Sleeping makes everything easier

So I slept 8 whole hours on Friday night and got a good nap in yesterday. Then last night I slept for 7 hours and have had an hour nap and a 2 hour nap today. I feel a little more together, although with the Ativan, Valium, and Benadryl dosages I also feel a little loopy. But I'll take that over the exhaustion, mood swings, and severe noise and light sensitivity ANY DAY!

Today we made a spreadsheet to map out all of the supplements I will be taking. It will help me see not just when to take them, but if I need to take the with food, etc. So far she's starting me on 14 supplements and they should help tremendously. Now that I have them on a schedule I can start taking them today and easing into the treatment plan she has set out for me. But when I looked at that big box full of bottles of various pills and powders on Friday afternoon I couldn't fathom how I was going to sort it all out into some sort of cohesive order! All of this has been overwhelming at times and I am so thankful for Melissa and Christy for letting me know before hand that I would feel this way. I can't imagine if M & I had just popped up here with no idea of what to expect - we might have already packed back up & headed home!

I do love that this doctor believes in supplements and diet as a major part of getting my health back. I think the body works as a whole so that diet and hormone or vitamin deficencies would cause a lof of problems even if I got rid of all the bacteria. I like the idea of trying to take the most natural drugs instead of a ton of "band aid" drugs that just cover symptoms. These will actually allow me to heal instead of just keeping the symptoms at bay. Now of course the antibiotics, Valium & Ativan are real heavy duty drugs but they are used a bandaids for the severe shock my central nervous system is going through right now. They will help me handle the actual treatment.

For those who don't know, when you attack and kill multiple bacteria and viruses in the body the waste ends up in your blood stream and can often make your symptoms worse before they get better. At least that's the best definition I have of what is referred to as a Herxheimer's reaction. I love the fact that she wants to be very aggressive in treating me but also is trying to keep me as comfortable as possible while I go through this aggressive treatment regimen.

We started easing into the diet last night. Since I had a bad herx reaction when I went on the strict no-yeast diet last year (which landed me in the ER for dehydration) she knows my body might not be able to tolertate much. That's what the supplements will help with along with the Ativan & Valium. The Benadryl is taken in 50 mg doses at night at then at 12.5 or 25 mg doses during the day as needed up to 200 mg a day. That alone will leave me a little out of it. But I understand that she is trying to get my histamine levels as low as possible before fighting everything so that my allergies don't signal my immune system to attack itself even more.

I'll try and write more tomorrow. We are tired, but we are so very thankful to be here with a doctor who is looking at every possible problem I could have! We have never felt like we could really trust the doctors before and that they were more concerned about getting their paycheck than really helping me (of course there were a couple of exceptions like Dr. G & Dr. H who we both still love). It's just amazing to hear her discuss how my entire body is going through a very understandable process from being exposed to viruses and bacteria from as long as 30 years ago. How those things can wear down hormone reactions and everything else until I ended up in the bed feeling like a 90 year old woman.

Thank you all so much for your prayers and thoughts and showing of support. I do need it now more than ever because this road is definitely uphill from here. But M & I are willing to climb any mountain to get me back to health & we praise God for leading us to a doctor who knows how to teach us to climb that mountain!

We trust that God in His infinite wisdom is using these trials to strengthen our faith and we feel certain that He has plans for us that we can't begin to imagine. We just need to step out in faith day by day and not worry about the day after that. Trusting in Him for every little thing is hard, but we're both learning it's the only way to get the results we really want. We know God is good and He will never fail us.

"Who shall seperate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or sword? No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us." Romans 8:35-37 (NIV)