Adventures in Arthritis

So, it’s been over a month now since the evening I was here, home alone, tapping away at my keyboard when I felt the rush of something coming over me. If I didn’t know me so well, and the fact that I never get the flu (knock on simulated wood grain finish), I’d have sworn that’s what it was. Complete with nausea, cold sweats and dizziness all dropping in on me like a lead brick. I didn’t need to be a medical genius to know that something was way out of whack.

Then I passed out. Three times.

I still remember how it felt coming back to the surface then sinking again, and again . . . It was definitely surreal in every sense of the word! Each time I regained consciousness, I felt like there were two parts to my brain and they each wanted something different. One wanted to stay in that odd place where there was literally no brain activity at all. Okay, some could argue that I go there often but it’s just not the same. It was strange and dark and so inviting! But the other part of my mind was desperate to escape it. The battle raged on and on for all of two or three seconds each time I “came to.” It must have been during one those struggles that the thinking Linda picked up her cell phone. Then the non-thinking Linda took over, dragging us both back down to the dark place again. 

I finally grabbed hold of enough clarity to wonder a couple things: how the phone got into my hand and what the hell I was supposed to do with it. It took a couple more seconds to figure that out and when I did, I decided to call my husband. Okay, I know . . . I probably should have called 911 instead. But for lots of different reasons, I didn’t. I made my husband come home. And then HE called them.

A “G.I. Bleed” is what EMS called me as they poked a few needles in for fluid and other sundry stuff. I spent two nights in the hospital, got two transfusions along with an upper endoscopy and a (yuck) lower one too. At the end of it all, it was ulcers, the kind that had bled into my stomach until I’d lost enough blood to deprive my brain of oxygen (hence, the passing out). Everyone was pretty sure the culprit was meloxicam, my arthritis meds.

Since then I’ve read a ton of stuff about the dangers of NSAIDS (non steroid anti inflammatory drugs . . . yep, even the over-the-counter kind like Tylenol and ibuprofen). Since then I’ve stopped taking anything remotely resembling them, especially while my bloody stomach heals. Since then I’ve learned that there are a lot of deaths attributed to the use of NSAIDS every year. I also learned that long-term use can actually make arthritis worse since certain NSAIDS inhibit the absorption of liquid into the cartilage. Gee, thanks a lot, doc. 

But I have to take full responsibility for my actions. After all, I was the one who trusted the advice of the specialist without doing my own real research. I was the one who read all the possible side effects and thought, “Naaah - that kind of stuff happens to other people and not me.” But we live and we learn, don’t we? And if we refuse to learn . . . well, that’s a whole other story, isn’t it?

So now I’m on a new mission: to find a holistic way to live with chronic pain. I’m upping my turmeric until I can get my hands on something called Curcumin (an extract of turmeric). It’s a natural anti-inflammatory with all sorts of health benefits. I’ve talked to a couple friends who have been taking it for a while and they swear by it. So what the heck, I’ll give it a try.

And I’m trying Chinese acupuncture, a modality that’s been around for something like 2,000 years. When I told my son this, he asked what they used for needles back then. What a great question! So I posed it to my acupuncturist and she said . . . fish bones. FISH BONES! Can you imagine? So I got to wondering who the first person was to think; “Gee, I bet I can stick this fish bone into my hand and make my back pain go away. . .”

Sort of like the first person who ate an egg . . . I mean what the heck was he thinking? 

But anyway, since the needle poking appears to be helping, I'm thinking that brave, ancient soul was pretty smart! . . . the one with the fish bone, not the one with the egg.

And so goes my adventure into arthritis . . . the saga continues with the unexpected benefit of losing a little weight from of all the new stuff I cannot eat! Life is just filled with little perks like that.