grilled banana for breakfast. Feeling ok....just weary. Just another day of rest (after all it is Sunday) and I'll be fine.

Exams are less than a month away and I have missed most of the lectures. I'm getting really worried about this because I like to do exceptionally well. The expectations I put on myself are probably part of the reason I've ended up like this anyway.

Went up to the Gardens in the car (***** driving) to see the birds at the Aviary - something I still enjoy. I like spending time up there. A couple of the parrots are quite cheeky. very very tired after the visit.

Had 2.5 hr nap in the afternoon. Feeling OK.

8.30 pm - uh oh....feel funny again. Became aware of heavy head and strain to watch TV. Felt urge to go to the toilet in a hurry. Burning scalp.....thinking abt neurological diseases again. I want a scan to make sure my brain is structurally ok.

IT IS JUST GLANDULAR FEVER - but how long will it go on for? OH FOR A NICE CLEAR HEAD.

Felt lightheaded and nauseous before bed. Feel scared about the sensations of my body. I'm not convinced I'm not dying :(   Oh boy - I have to stop this. I'm ok....just exhausted. The heavy muzzy foggy light head or whatever it is makes me feel like I might lose consciousness and not wake up. Sometimes I get scared that I might have a seizure and that the GF itself is doing neurological damage. Sigh

Oh no...its happening again. I keep needing to put my hands up to my head. I don't want to turn out the light to go to sleep. Shaky.

Concentrate on breathing - its shallow - I must be hyperventilating. Had a bit of a cry - feel like my body is shutting down; not functioning properly. Got to try and relax - easier said than done! Feel hot and shaky, really scared - please please make it stop. Must sleep....at least I can't feel any of the distressing sensations when I'm asleep......

Friday 21st October 2011

Skip forward in time to today.

Today is not such a good day. I had a diagnostic laparoscopy 5 weeks ago and I'm still uncomfortable. Is this to be expected? My abdomen feels tight and I have vague pains near by umbilical incision. In fact I can squeeze pus out of the incision and can see a stitch poking out! Presumably it takes a while for absorbable sutures to dissolve???!!! I read somewhere up the three months. Is that correct? I have an appointment with my new GP today to review what I'm planning to do about my depression/anxiety/agoraphobia. I'll ask then - if I'm granted enough time! I also feel like someone is trying to pull out my uterus and have pain over might right ovary area. This is where adhesions were found and divided. It is also the site of the removal of an ovarian cyst the size of a grapefruit in 1989. This old surgery is probably the cause of the formation of the adhesions. The adhesions are causing my right ovary to stick to my right fallopian tubes that is in turn adhered to my uterus - the surgeons couldn't do anything about that but they did divide the adhesions from my right ovary to bowel to right abdominal wall. I thought all the cyclical pain would end after the surgery - it hasn't....but perhaps things are still inflamed in there! Time will tell.

In the meantime I'm freaking that i have peritonitis or something and I'm about to die. My doctor's appointment is two hours away and I just can't wait that long - then there's the wait in the waiting room - torture (panic attack inducing).

It is our son's last day at preschool today - perhaps I am anxious and tied up in knots about that? I just know I am going to be so emotional - the staff have been absolutely amazing and the place is more like extended family. We can't thank them enough and are so sad that ***** has to leave to go on to primary school :(  But the time has come and we are all excited for ***** starting big boy's school :)

Perhaps it is the expectation to perform - to turn up at the preschool where I have felt giddy and panicky before. I also need to pop into work for a few hours today - also the expectation to perform - I have to help out a colleague.

I just can't do it - don't want to do it - I don't want to HAVE to do anything - I'm too tired....so tired....so exhausted - surely I'm at the limits of human endurance....


Later: Well doctor was running late - guess what....had a panic attack in the waiting room. Thought my vision was fading out. I was so agitated...surely someone must've noticed my fidgeting! I searched 'Having a panic attack in the doctor's waiting room' and found an interesting blog to occupy me until Dr ******** came out of her office. It all went well...things are progressing - psychiatrist being called to arrange prescription for new drug (Avanza), password for online CBT - 'Beating the Blues' in progress. Abdomen was palpated, seems fine. Discussed the pulling sensations, pain etc and found out that most people are only 80% healed by 6 months, that's right 6 months after abdominal surgery and that includes laparoscopy. I mentioned that I had heard two weeks - but was told 'on the outside maybe'. I have permission to pull at and cut off the suture poking out of my belly button if I wish....it won't dissolve if not exposed to my bodily fluids! And sutures CAN take up to three months to dissolve!! All very reassuring.

Later again: Psychiatrist won't prescribe Avanza - wants me to try adding nortriptyline to fluoxetine. No way.....I've read that there are major interactions between the two. Apparently that's a psychiatrist's prerogative! I'll sleep on it......or maybe I'll come right with the status quo and increased exercise and CBT.

Mental Symptoms and thoughts associated with panic attacks

These are the thoughts I have when in the grip of a panic attack - have also been documented as common experience

• I'm going to die
• terror - sense of impending doom - something unimaginably terrible is about to happen
• I'm losing control'
• This will never end
• I'm terrified, really scared
• I'm going to pass out and die
• I'm having a stroke/brain haemorrhage
• I won't be able to get out of here - I'm going to make a scene
• what is happening to me
• I'm going to throw up
• I must have a brain tumour
• I'll choke to death
• I'm going blind
• I'm going to scream, babble, talk funny
• I'm becoming paralysed
• something is really physically wrong with me
• I can't breathe
• no-one understands and no-one can help
• Nothing is real
• Racing thoughts - loud internal dialogue

Bodily Symptoms of Panic Attacks

These are the symptoms I have during a panic attack and that have been documented elsewhere

• Hot-flashes - warm all over
• tremors
• weak or rubbery knees/legs
• dry mouth
• lump in throat
• tightness in chest
• choking-smothering sensations
• nausea
• diarrhoea
• dizzy - lightheaded
• feeling of unreality as if in a dream
• poor concentration
• blurred vision - tunnel vision
• feeling of being partially paralysed
• feeling of detachment or floating away
• feeling like body is shutting down or dying
• tingling in hands, feet and face
• feeling faint
• buzzing sensation going through body
• headache
• claustrophobia

Glandular Fever Diary 2001

19th Sept

'Head felt like it was burning. Thought I might be having a stroke or haemorrhage, or maybe a brain tumour? Went and looked at my pupils in the mirror. Phew - they were even! Prior to all this I was working on the computer for an assignment. Felt like I had to go to the toilet in a hurry - sick of that. Started to write - trying to avoid taking a clonazepam. Feel a bit woozy. Don't recall what I was thinking about other than the intro for a red algae assignment!'

20th

' Yay, slept without needing to take clonazepam. Got up and showered but felt a bit shaky afterwards. Took a while to settle down after that. Scalp burning and head is heavy. Have Globus Hystericus. can't think of what triggered this. Picked up Claire Weekes 'Self help for your nerves' and read over symptoms of nervous illness again and again to reassure myself. I haven't taken a pill because I need to drive into town to do some photocopying and get a glue stick. Took 30 mg fluoxetine and had a lemon tea.

Ok...I give up, I'm taking a pill to settle me.

3pm - didn't take one. I have to accept this illness and slow down, stop fighting.

4pm - did take one. Someone came to check the roof and I can over all hot and giddy and urgent need for loo (couldn't go cos they were working right by the loo door!). Felt like I needed to call ***** straight away. I felt like I did at the Emergency Psych Services before they gave me the clonazepam. IT WENT AWAY THEN SO IT WILL GO AWAY NOW! 

I fell asleep. When I woke I was in a state of panic. Thought I'd taken too much clonazepam - but can't have only had half of a 0.5 mg pill!! Sleep probably did me good. I feel so very weak. My skin feels like it is burning - I'm nauseous. Scared again - fear of death and all that.

21st Sept

Oh boy - the dreaded morning feeling. Don't get me wrong, I'm thrilled to still be alive, but after a decent nights sleep I expect to feel 100%. Of course I find myself disappointed. Head foggy, scalp burning. I'm not enjoying being at home because this is where it all started - but I'm bedroom bound now - severe agoraphobia. Change of scene would be good. I'm going to rearrange the bedroom furniture - after all, its bead Feng Sui to have your feet poking out towards the door from your bed - symbolises being carried out in a coffin. No way I want that!!

Somehow I managed to finish my poster - life history of the Floridean seaweed: Polysiphonia. Looks pretty damn good if I might say so myself! :)

To be continued......

A bit of history

My first episode of depression probably happened when I was about 16 or 17 - although we (my family and I) never clicked on to what it was - I guess no-one gave mental illness a thought in the 80s - or didn't want to acknowledge it. My Dad had died suddenly at the age of 37 from a cerebral haemorrhage, when I was 14 and my brother, 11. I don't think I started to grieve properly until two years later. I recall walking to the bike stands and feeling unsteady, giddy - I'd never experienced the sensation before. I think things got worse from there. The dizzy-giddy sensation started to freak me out to the point where I became agoraphobic and starting skipping school. I started to get headaches and other bodily aches and pains. Soon enough school noticed and I was sent to the school counsellor - lots of crying and telling them what they wanted to hear. Lots of visits backwards and forwards to the doctor who kept telling me the regular cyclical pain I had since developed was in all likelihood constipation and irritable bowel. I could assure him I wasn't constipated. Lots of tests - barium enemas, sigmoidoscopy (great lots of gas pumped into me and no warning of the after effects - I got on a public bus only to be able to go one stop!), ultrasounds etc etc. Nothing wrong with my bowels, kidneys, liver.....soon developed a lump in my throat and excessive thirst - no diabetes and lump in throat given a name - globus hystericus.....it went away once I had a diagnosis for it!

I year or so went by and I changed GP. He suspected an ovarian cyst. I was sent to a specialist and operated on to remove a cyst the size of a grapefruit and some from my tubes. After recovery from surgery I felt great. I had been cured/fixed!!

A couple of years later and in my first year of University - started to get strange smothering sensations, felt dizzy...had to run from where ever I was. I recall sitting in a boring as hell Greek and Roman History lecture - lots of dates to remember for exams! I just had to get out of there but I was stuck in the middle of a lecture theatre row. Embarrassingly I scrambled out only to have the lecturer call out above a class of 300 or so - 'So pleased you found my lecture so interesting' Laughter. If only he knew boring brown suited arsehole! I ran outside, trying to catch my breath. What was wrong with me? cancer...I have cancer?!!

Things spiralled out of control - I gave up on University, failed to turn up for my part time job on occasion. Tried to treat myself with herbal medicine - even started training as a Naturopath. Nothing helped. Eventually, after 18 months this time, an even newer GP (I'd moved by this time) asked me to try it his way for one month and see if I felt any better. Prozac had just made its way here. There was no way I was taking an MAOI given the dietary restrictions and what my Dad had died of! OK...I said....I agreed.

One month later I was thanking him for saving my life and things stayed this way for almost ten years. The grey curtains had opened, I could feel the sun again, I laughed and meant it (instead of wondering why others were laughing and why I felt so unreal)- I could sit at a movie theatre and not need to sit at the end of the row to make my escape.

Things stayed this way for close to 10 years.....that is until I got Glandular Fever (mononucleosis) at the age of 30

Day one

I've struggled with depression and anxiety as long as I can remember. It takes me a year or two to get over an episode only to have the 'black dog' sneak up behind me to bite me on the bum every 7 years or so. I've decided to keep a diary of how it feels to be depressed, anxious and to have paralysing panic attacks......in the hope that I can look back one day and realise that no, these strange symptoms are not indicators of my impending death....and also in the hope that others may recognise themselves and become well.