Tag Archives: drug trials

Heart racing

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Here’s an Amitriptyline symptom I should note: I’m having noticeable elevated heart rate. My watch buzzes when my heart rate is too high compared to my level of movement. It’s going off almost all day right now. I’m elevated above 120 bpm for hours a day even if I’m barely moving around. That seems kind of problematic. Hm.

Because of the watch I can give specific data about my heart rate compared to exercise over a very long time period. I normally rarely hit 120 unless I’m doing prolonged fairly intense exercise. Now I hit that sitting in a chair over and over all day.

My watch is buzzing enough that the people I live with are noticing and commenting on hearing it. That seems… possibly not good.

Well I stopped tracking…

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The onramp to this medication is magnificently easy. I am stunned. I have never had such an easy time with a psych med (ok it’s considered a 4th line antidepressant so it’s not mostly a psych med but… it’s a psych med).

I saw the doctor for an in person exam. She basically said that the placement of the wound means I am almost certainly not experiencing nerve pain as a result of the surgical site. She thinks it is muscular, which tracks with my previous general experience. (My old long-term medical massage therapist and good friend thinks that it is fascia related and he sarcastically says “It’s not like I’ve watched the progress of your body up close and personal for over a decade or anything”.) For the record he was one of the early people to suggest Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome.

So the doctor wants me to stay on this medication in large part because it is giving me one of the benefits I got from cannabis that is anxiety/depression/ADHD related-ish. Specifically: I really struggle with impulsive reactions to things. On pot I have this pause in my brain that allows me to stop and consider how I want to react to things that happen to me. I’m getting the same pause with this drug. It’s not that I am generally speaking super slowed down or dumber… I’m not losing words and I can still be funny and respond fairly quickly. I just have… the ability to decide how I want to react to things again and I really like that effect. Given that this drug is free from the NHS it may be almost worth the price of admission.

Other side effects that are ongoing: I’m slower to wake up than normal and it isn’t putting me to sleep much earlier or more reliably after being on it for a few weeks. I can take elephant level quantities of tranquilizers and just shake them off. Sure I can stay up all night cleaning, why not?

She doubled the amount to 20mg. I’ve now been on this a week and I’d say I’m very acclimated and it’s a mild overall impact.

She also wants me slathering gel Ibuprofen on a few times a day and I would say that is helping somewhat… if I do almost nothing with my arms. If I do much with my arms in a day it hurts about as much as normal. If I do almost nothing the Ibuprofen brings the pain level down.

I’m feeling incredible distress over the level of pain I’m experiencing because I had months of almost no pain. I’m not entirely sure what kicked it up to full speed again. It started getting bad in September/October and it’s been bad since.

I’ve been super low energy for the last week but I think it is more related to my sore throat and mild cough. Everyone in the house feels lousy so I don’t think it is medication related.

I’m having enough trouble sleeping that I used one of my last Lorazepam tonight and I had some brandy.

I just… metabolize drugs like whoa. And it’s 9:10 and I’m a little tired but not really sleepy at all. I took the Amitriptyline at around 6. The Lorazepam at 8. I’ve been nursing a glass of brandy for about 4 hours. I’m not even anxious I’m just… not sleepy. I crave interaction.

On the fourth day of med trial my body gave to me…

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I slept from 8pm to about 6am. I woke up earlier with the vague belief that I should probably get up and pee… but I didn’t bother and went back to sleep instead. That’s nearly unheard of for me.

So… last night I had some cocodamol and two glasses of wine. I have very mixed feelings about how hard my body resists sedatives but I’m fucking tired and if it takes a lot sometimes I’m going to knock myself over the head with a hammer.

I’ve had a few bursts of severe pain in my hand/arm/elbow/shoulder. I attribute that to working. Which… is a mixed bag. I don’t need pain meds tonight. My back is sore and icki but I don’t feel like I want to cry.

Today I have been alert and energetic and I’ve gotten a lot of chores done. I haven’t felt slow or impeded. I don’t feel the same sense of time distortion. I feel a little tired in the “Jesus I’m years in the hole on sleep deprivation” sense but not bad or worn out for me.

I have 15 books and 32 days to go on my reading challenge. I’m almost done with one. I may even be able to finish tonight. We’ll see….

On the third day of med trial my body gave to meeeeee

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Very little notice that I am using anything new. I would say that today I felt incredibly close to normal. I feel like I was a little slowed down but in the “I need more sleep and I’m working too hard” sense rather than in the “Holy shit I’m swimming through molasses” sense. I probably feel less of a malaise of depression. Today I was more patient with the kids than I have been on a lot of days lately.

I didn’t do as much exercising as yesterday (only walked 2 miles but I rode my bike almost 5 miles and that didn’t feel hard at all–more than a mile of it was up an extremely steep hill). We went out and picked litter with a group who has been moving around the city trying to help out in different areas every weekend. It was very productive and nice. Gotta meet our local hippie comrades.

I took the pill at 5:30 tonight because 6pm last night didn’t have me feeling sleepy till 9. I also took some pain medication tonight because my back and neck are in full on fuck-you mode and I can’t keep this up.

I don’t know that it is making a big difference in the nerve pain. My hand is still going numb quite easily. My elbow is on fire. My upper arm is numb until you touch it then it tingles and hurts. I can’t reach the wound site to see how tender that is by myself.

Overall I would say that right this minute I think this dosage is not a serious/permanent solution to the problem but the side effect profile is not so bad that I am terrified of upping the dosage to play with it. I am currently taking 10mg and up to 75mg/day is within normal expected range. Apparently it is expected that it might take 6 weeks to be effective as a pain killer. As of this evening I feel very comfortable with being willing to test that long. That’s actually a pretty resounding endorsement from me. Normally 3 days into a drug means I’m already trying to figure out how to get the fuck off it.

So I’d say a C+ or B- right now? I’d like more impact on nerve pain. It could definitely do more for actual depression and anxiety. But it is a start and it’s not a bad start.

And this is all fucking free.

Another day, another chance to record what’s happening

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Med responses are very important to me. I am upset that I have so few written records of my previous drug attempts. Oh, by the way my oldest heard me make a crack about having a hangover from the drug and she flipped out. She thought I was using hard street drugs because I had just run out of cope.

Serves me right for not telling my kids in advance absolutely everything I do with my body I guess?

Today was different. Less exhaustion. I woke up at 4 for a trip to the loo. I didn’t get back to sleep for close to an hour then I was up by 6:30. I took the pill at 7 last night and was asleep by 8:30.

Tonight I took the pill at 6.

Today we had already made plans to go for a walk in the woods with a family who lives about 1.5 miles away from us who are new to home education. They have a 9 year old boy and an 11 year old girl. The two of them both turned up saying that they were hoping for a kid of their gender. I said, “How would a non-binary kid who is not a boy and not a girl who likes to do things regardless of gender fit?” They had about two questions then they both went with it. For the record: that’s where middle kid is at again.

Anyway, I was… more calm than usual? I felt like my brain was slower and on the sluggish side. It was a less pleasant experience than pot but not completely dissimilar? I didn’t have any of the uplift I get from pot but I got a little bit of the “pause” between having a thought and reacting.

My feet are going to sleep ridiculously quickly. If I kneel down to put stuff in a drawer it doesn’t take 2 minutes. Usually I can kneel for 10-15 minutes before my feet fall asleep.

My back has been hurting quite badly all day. Of course I have walked 6.5 miles after it hurt when I woke up. Cause yeah. I carried the littlest home for the final mile because she was utterly wasted.

I’m still having some nerve pain in my arms if I tweak them up to use them in an unusual position. (Putting the baby in the back carrier was a bit festive.) I feel a lot of tightness and general arm unhappiness. I have fairly deliberately not typed much today trying to rest. (Really the last couple of days.)

I have very much wanted to not add more medication to this in the first few days. So I’m not taking anything for the back pain or headache. I want to have a really solid idea of what is coming from the Amitriptyline. Normally I would definitely be medicating for those at this point because it hurts.

I’m having massive time dilation. I can check and see this is the end of the second day. It feels like a lot more than that. I labeled the pill packet with the exact date I am supposed to take each pill because I am worried about taking too much or skipping a day and not noticing.

I am utterly out of patience with the kids but I think that was happening before the meds. Right now it is hard to remember.

In unrelated news: I have 17 books to read in 34 days. Time for some graphic novels (Neil Gaiman’s American Gods 1 & 1). In another day I can finish The Cooking Gene, and I need to sit the kids down and finish Odd Girl Out. That will leave me with 14 books to go. Eep. Maybe my goal was a tad ambitious for this year…

New med tracking

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Started Amitriptyline last night, primarily for nerve pain. I got a solid 8 hours of sleep, which I don’t always do and that seems nice. As I was going to sleep I felt like I got to watch a firework show on my eyelids. Lots of bright white lights dancing. As is typical for me it took more like an hour and a half to really hit me instead of an hour.

ETA: Yeah, I barely stayed awake long enough to eat a little breakfast then I almost passed out on the table so I crawled back to bed. I was in and out for a while making sure that oldest got to school. Then I slept hard until 10:30 when I could tell that I needed to go to the bathroom to deal with blood (it’s the heaviest day of my period. What glorious timing).

My dreams were super intense and overwhelming and constant and highly sexual which I did not expect on a medication known for lowering libido.

I am so groggy that middle kid has been talking at me for a while and I have literally not retained a word of what has been said. I feel slow and stupid and exhausted.

It’s a very good thing I homeschool my 10 year old and Noah works from home because I don’t know how I could have provided care for the 2 year old today while alone. Scary thought. Woof.

I have a really intense headache at the back of my head near the top of the spine and it shoots straight through the skull to make it throb hard on my left temple. My mouth has been throbbing, which is a weird ass feeling. I keep feeling like I am falling only I’m lying prone at the time.

Strangely it was easier to sleep than usual because even though my neck/head hurt quite badly my shoulders already feel a little easier. It didn’t instantly hurt lying on my side. If I reach back gently the surgical wound site still hurts.

The headache is absolutely massive but I am worried about taking another medication on top of what is in my system.

I am sad because my lack of help today is going to mean that Noah has to work more days into December. (He was going to take the month off.) But at least I think it’ll only be a couple of days next week and not the whole month.

Also of note: my typing has been super shitty. It’s taking me 3-8 tries to figure out how to spell a lot of basic words. Yay spell check preventing me from looking in writing as stupid as I feel.