I met with my neurosurgeon this week. He went over my MRIs and said he thinks I have a tethered cord because there isn’t a huge disc causing my symptoms. A friend asked if it could be Arachnoiditis, clumping of the arachnoid nerves. I didn’t see any such clumping on my MRI and neither did the radiologists or my surgeon but I asked him anyways.
I haven’t been sleeping well so when I got home the day of the appt, I laid down and passed out. I woke up four hours later to empty my bladder and then write some emails to let some people know what the surgeon said. The surgery will have me under and through EMG they will know what thing to cut to release the band supposedly causing all this. I told him to look at my L3-L4 disc to make sure it was ok. I need to make sure I don’t need another surgery later on.
I met with my pcp yesterday and asked about top surgery. He said the surgeons a BMI of 35 minimum which means I have to lose another 20 pounds. I am not happy about this because it feeds into my loss of appetite stuff. I kind of challenge myself as to how long I can go without food and it could be days now before I can eat something. I do regain what I lost soon as I resume eating again. It has been the same five pounds past few months. I gain and lose it. Now that I have it in my head to lost 20, I really want to lost 35 and be around 165 just to give myself some extra room.
My pcp seems to think it would be easy. But it is not. Meds are fighting against the hunger strikes. Adding the nortriptyline and mixing it with gaba has been my downfall. I may still be a size mens 38 but holy fuck wearing a size 40 today made me feel I wearing balloon pants on. They were so loose as I had to keep picking them up. I do have a few pairs of pants of 38. I am going to have to alternate them so I don’t wear the crotch out. That has been my downfall with pants is wearing that part out.
This week is over for appts. I’ve had four and will have four next week. Next week I see the behavioral medicine psychologist and my urologist. Other two are therapy and psychopharm. I asked my psychopharm about TMS or ketamine and she said next step would be ECT. Fuck. I value my memory. That has been the one reason why I have not given in to this treatment. I most likely would have to be hospitalized for initial sessions. Surgery date has already been set. Between now and then I am going to try and lose weight not gain a psych admission. I told my therapist yesterday (had two appts yesterday, therapy and pcp) that I was suicidal again. She asked what was my risk and I told her. She then asked what to do to keep me safe. Other than transplanting the thoughts out of my head, I have no clue. I don’t plan on acting for a while. I didn’t tell her my plan date. There was no need. She was writing down everything I was telling her which annoyed me. I get she has to but doesn’t mean I have to like it.
I made some progress with my mother about bathroom privacy. I told her if the fucking door (said without the f word) is closed, someone is in there and to not open the door. Apparently she has walked in on my nephew a few times. She laughed about it. Laughed! WTF is funny about violating someone’s privacy?? The door’s lock mechanism is shot. It needs to be replaced but things don’t line up right because the goddamned door isn’t on the track right. We have a sliding door which I guess can also be called a hidden door. I call it a sliding door because that is what it does. It slides open and closed. Sliding. She has not walked in on me since that conversation. She did deny that she has barged in on me. And the therapist wonders why I have anger in my voice when I talk about her. JFC.
midnightdemons7 