Tag: abnormal movements

Posted in Archive, November 2022

Declining Health

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“It’s your choice. Do you want to keep trying to cope with the pain at home, or I can send you up to the hospital?” I sat opposite my doctor, wanting to explode. Not at them. My doctor has gone all out over the last month trying to help me. I’m on week four/five of an infection which has in turn irritated my usual spasms, my pelvic prolapse which has been a problem for 3 years (and I’m still waiting to see the specialist) is causing its own issues, and I now have to self-catheterize daily. Hospital admission is tempting, but the local hospital isn’t that great with rare conditions, and someone needs to be here for the kids. I decided to remain home, where I know my meds wouldn’t be messed with and I could use heat therapy and a TENS machine too.

Week four going into week five of antibiotics

It’s something that I’m struggling with quite a lot at the moment, the sensation that my body is deteriorating at a rapid rate again. It goes through phases of this, its part and parcel of having multiple chronic conditions. Knowing that doesn’t make it any easier though. I recently made the decision to start having therapy again; struggling to accept new declines in my health is something I’m making sure to discuss.

My decline in health at the moment is mainly due to my Ehlers-Danlos, however my Dystonia is impacting this too. Ever tried using a catheter with hands that tremor? It’s by no means easy! I’ve not got a Botox date yet with the new hospital but I’m hoping they maybe willing to try injecting my hands so as to make this whole process a bit easier.

Posted in April 2022, Archive, September

Friendship with Chronic illnesses

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Living with any chronic illness brings with it by nature a certain amount of unpredictability. For me that has meant no hour is the same from one to the next, let alone one day to the next day so forward planning always has to come with the understanding that extreme last minute cancellations are not just possible but likely especially when going through a rocky patch with symptom management. Part of pacing is actively choosing where to rest and cut back and sometimes that means staying home. A fact many healthy people forget. It results in people viewing me as unreliable/flakey/lazy and as a result many friendships have been lost over the last decade.

When I first became ill the isolation was deafening. It’s quite astounding how loud the silence is when people who you thought were your friends disappear when life gets hard. At the time I was confused and angry. Now I’m grateful, it showed me who my true friends were and ten years on I’m still very close to them and look forward to our reunions.

Recently I’ve gone through another bad spell. I’ve been able to do less than previously, I’ve cancelled multiple plans last minute despite my best efforts. But between my general chronic illness and complications caused by new issues my daily activity tolerance /spoons has been appalling. Basic activity wipes me out. Now this would have been devastating to me previously but now I’m just proud I’m listening to my body and learning where to cut back. I’m not going to lie it’s still upsetting losing friends but it’s not having the impact that it once would have had. I’m grateful to the community of online friends with chronic illnesses I’ve built rapport with whose understanding is everything.

Posted in Archive, February 2022

Saturday Spent in A&E

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This morning was meant to be normal. For us that meant breakfast, chair yoga, meds, get the kids ready for their football club and rush out the door. Then it quitens down from midday. We do homework, see family, and enjoy nature. Today life had other ideas. Damon had already tried to relocate my jaw several times with no success before the kids football. By the time we were on our way home I was crying and asked to be dropped at the hospital.

I knew in myself that this was the right call. I don’t get upset over pain easily. If I’m like this then I need to be seen. Despite being rushed off their feet I was called through and quickly wheeled in to resus very quickly. The reason for this being that jaw dislocations can pose a risk for compromising ones airway. Normally they don’t bother x-raying me, but today they did. A number of drs were shocked at how bad it was, and that I’d let it stay like that since Wednesday.

The doctor looking after me wanted to try a few different methods before resorting to sedation. So a wad of tongue depressors were inserted into my mouth for half an hour to attempt to tire the muscles. Personally I don’t find this helpful, it just hurts, but I’ll do what I’m asked if it gets me treatment that I need eventually.

In the end they did have to sedate me. The Dr told me after that it was a extremely strong spasms pushing the jaw out and it was very difficult to relocate. The first time they got it in the jaw dislocated again immediately. Once they managed it for a second time they quickly bandaged me up to encourage/help support the jaw to remain in place.

I’m now home feeling worn down, emotional, bruised and tired. I’ve got to remain bandaged for a while as it settles and start being more conscious of my jaw movements. Not the sort of headwear I’d been planning on wearing to church tomorrow but heyho. Got to keep laughing.

Posted in Archive, January 2022, September

Day to Day Management

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No day is ever the same when living with chronic illness. The routine may be vaguely the same but each day revolves around adapting to what symptoms are presenting that day and the severity of them in the moment. What may be rather bad in the morning may be insignificant in comparison to another symptom by midday

A good example of this is today. Sundays are always our family rest days. We go to church, sometimes have family to us but generally speaking we are at home together. Now I was already shattered after a bad night sleep with nerve pain in lower right leg and lower back pain. However upon getting up my neck spasm started pulling my head down towards my shoulder. It’s a particularly nasty spasm that’s hard to break. I have a percriped Aspen collar for when my neck does which I alternate with wearing a TENS unit and a heat pack.

Picture of me ready for church wearing my Aspen collar to been help support and straighten my neck

I’ve not had to wear this collar in a while. The overly nervous me did my best to disguise it with a scarf as we sent out for church. It deffinently took some getting used to wearing it out and about and learning to ignore the second glances once again. But it’s worth to help ease off the painful spasms somewhat.

Off to church. Scarf ‘hiding’ my neck support

My Botox appointment is extremely late this time round having being schedule for almost six months instead of three. Whilst I’m hoping for a cancilation to come up, I am in the mean time going to ask my general practitioner to allow me to my Trihexyphenidyl untill I’ve had my injections

Posted in Archive, August 2021

Pacing; Using A Wig

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Moments ago I quickly signed off a Facebook live as my partner walked through the front door, home from his evening gym session. Normally during my lives I’m very good at opening up and sharing my concerns but tonight I struggled. They are superficial to say the least.

Yet as Damon sat down I burst into tears. This seems to have become an evening routine. I’m physically struggling at the moment so I’m cutting corners where I can to save energy and reduce pain. This is starting to really bother me. Things like washing my hair is something I do as little as possible as it’s painful, energy drainage, and often leads to a flare in pots, eds and dystonic symptoms. Yet I don’t want to look unclean. The solution I have in mind I’m not to sure of. I don’t know whether to go for a drastic buzz cut and wig wearing while it grows back; the difference being I would follow the no poo method which would result in less physical stress on my body, or just to try to wig wear on days when I’m struggling.

Trying a wig for the first time to explore the idea

I’m still exploring my options. I’m not reaching for the razor on the back of feeling emotional no matter how tempting it may seem. The plan currently is to reach out to hairdresser’s first for advice on the above idea but also on the issue of hair loss which I currently have in certain patches which gets me down. I’d love to hear from anyone whose done similar.

Posted in Archive, August 2021

Adapt, Rethink, Go

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We recently had to return the power wheelchair we had on hire. It had been with us for the best part of a year and had quickly become a very integral part of daily life. It reduced my pain, dislocation frequency and enabled me to get out and about everyday. It was freeing. We’d hoped by the time it had to be returned that I’d have been seen by the local wheelchair service for an assessment as currently I dislocate my fingers while trying to push my manuel chair. However it’s a long waiting list and an appointment date is still a while a way.

In the meantime I’m reassessing how much activity I can do and what I do each day. My head deffinently believes I’m more capable than what my body thinks I am able to do. A lot of this week has been spent resting and trying to find a happy medium. However I’m also currently on week three of my period and I know that when I have extended bleeds I generally feel rubbish and my joints and muscles seem to be worse in general.

I’ve started introducing sleep hygiene into my night routine to help improve the quality of my sleep and to see if it improves how rested I feel. I’m trying to have no screens for an hour or two before bed. Instead I’m reading and crocheting. This has also given my mental health a little boost as well which is positive.

I’ve had a gyny appointment come through for the end of September, so not long to go now. Hopefully this one won’t get cancelled.

Posted in Archive, July 2021

Injection Day and referral thoughts

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Picture of Rebecca wearing a facemask and holding a takeaway coffee cup sitting in a hospital waiting room waiting for an appointment. Wearing a brown cardigan, black white spotty top, blue disposal facemask,
Waiting to see my neurologist

Today was botox day up in London with my lovely neurologist. He’s happy that the medication we started on a few months back is keeping me far more stable, which is amazing, so we are keeping that in my treatment plan. I’m currently on a medium dose so we have room to play with should we need to come winter when I typically go down hill due to the cold.

I’ve finally gotten the date for my video fleursoscopy which is the middle of next week. I’m a little nervous but it will be good to shed some light on what’s been going on internally and if there is anything specific that we can do/change to tackle it. This is to tackle the chronic aspiration.

Then it’s on to blood tests. Whilst I don’t mind these particularly, my veins are world class players at hide and seek. No matter how much I drink before hand they like to hide or better yet collapse. I often leave blood tests looking somewhat like a pin cushion. These are being done just to double check there’s nothing being missed and causing any issues whilst we wait for Gyny to see me. They were meant to see me almost a year ago. However they keep rearranging and cancelling my appointments, which my lovely GP is chasing. In the meantime I’m left with regular pain flares that leave me doubled up in pain.

I’m hoping now that more people are vaccinated that appointments/refferals may start going back to normal. Specially orthotics is one appointment I’m looking forward to, my knees and wrists need new splints. It’s not an urgent appointment in anyway but it would make day to day life a bit easier and reduce pain a little more.

In the meantime I’m ticking along. I’m looking forward to the schools breaking up and making the most of the summer holidays before my eldest starts primary school full time.

This made me laugh a lot. Credit to Theraspecs
Posted in Archive, March 2021

Back from Break; Update

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It’s been a few weeks since my last post, as some of you will know from my Facebook page I took time away whilst my son had a major surgery. Now things are settling again the posting schedule will be returning to normal.

So what’s been happening? My neurologist and I have been trialing different medications over the last three months to try and improve my quality of life, bring my pain levels down and reduce the number of Jaw Operations I have. We tried a number of different ones before landing on trihexyphenidyl. This medicine has been life changing. It’s drastically reduced the constant jaw spasms, and whilst they are still there the severity is reduced and manageable. We’re still playing around with the dosage to see how much further we can control my spasms. It’s been amazing.

I’m still waiting for a Barrium Swallow test to confirm my chronic Aspiration and give the dietician an idea of what thickness fluids need to be to help stop this. In the meantime the speech and language therapist is checking in regularly to ensure I’m doing ok.

Currently I’m waiting to see my Gastro Dr as my GI symptoms have returned. It’s extremely painful to eat or drink anything heavier than a cup of tea. I’m pretty much living off sugary tea in the meantime to get by.

On a more positive note I’ve just signed a three ebook deal for my young adult fantasy series which is very exciting. I feel very fortunate that this is something I can do from home while the children are asleep, as given the severity of all my conditions on my body a typical job is out of the question.

Finally I want to say thank you for the support I’ve received over the last few weeks. It’s been extremely touching. Now that this post is up and you are all caught up I’ll be back to posting my usual blogs from tomorrow.

Posted in Archive, January 2021

The Test Results Are In

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After spending the last several months in and out of hospital, losing the sight in my eye for an extended period of time and only partially regaining it, losing all sensation in my right leg and experiencing sensory issues in my arms I was once again told it looked like I had MS. Yet the examinations didn’t agree. I was left battling for help as different hospitals and departments seemed to find it impossible to communicate with each other. Well the most recent test results are in! We finally have an answer.

If I am honest I had almost given up on a diagnosis other than unknown complex neurology condition with global sensory loss. None of my Drs were communicating with each other, no one could agree with each other and that was resulting in me receiving no treatment. It has been a period of high stress and extreme emotion.

Today I finally had my Emergency Video Consultation  with the local specialist in Neurology; this was requested back in October. Firstly they are agreed it isn’t MS which is great confirmation. What they are sure of is that is another part of my Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome. Apprerently when I’m dislocating my knees the nerves around it are being over stretched and damaged hence the loss in sensation/function. The same thing had happened to my elbows causing the sensation I was getting in my lower arms and hands. This surprised me greatly; mainly as I had in fact asked the doctors this very question when I was on the ward last year and they laughed at me for suggesting it. In regards to my eyes the nerves are not communicating with my brain effectively, but are not damaged like you get in MS.

He’s suggested we get me booked in with my EDS consultant for some advice in the meantime on how to cope with these symptoms as they can last a significant amount of time.

So whilst the EDS is generally on a slippery slope currently and it’s all about managing it, keeping on top of my pain and being proactive, I feel that overall it was a very positive chat.

Posted in Archive, January 2021

Lockdown, Homeschooling and Work

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With the introduction of the new lockdown I had had been planning on getting crafty with the kids again. That idea was snuffed out after an email landed in my email box confirming that nursery would be doing live home lessons followed by tasks to be completed, photographed and emailed to his teachers. All well and good except my partner works shifts and I have an 18 month old whose favourite word is no, also takes no as a yes and will most deffinently try to touch every key on my laptop.

So today was the first home school lesson. After half an hour of technical wrestleling we finally got on to Teams and were met by a chorus of STEFAN. The children were happily mucking around with each other, my daughter was desperately trying to join in and the teacher? Her laptop had the same issues mine had to start with and never made it to the lesson. Round two tomorrow!

Dystonia and Me Holistic Health Coaching is officially up and running which has added a lovely touch to my evenings. I have been thoroughly enjoying chatting with different people with a range of issues and starting them on their journeys with me.

Colourful heart enlarging in further colours being touched by a human figure in blues and purples

I would love to hear if any has had the vaccine yet? From the calculator I predict mine to be late Feb to March at the current injection rates and would be interested to hear your experience in the comments. I personally will be accepting the offer of the jab, I just would like to go in to it eyes open to side effects.