Downtime

Funny how God makes sure you get your time off.

To say that I have been stressed for the past three weeks is the understatement of the.. well, the past three weeks. Aside from the frustrations I had with my boss and my job, I suffered a week long cold, followed by stomach problems that lasted another week, and now, dysmenorrhea that forced me to finally take a day off from work. 

Saturdays have been spent quite well, balancing wedding preparations with quality time with Marc. Sundays have been for Church, GLC1 classes, and D-group. Rest has been evasive. 

I now am being reminded of God's fourth commandment:

Exodus 20:8-11 (NASB) Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a sabbath of the Lord your God; in it you shall not do any work, you or your son or your daughter, your male or your female servant or your cattle or your sojourner who stays with you. For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day; therefore the Lord blessed the sabbath day and made it holy.

So, yeah, day off it is.

And to try to enjoy the day of rest, and hopefully relieve the backache, I brewed my TWG Moroccan Mint. Simple joy #11.

desperate times call for loose leaves... when teabags are simply not going to cut it.

Mint tea helps soothe cramps; at least it does for me... and the smell is wonderful! Moreover, Google informed me of the additional benefits of  having tea daily, so it's a big fat plus. Now if only I had pastries --lady fingers in particular, to go with these. Mmmmm!

Healthy Adjustments

I recently re-took my FBS test and my sugar has gone down, but still exceeding the normal range a bit. After my follow up checkup with the endo... (Would you believe the original endo is out of the country again, and I got a different reliever this time. One who knows what she's doing, thank God, compared to the previous reliever.) I'm back on medication. This time it has gone down to one 500mg tablet a day, with strict bilin to exercise. Also, the Metformin brand has been changed from Glumet to Glucophage because of the diarrhea.

Since I don't live in a village where I could run/jog or bike, Marc suggested I do stairs instead. He's been incredibly thoughtful and supportive with this, I could not ask for more. He actually searched for easy routines I could do and emailed me instructions for them. I have yet to learn to do the stairs thing properly to avoid injuries, and I need to make a schedule I could stick to by this week. I'm due back in 3 months. Hopefully, by then I won't need to maintain the meds anymore.

For my PCOS, I'm still taking the pills. I'm on my third month now and had a bit of a mishap with the timing when I started this batch, but hopefully I could stick to the original time and be PCOS free by January!

In the mean time, I'm also adjusting my diet and trying to lessen the carbs. (Goodbye white rice, sniff sniff.)

 

So This Is What Being Old Feels Like

I've been on "maintenance meds" for a few weeks now, and I really think I'm about to go crazy. For my elevated sugar, the doctor prescribed Metformin. I'm supposed to take it with meals twice a day, once for breakfast and another for dinner. The fact that I'm supposed to remember to take the tablets twice daily is driving me insane. I do not have the discipline for this kind of thing. For one, every time I go out, I have to carry two with me. Then when the time comes, even when I'm not the least bit hungry, I need to find something to eat just so I could take the meds. The worst part are the stomach upsets and trips to the bathroom. It's causing diarrhea at ungodly hours! The horrors! My brother tells me to go back to the doctor to have this addressed, but after my experience with the failure of an endo, I am not about to waste another 800 pesos on the girl. I'm trying to suck it up and get through the 45-day sentence. I go back to the lab to have tests again by the end of the month, and a follow up checkup by December, first week. Hopefully, the proper endo will be there to see me. 

I'm praying I get cured of both my PCOS and the IFG soon. I will go absolutely bonkers if I'll need to develop the discipline for perpetual maintenance medicine.

On the other hand, Marc was required to re-do his physical exam. This lead to two ultrasounds, two urologists' PF, and an operation this week. I haven't received my notice to re-do anything from my last APE yet. I'm hating the fact that our retirement package is being spent on these medical bills that should've been covered by our old company, and coordinated with by the new one. It's so unfair that the incompetence of the ones who did the arrangements (read: HR people) are causing serious dents on our savings.

Health Problems

Spent the day at the hospital yesterday. Still irked at the endo's secretary. You see, we actually scheduled an appointment with her almost a week before. When we got there Saturday morning, our names were #1 and #2 on the list. It had a note however that the endocrinologist with whom we were hoping to have ourselves checked was unavailable and a reliever was there to see us. Strike one. We should've gone to another endo right then and there. Anyway, Marc and I, being rookies and all, decided to stay. After all, we only needed clearance. So we waited... and waited... and waited. After a few hours, we started to wonder what's taking the doctor so long to arrive. Marc decided to ask inside. Apparently, the doctor was already there! The secretary told us that usually the patients go in to ask so she doesn't bother calling out people's names anymore. I was like, what?! We were waiting for hours right outside the clinic. Everywhere else calls out people's names! What the hell is wrong with you? I was really really irritated, but then, what else could we do? Strike two.

We were then accommodated by the replacement doctor who admitted right off the bat that she wasn't licensed to sign as an endo yet, or something to that effect. She then proceeded to rattle off disclaimers on how she wouldn't want to incriminate herself by issuing clearances, etc. Strike three in bold, all caps, flashing red lights! Long story short, it was a wasteful 800 pesos worth of professional fee. I mean, if you really knew what you were doing, then there wouldn't be any need to "protect yourself" as you claim. What. The. Hell.

I'm not sure if it was due to the stress or the frustrations or both, but my period came as well as the dysmenorrhea that always came with it. This time with wave after wave of pain and discomfort.

Fortunately, when I visited my new ob-gyn, the experience was redeeming. The ob-gyn was straight to the point and very professional. There were no disclaimers and no vague statements. Now this was a doctor who knew what she was doing. I had my check up done and an ultrasound.

To control my blood sugar, I need to take Metformin twice a day after breakfast and dinner for around 45 days. I also need to take pills for my Polycystic Ovary Syndrome for 3 months. They said that the PCOS could have caused the elevated sugar in my blood. I am scheduled to go back to the endo by first week of December with a full set of blood test. Hopefully the real doctor would be there to check my progress. Then back for check up with my ob on January for the PCOS.

Onboard

Day 1 with the new company was the 1st of October. So far, we haven't felt any significant change. Most of us, if not all, are still going through the transitions. Unfortunately, it isn't going as efficiently as people thought it would, but that's a story for another day.

What I wanted to post about was the thing that greeted me on my first week. My pre-employment medical requirements have been based on the past annual physical exam we had with the old company. The results say I have Impaired Fasting Glucose. Now, if you're like me, your initial reaction would have been a mixture of confusion and shock. Stay with me, I'll educate you a bit.

I'm 28. There isn't supposed to be anything wrong with me yet. Apparently, I was wrong. Impaired Fasting Glucose is a fancy way of saying the medical term for pre-diabetic. It means that my blood sugar is above the normal range and is about to reach the diabetic mark. Since I am not exactly a fan of too much sweets, I'm blaming this on the love of rice, the occasional coke addiction, and chocolates.

According to Wikipedia:

Impaired fasting glucose (IFG), more commonly known as pre-diabetes refers to a condition in which the fasting blood glucose level is consistently elevated above what is considered normal levels; however, it is not high enough to be diagnosed as diabetes mellitus. This pre-diabetic state is associated with insulin resistance and increased risk of cardiovascular pathology, although of lesser risk than impaired glucose tolerance (IGT). IFG can progress to type 2 diabetes mellitus if lifestyle changes are not made. There is a 50% risk over 10 years of progressing to overt diabetes. A recent study cited the average time for progression as less than three years.

I would have to have this cleared within 6 months or else I'm going to have problems with my health benefits. To address this, I have already vowed to stop soda and artificial juice intake. Also, I'm trying to lose weight by lessening rice during meals. Maybe next time I could try them totally without. Umm, what else? Uh, yeah, I need to get back to running... and/or start swimming when I do get the fats off, just so I don't embarrass myself wearing bikinis with bulges hanging out.

Initial lab tests done last Saturday, October 5, 2013 confirmed the elevated glucose in my blood. Although based on my HbA1c test, (find out about the test here) I am still within normal levels. Have a consultation with an endocrinologist scheduled for this coming Saturday. Kinda nervous about it, but I gotta do what I gotta do, right?

I'll keep a mini-journal here of what happens to my health problems.