Announcement

It's a damn good thing that I was a card carrying member of Team No Babies in 2009.

It's official.

With an FSH level of 49 I am (drum roll please)

post-menopausal.

The ovaries are done, dude. Mitoxantrone cooked them.

The plus side is that I won't have to worry about o.b's discontinuing my favoured absorbency. Maybe I can sell what few o.bs I have to the highest bidder?

This feels kind of weird though. I mean, I'm only 36. Am I now going to start shaking my fist and telling those darn kids to get off my lawn?

I've been off hormone replacement therapy for about 6 weeks with little problem. I now have all the time in the world to decide if I want to go back on it or if I want to mitigate my estrogen loss in other ways like diet, exercise and supplements.

Stuff to think about that I wouldn't have to think about if it weren't for MS.

Stupid MS.

Uncomfortable

Random strangers often comment on my public transit cane, and immediately start recommending a acupuncturist/therapeutic touch practitioner/ear candler/what ever kind of whatever that saved their lives. When I say "I have MS, that probably isn't going to help me." they all put on this sad frown and say "Oh, that's too bad. You look so good though!"

You. Look. So. Good.

The four words I fucking can't stand any more. They rank right up there with

It could be worse.

or

Look on the brightside. (Okay, that's five words and I cheated. Fucking sue me.)

What I really want to say is

"WHAT the fuck did you think someone with MS should look like?"

but what comes out is

"Thank you."

I think I make Joe uncomfortable with my cavalier attitude about future disability.

I often say things like "That'll give you practice for when I can no longer lift my arms." or "I think I should get a scooter now to practice for the wheelchair I'm going to end up in."

I'm trying to be realistic about this. While it's certainly not guaranteed, it's not outside the realm of possibility.

I'm okay with this bit of information. Novantrone (mitoxantrone) saved my life and having a 0.8% chance of leukemia is way better than the alternative.

I suddenly got really bored of this so I quit.

My MS backpack.

I wanted to do a blog post about it, but it hasn't arrived yet.



Other than that I'm busy with hockey and hoping against hope that the HRT fixes my Premature Ovarian Failure soon.

Oh the indignity of it all.

What was supposed to be a 1 hour and 15 minute appointment at the MS Clinic turned into a four and a half hour epic.

I was supposed to have a 15 minute drop in with the neurologist to confirm that Copaxone is the way we are going and then go to see the physiotherapist for an hour to get some exercises for my vestibular problems.

My neurologist was running late (qu'elle suprise!) so they sent me to the physiotherapist on time. Great. Then the physiotherapy student working with my physiotherapist was late so a quarter of the way through my assessment we pretty much had to start over to get her up to speed.

My vestibular dizziness problem is very slight, so my exercises are going to be very fine movements of my head and eyes. I ended up with the physiotherapist for half an hour longer than scheduled.

Then I end up back in the waiting room. 45 minutes later my neurologist comes out and we have a short talk. She asks me how many times I have gone to the bathroom that day. When I told her four she wrote out an order on a slip and told me to go see the MS nurse.

I had a bladder ultrasound. My bladder is fine and I have no UTI. The nurse says she's going to refer me to a urologist because I'm too young to have this not be MS related. Then I remind her that I have menopausal symptoms because of the mitoxantrone, she gets wide eyed.

"Still?"

So now I am getting a referral to BC Women's Hospital & Health Centre to get some help for my chemotherapy induced menopause. There is a chance that hormone replacement therapy will kick start my ovaries again, and Women's is the place for that kind of support.

But the gravest injustice is that MS has given me an abundance of old lady problems at the age of 35. I have a cane, my bladder is too active and I'm in menopause.

This is not how I pictured my mid-30s to pan out.

Mitoxantrone

I had my half way through treatment heart scan today.

Tomorrow I meet with the cardiologist. If everything is still good, I'll get my next mito treament in July.

It was raining and totally cold today and that does little for my mood.

I'm always freezing or hot flashing. I rarely am just temperate. There's nothing I can do about this until after I see all the specialists who get a say in what kinds of drugs I am allowed to go on. It's more than frustrating.

I'm officially seeking employment. It sucks. Job hunting is as soul destroying as MS.