Day 112 "Today I've Been A Mess"

Today Has been a lousy day.  I slept pretty good last night but woke up with a pretty nasty headache.  I haven't had one for a long time and it caught me off guard.  I've also had a lot of diarrhea since starting on metformin for my diabetes and have been dehydrated a lot the last few days.  Tonight I got so worried that I went to the hospital and talked to the nurses in the emergency room about it.  They told me to drink Gatorade to help rehydrate myself and replace the electrolytes I lost.  They said I would be OK but that I should talk to my doctor in the morning.  Well, I see my nurse practitioner tomorrow and we're going to talk.  First off I haven't had a blood draw to check my lithium levels since the first week I was on it.  Since then I've been put on blood pressure medication which I read can increase the toxicity.  Then I'm freaking out because of the diarrhea from the metformin also having an effect on my lithium levels.  I probably have nothing to worry about but it all just makes me nuts. 

So tomorrow when I see my nurse practitioner I'm going to ask her to take me off of the Seroquel because I can't function on it.  It makes me like a zombie and I can't operate the car.  Plus it causes diabetes or can make it worse.  I'm just afraid she's going to try and reduce my dosage and I say why do that when it wasn't working for me at a lower dosage.  I just would like to try something different that has fewer side effects especially diabetes.  Then I'm going to ask her to send me for a blood draw to check my lithium levels.  I've been on the medication since the end of May and with the addition of the blood pressure medicine and medication for diabetes I would say I'm overdue.  I was in the emergency room a few weeks at the end of August and the doctor said I was overdue.  it all makes me angry.  Why hasn't my nurse practitioner been more concerned about my lithium levels knowing all the medications I'm on?  Why didn't my regular doctor do a lithium level test when he did all my blood work knowing that he was prescribing me medication that could cause toxicity?   Sometimes I wish I was a psychiatrist because I would be a little more compassionate and take a little more interest in my patients.  I was a retail manager for quite a while and the one thing that was always stressed was always providing excellent customer service.  Anyway, I could go on forever on how to properly treat people.

Today I went with my cousin over to her Mom and Dad's house for a visit.  My uncle can' hardly swallow at all.  Everything just gets stuck.  My cousin made him some soup like roast that will hopefully go down easy and I took over a blender so that he could make smoothies and milk shakes.  He has his appointment with the Oncologist on Tuesday and then will know what stage the cancer is, the kind of treatment he'll be receiving, and his prognosis.  My cousin is a basket case and my aunt is in denial about the whole thing.  It's been three years since my Dad died from cancer and this experience with my uncle is bringing up a lot of sad memories for me.  All I know is my uncle told me he would be there for me when I started my treatment for bipolar anytime I needed him and I have to be there for him.  I have a bad feeling about everything right now and I'm so hoping that his cancer isn't severe.  My Dad's cancer was all through his liver when they found it and was told that when the chemo stopped working he wouldn't have but a few months left.  My uncle's cancer as far as we know is just in his esophagus and possibly in some lymph nodes.  Anyway, I have to stop talking about for now because I'm just getting myself worked up over things I haven't got answers for yet.