Being Your Own Advocate

As for the psychiatrist, I think he was overworked. He was one of the few psychiatrists in the city that still accepted insurance so I'm sure people were knocking down his door. I do think he was knowledgeable about his field. But in retrospect, do I think he was really getting to know his patients in order to provide a proper diagnosis? Absolutely not.

One of the diagnoses he gave me was for a mental illness that is usually initially diagnosed to someone in their teens!! Not in their late 30s.

Was he really listening when I would call his office regarding the side effects of the medications he had given me? Absolutely not.

So my advice to all of you, if you have any doubts about your doctor or the medication he/she has prescribed, you must trust your intuition and judgement. You are the ONLY person who will look after you. You are the only advocate you have. And this applies if you are a parent as well. You are the only advocate your child has. Do what is best for you/them no matter the cost.

Since the incident that year, I have become even more focused on health, both mine and my boys'. I have tried various diets (not for weight loss, for health) and have learned something from each of them. Most recently, I have begun using and selling Pure Herbs products. They are mostly liquid herbs that I take or give to my boys for various reasons, just about any health issue you can imagine. They have improved our health considerably in a very short amount of time. I'm learning to use them to build our immune systems, get rid of viruses (pretty important now that school is starting) before they can really kick in, and clear our digestive system. I have also been the recipient of one Reiki treatment and experienced a noticeable change in my health after receiving it. So much so that I am going to be trained to provide it as well. I will explain more about Reiki in another post.

After quitting the psychotropic medications, I did take an anti-depressant medication for a short time. I also began using bio-identical hormones as my estrogen and progesterone levels were "off." However, just in the last month or two, since cutting out all processed foods, soy, sugar, grains, and most carbs, beginning the use of the herbs, and receiving the Reiki treatment, I have been able to discontinue the use of the prescription anti-depressant and the hormones. My energy levels are out of this world, I no longer require 9+ hours of sleep each night, I have regained "most" of my patience (hey, I do still have a 2-year old!), and I'm feeling much more like the "me" I was several years ago.

Don't be intimidated by all the changes I have made. This has been a true journey for me and my children. I have had to make changes in our lives one small step at a time. Has it been difficult? You had better believe it. Do people close to me roll their eyes because they think I am just "out there" and that I'm harming my children by cheating them out of Twinkies and Cheetos? Yes, they do. But I have seen the health changes in me and my children. I know what a difference it will make in our health in the long run.

My children and I will have a marked decrease in our chances for diabetes and cancer, our allergies, once severe, will be gone, and barring any accidents, we will likely live longer than most people around us. So if being my own advocate means I get to be around to enjoy my children (and hopefully grandchildren) for a long, long time, then the challenges are worth it to me.

What about you? I would love to hear how you have advocated for yourself or your children. Please share a story for me and the others out there. Every story has the potential to change a life.

Lowest of the Low, Part II

So, it was going to take a couple of weeks to completely wean off the medication that the psychiatrist had prescribed and at first, I didn't experience any withdrawals. However, once the dosage became significantly smaller and my brain started reacting to the lower amount, everything changed. And that was it, this drug was a mind/brain altering drug and a heavy duty one at that. Every night for close to two hours, I would curl up on the couch in a fetal position with a veritable mountain of blankets piled on top of me and shiver uncontrollably. It felt like the flu every night except, thank goodness, it wasn't contagious. My mother wanted to take me to the emergency room the first time she watched me go through it. But I knew there was nothing they could do. I had to suffer through it.

The worst part was that the anxiety continued even though the dosage was decreased. As a result, I was still taking the anxiety medication on an almost daily basis. If I didn't, I was pacing the floors non-stop and couldn't interact with my children. So, I took it. And I was still taking the very-well-known sleep medication so that I would get more than a few hours sleep. At some point, the desperation set in. My mind was a mess. What was wrong with me? I had been through much worse it seemed--I had suffered the death of my father at a young age, along with abuse as a teen, and a traumatic c-section and I always bounced back. Why wasn't I bouncing back?

I was despondent, desperate, and feeling extremely guilty for all the time my mother and mother-in-law were having to spend with me and the boys. My mother-in-law accused me at one point of just making it all up. My mother began to say that she just couldn't come down anymore (she lived about an hour away). I was disrupting their lives and they, like me, were starting to feel that there was no end in sight. I was scared to death that it would never change, I would be this way forever.

And so it happened, truly The Lowest of the Low, I hit bottom. I told my mother-in-law that I needed to go to the local psychiatric hospital. I cried the whole way there. I didn't want to go, but I didn't know what else to do.

I told the doctor who did my intake that I "just wanted to feel better." I can still remember sitting in that cold chair across from him with my head hung low, not wanting him to admit me but at the same time terrified that he wouldn't. Surprisingly, he did admit me. (I say surprising because I wasn't having serious suicidal or homicidal ideations which are usually the requirements.)

So, I suffered through the embarrassment of a strip search (not invasive, but very uncomfortable nonetheless) and walked through those doors that were clanged shut and locked behind me. There was nothing happy about this place as you can imagine.

I met with the on-call psychiatrist and he proceeded to tell me that it was not possible to have withdrawals from the drug I was taking. I very nearly laughed at him. My husband called the original psychiatrist but he didn't return his call for two days. What a compassionate doctor, huh? I cried every time my husband came to see me. I didn't want him to see me there but he was my lifeline.

For the first time through this ordeal, I was prescribed an anti-depressant. I made the acquaintance of a woman around my age who was there because she had aborted a multiples pregnancy after having spent years going through fertility treatments to try to get pregnant. I stayed at the hospital for 3 days and was released.

About two weeks after coming home, I woke up one morning with terrible indigestion and stomach upset. This went on for weeks, I would wake up early, early in the morning upset to my stomach. I tried eating more, I tried eating less. I prayed a lot. I thought it must have been the result of the anti-depressant so I quit taking it. I then decided to look up the side effects of the anxiety medicine I was still taking. Not only was severe reflux and nausea on the list, but many, many others. The other major drawback? Because it was a drug that impacted my central nervous system, it was highly addictive. So, quitting it was akin to quitting a highly addictive illegal drug. But I was SURE that the reflux was caused by the anxiety medication. Fortunately, I was able to wean off of it with not as many troubles.

UN-fortunately, my reflux continued. I went to see a family physician who told me that severe reflux could be a problem related to the brain, so I underwent a CAT scan. It was a nerve-wracking week before I received those results and of course, they came back negative. I knew in my heart that the reflux was medication related. The only medication I was still taking though was the very-commonly-prescribed sleep medication and surely it wasn't that. The family physician finally sent me to a GI doctor who told me that I needed to have a colonoscopy and upper endoscopy. Yeah, NOT.

Just a couple of days before I was scheduled to have the colonoscopy, I looked up the side effects of the sleep medication. I was blown away. It had as many side effects if not more than the anxiety medication. I stopped taking it and started a supplement which included Valerian Root. Two days after I quit taking the prescription sleep medication, I woke up with NO pain, no reflux and I had slept better than I had in a very long time. And I CANCELLED the colonoscopy. Things were looking up!

Please feel free to comment. It took a lot for me to put this in writing as only a handful of people know what happened and I would rather forget about this time in my life. But I know now that God sent me down this difficult path for a reason and that He wants me to share it in order to help other people.

Up next, my thoughts on the original psychiatrist, his diagnoses, and a bit of my and my boys' lives since the hell finally ended.

Lowest of the low, part I

Due to the stresses of my youngest son's health issues and the extended lack of sleep that they caused, a major move (from Omaha, NE back to the Austin, TX area), my failure (as it appeared to me) to nurse as long as I had hoped, and some additional extended family stress, I began to suffer from major depression and severe insomnia. Upon the recommendation of a trusted counselor, I made an appointment with a psychiatrist. After reviewing my paperwork and interviewing me for a lengthy 15 minutes, he diagnosed me with some pretty serious mental health disorders. And prescribed some pretty serious medications to treat them. I was pretty desperate at that time and wanted more than anything to be a better mom, a better wife and most of all, a better me.

So, I took them. Shortly after I started taking them, I started having major panic attacks, a couple that sent me to the emergency room. I'd never had panic attacks before and let me tell you, I know why that name is ascribed to them. Even though I'd never had them, the psychiatrist told me that I was having breakthrough symptoms and he continued to increase my dosage, as well as prescribe anxiety medication. And the panic attacks continued. It was so bad I was scared to leave the house or even be at home alone with my boys. My husband, mother-in-law and mother were lifesavers during that time, as well as a Stephen's Minister that was truly devoted to me.

The turning point: I am fortunate to be very good friends with a person who works with NAMI (National Alliance on Mental Illness) and she said to me one day, "Julie, if you didn't have this kind of anxiety before, then it HAS to be the medicine causing it. You are your only and best advocate."

So, I called the psychiatrist and said I wanted to get off the medication. It was around this time that he started taking longer and longer to return my phone calls and I rarely, if ever, actually spoke to him. It was usually one of his office staff. He prescribed a plan for weaning off the medicine and explained that I could potentially have withdrawals from the medication. I thought NOTHING could be worse than the panic attacks, but boy was I wrong.

A New Journey

I'm finally home. Yes, that's right, HOME! More on that later. :)

Five years ago, I started a journey--a journey into motherhood. When my first son was born and around the age of 2 weeks, started crying non-stop, had painful gas, wanted to nurse non-stop, would only sleep in his car seat or on me, would wake up the instant you laid him down, and often would only calm to the sound of the vacuum cleaner, my brand-new mother's intuition told me something was wrong. But the highly-recommended pediatrician and her staff told me it was "colic" and I just had to deal with it. So, I did, but let me tell you it was not easy. I spent many a night/early morning walking him up and down the sidewalk in his stroller to try to get him to stop crying, driving around at 3 a.m. with the radio tuned to static or driving and cursing the stop lights or drivers in front of me because if we stopped the vehicle, he started crying. As long as he was moving, he was happy. The incessant crying finally stopped around 4 months of age but sleep was an issue for him for quite a while and well, let's just say there are still issues we're dealing with. "Everyone" told us that colic only happens in one out of 4 kids so when we decided to try for another, we were confident that it wouldn't happen to us again.

Can you guess? Yes, not only did it happen again, it was WORSE, much worse when my 2nd son was born 2 1/2 years after the first. However, this time we had a pediatrician that said, "If Mom is calling this much, tell her to bring him in." He diagnosed him with Milk and Soy Protein Intolerance (MSPI) and GERD (severe reflux) and told me that if I wanted to continue to nurse, I would have to eliminate every single trace of milk and soy from my diet. So, I did, but it wasn't enough. He was intolerant of much more than just dairy and soy and was eventually diagnosed with Multiple Food Protein Intolerances (MFPI). After several months of misery for my son and me, I finally made the very difficult decision to try hypo-allergenic formula. We tried three high-dollar formulas before finding one he could tolerate.

By this time, I had been reading mountains of information about diet and what a difference it can make in your health. One turning point came when I read the book Healing the New Childhood Epidemics: Autism, ADHD, Asthma, and Allergies: The Groundbreaking Program for the 4-A Disorders by Kenneth Bock and Cameron Stauth. It really opened my eyes to a biomedical approach to living. Based upon what I'd read, I very quickly began a strict gluten- and dairy-free diet and put my oldest son on the diet as well. Gluten includes wheat, barley and rye. After just a few months on the diet, I was able to completely eliminate the daily asthma medication I had been taking for 15 years. I credit the diet with eliminating my son's hypercalciuria condition affecting his kidneys. He also was on prescription medication and was able to stop it after being on the diet for several months. He no longer has any trouble with his kidneys. My youngest son, now 2 1/2 years old, still cannot tolerate pasteurized/homogenized dairy, wheat gluten and various other foods.

What about you? Why do you eat the way you do? Have there been any major events that have changed your health or has it been a gradual change?

I will continue in the next few posts to detail my journey home and I hope that you will join me for the ride.

Julie