Sexuality Happens

Always Aroused Girl has been blogging a bit lately about the oh so fun game of trial and error with her pills, and I feel so much empathy for her, she doesn’t even know. I actually have to have a spreadsheet now of what pills I’ve tried for which problem, their dosage, why they didn’t work, etc…other wise, I have no idea when the doctor asks me if I’ve tried Alavil, and if so, why it didn’t work.

I take about 8 or 9 pills every morning, depending on the condition of my knees. Then 2 at lunch, and another 3 before bed. This is assuming I’m not in any intense knee pain (up it by one more pill every 4-6 hours), or having a migraine (I get 2-3 a week…then add 3 pills to start, and 1 every hour till they knock me out).

People joke with me that I’m a travelling pharmacy when they see my giant travel pill box. But I have to have it with me at all times, because I never know when something will act up. Plus, of course I keep a bottle of IBprofen in my purse, because that’s my first line of defense for my knees/hips before I add the oxycodone.

I hate it. A lot. I hate having to swallow literally a handful of pills every morning. A whole handful. If you ever meet me, you’ll be very impressed with my ability to swallow almost a dozen pills all at once. I’m like a python or something.  It takes practice. I remember having to learn to swallow pills when I was younger, and I got to practice with M and Ms. Which actually sucked, because you didn’t get the taste the chocolate.

I hate not being able to go anywhere without the clacking of my pills. Without my purse, I get nervous.  What happens if ___.

I mentioned on twitter my frustration with all the damn pills (keep in mind some are not traditional Western medicine; I take glucosamine chondrontine for my knees, and flaxseed Omega-3 for my heart and B-12 cause I’m a vegetarian), and someone said that when they felt that way, they just stopped taking them all for a few days.

While this may work for some, please note how dangerous this can be with many drugs. In college, I was on Paxil, mostly for my insommnia.  I got sick of taking it, and so in my 16 year old mind, the best option was to just stop taking it, ignoring the fact it had taken 2 weeks to ramp up to my current dose.  4 days of cold turkey and I ended up in a severe depression and tried to kill myself. PLEASE be careful with your drugs.

The point of this post? There really is none. Just me bitching about the ridiculous amount of medication I have to take on a daily basis, and to please warn people about going off any med (prescribed or OTC or natural) suddenly. Your body needs time to adjust.

I don’t need any more migraine med recommendations. I’ve gone through the list. The med my current neurologist wants to put me on has been refused by my insurance (like my allergy medication), and costs $160 for 4 pills. FOUR PILLS.  It’s cheaper for me to go to the ER ($150 copay) than to pay out of pocket for the migraine pills I need to keep me out of the ER.

So I just up the doses of what I have, and hope it works.

People wonder why I don’t really care about gambling…it’s because I do it every day with my health. Trying to figure out which pill fucked up which part of me, trying to avoid taking pain killers, but guessing whether the pain will become unbearable. It’s all roulette…just with me, instead of red and black.

-Essin’ Em