Hello Again!

 Well, hello! 

I bet most of you thought that maybe I'd given up blogging. I'd only made a few posts this year and haven't done so in something like four months, so I would see how people would think that.

Truth is, I have thought  about giving up blogging, due to a few different factors. One being that it doesn't seem to be very popular anymore, so when I do put in the effort to publish something it's often not read by very many people. The second reason is what I mostly wanted to talk about today. Chronic Illness. 

When I began blogging something like 15 years ago it was about autism, mainly about my two autistic kids. They have now almost grown up and like them I have grown, as well. Seems kinda weird to talk about their lives through a blog when they're 18 and 16. It's an invasion of their privacy as well as an unethical form of voyeurism, imo. I had thought about this awhile ago and began to scale back the amount of info I shared about them online in a public forum. Maybe I should never have been so open about their lives to begin with? I don't know. Probably not, but hindsight is 20/20. When we know better we can do better. The best any of us can do is adjust our behavior to the knowledge we continually seek, refusing to stay uninformed and ignorant about how we affect others and they affect us.

Besides, the last ten years or so I have moved to speaking out about my own autism, and how I view the world through the unique being that I am. This took up quite a  lot of the space in the blog, until I began to feel I had almost run out information to share on the topic. 

Then, I opened up the scope of focus to include introversion as well. As I aged and learned more about myself I felt that being an introvert has been a very large part of who I am,  almost as much as the autism. I felt the need to further explore what being an introvert means to me and how it has impacted my life. I wanted to connect with a wider community than just the neurodiverse,  so I changed the blog (and blog page on FB) to the current name,  replacing Inner Aspie. I'd outgrown that name, that persona in a variety of ways, so I wanted the title of my writings to reflect that. In doing so I have been very lucky to connect with many new friends that I cherish. 

Now, I am including chronic illness as a focus, or a sub-focal point (?) to the blog. This isn't entirely a new topic on here. If you've been a long time reader you probably remember some posts speaking of migraines and such. It seems that I have found out the cause of my ever growing and ever changing physical maladies that have prevented me from being able to be as active as I'd like, including things like blogging. 

I'd been to my regular physician and a neurologist these last couple of years trying to find out what is causing my symptoms and what can be done. Tests and more tests have been run. Then after a very detailed lab panel had been run and come back fine my doctor told me I have Chronic Fatigue Syndrome or Myalgic Encephalomyelitis 

I knew basically what that was, and wasn't happy to hear that diagnosis, at all. I felt my stomach sink as she told me there's not a lot that she can do  for me. I left with a printout about ME feeling a bit defeated. 

 

I'm still learning about what it is and how it applies to me. Looking back over my life now I realize that I probably have suffered from this illness on and off to varying degrees since I was 15. I'm now trying to tease apart what has been depression and what has been just flat out exhaustion and malaise, for one. There's been a lot of assumptions I've made about myself and who that I am that I have to reevaluate now. It's been a very freeing process to understand myself through this lens, letting go of shame of who I thought I was and who I admonished myself for never being. 

 

I'd love to be able to express this whole journey through writing about it here, and I plan to  as much as possible, but the amount possible is where the difficulty lies. Much of the time my head is so foggy and even thinking about putting together coherent sentences is beyond my reach. Still, it's my hope to be able to continue to blog here on the days the fog subsides and I have a tiny bit of energy to spare.  This place here is a digital representation of my soul., safe and authentic. Thanks for visiting, friend!

Managing Life with Migraines

Today was another doctor's appointment for me, in yet what has become a long, and sometimes desperate search for relief from the chronic migraines in which I suffer.

This time I went in 90% with my mind made up that I was finished with preventative meds. I wanted to remain steadfast in this stance, so I would not be persuaded in the moment, only to regret my decision on the way home as I often do. Still, I left the door cracked open so I could listen to reason, with a healthy mind frame of skepticism. I wanted to express that the current preventative med that I am taking is not helping, and the side effects were outweighing the benefits at this point, namely weight gain (which is a very touchy subject for me to begin with) and stomach pains.

And, so I did. I explained how I feel like I can't separate the side effects from my illness(s) at this point. There's no way to differentiate what is where, and I'm tired of putting my body on this roller coaster with only a small amount of relief. I asked for a pain reliever, and a break from everything else related to migraines. Long term, this may not be a good option. I'm aware of this. I just feel it is for where I am now. I can always take the doctor up on the offer for another med, or a referral to a neurologist later on.

I'm sure that there are loads of people that are in the same situation as I find myself in right now, chronically ill, and feeling like they're out of options for relief, or even a shot at living a life that they once knew. It's hard to accept

Oh My Migraines!

There has been more than one post here on this blog began recently by me only to be abandoned in the draft folder, unfinished, and gathering mental dust. I'm not one to usually start a writing project, and then move to another before finishing the first. When I do, it is usually certain death for the first piece, as I never again get my thoughts back on track to completion. I tend to forget where I was going, and it all gets derailed.

This time is different. Or, maybe it isn't in the grand scheme of finished products, but in the situation behind what is driving my haphazard writing. In the last few months I have been suffering from migraines. They seem to be be getting progressively worse to the point where I am now, which is almost always in a constant vortex of pain, nausea, and vertigo. I lose my words. My thoughts get lost in a cloudy fog of confusion. I find it difficult to complete daily tasks that need to be completed, and things like writing get put way at the end of my to do list. My ability to read, and write is so compromised at this point that being able to complete more than a few sentences with comprehension fully intact is difficult at best.

This has been exceptionally hard for me, because I am a very active person. I am fully dedicated to my fitness routines, and am always baking, cleaning, and playing with Beans. When I am not up, and moving I am mentally engaged in writing, couponing, social media, and more. I am rarely sitting still passively watching TV, or something like that, so when an illness strikes me that compromises all those things, the things that make me feel like me, I have extreme difficulty coping.