Wednesday, March 20, 2013

Been awhile....

It has been forever since I have written a post. Things have been so incredibly busy with the move into our temporary house before the final move to South Dakota, my evenings in Charlottesville, the kids and school, and various other appointments. Otherwise, things have been fairly normal again within the house.
I received a call from the Social Security Administration a few weeks ago, and after several voice mail messages I was finally able to connect to the case worker who is arranging for me to have an exam by a SSA doctor to evaluate my disability claim. Apparently they will send me a letter with w date, time, and location for my appointment. Perhaps after this I will hear a determination on my case and can finally be deemed a "cripple." my guess is that both of my doctors stating that I am crippled doesn't mean anything to them and they wish to evaluate for themselves. Hey, whatever moves this lengthy process forward is good enough for me.
On the pharmaceutical front, we have changed the meds around a little bit again and I have begun learning my dosage tolerances. We switched (trial basis for now) from my nightly Percocet 10mg to 10mg of Roxicodone. I learned that 10mg is not really enough anymore, but 20mg is too much and makes me high and want to vomit. I learned this as I was talking to my wife and really struggling not to completely speak in cursive (slurring for those who have forgotten my explanation in earlier posts) and then trying to take the dog for a walk whilst trying very hard not to let my dinner escape it's confines within my stomach. I must say it was not at all an enjoyable experience. However, the Roxicodone does work better than the Percocet when mixed with my Soma, so hopefully a minor adjustment to the dosage and we will be set.
Thankfully, have not really had any new symptoms lately. My hands have their moments when they don't want to listen to my directions, as do my legs. I did have a fall 2 weeks ago in the hallway leading to the bathroom that caused some damage to my left arm and right knee, but thankfully that only made things difficult for a few days. I did discover that when your legs fall asleep and you already have trouble controlling their actions to begin with, you probably should wait for them to "wake up" fully before attempting to walk. I will chalk that one up to a new lesson learned.
Wish I had some humorous anecdotes to add to this blog, but really f am kind of glad that I don't because that means that I have not had any new lessons from MS that need to be shared. I do have a few other topics that I may be sharing in the next blog, just formulating them still. I will also be posting my South Dakota visit around the 15th of April, so keep your eyes out for my experience whilst there.
Thanks for reading, and remember, it's just life, or something like it...

2 comments:

  1. Good to hear your side! And good luck with your SS exam.
    I never had to take one of those to be approved, so I don't have any real advice to share. My doc did tell me to make sure & stress your problem areas.

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  2. Is this your first claim? I don't mean this as any discouragement, but a lot of first claims get denied despite having complete medical records. If, by unfortunate chance, your claim is disapproved, I highly suggest getting in contact with a lawyer who specializes in helping individuals who suffer from similar diseases. My sister has CFS and fibromyalgia and finally got her approval last winter with her lawyer's help. Do update with how your exam and claim went. Best regards!

    -Erminia

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