Friday, February 11, 2011

Box 3

Yesterday I started my third box of Mr C.  That means I've had a grand total of 56 doses... 58 including this morning's injection and the day befores shot in my blubbery bum.  It has not been a hard 58 doses, but I think it's all about how you think about the medication.  I am adamant if I was anxious or angry that I would not be able to say that taking the medication is fine.  Yes there are some humongous welts, yes there is some itching and yes the needle does sting... but this medication is helping me stay well for longer.  It’s obviously not as good as never having had the disease, but it's treatment for this menacing, low down and down right sneaky disease.

I would like to add, that I am finding that I am not as itchy as I was (touch wood) and probably half the time now, the sting of the medication entering my body is almost non-existent depending on the location.  Sometimes I'm not sure where to put the tissue to apply pressure because there is no big sting.  A little baby sting might develop, but it is almost unnoticeable.  Unfortunately the welts are still pretty big on my thighs and I get an occasional bruise, but as I am not in the habit of wearing short skirts or hot pants I think I might possibly be able to live with them.  When I have to wear bathers for my son's swimming lessons once a week I could come up with something “smart” to say, like I put my cigartettes out on my legs or I was holding my daughter down to do her hair and she bit me.

The other thing I would like to mention is the price of Mr C.  I don't think I have ever spent $1092.65 on myself in one hit for two months running ever or even anything close to that.  That is $39.02 per injection!  So it makes me happy to say that Mr C is PBS covered and costs my family a grand total of $34.20 a month or $1.22 per injection or $410.40 a year.  I think the yearly amount covered my bill last year for all the presents I bought for all the friend's birthday parties Chynna attended.  Oh well no gifts this year...

Symptoms update... on and off for about 2 weeks now I have had a buzzy right foot.  It's a hard sensation to describe as most MS sensory symptoms are.  How's your imagination, sort of like pins and needles super fast and not so big.  One night my left foot ached like I had been standing on it all day without a break and I've had some Lhermitte's, but this is a fairly standard symptom for me.

A few days ago I was at the computer, catching up on blogs and checking out my uni timetable for perhaps an hour when I noticed that I couldn't really read my tutorial details.  It seemed like my sight had a furry, buzzy, shakey halo in it.  It was interrupting my reading by completely blocking my vision of a word in a sentence.  I got up from the computer - very calmly I might say, and looked at a newspaper on the table and I still couldn't read the sentence.  Obviously the first thing in my head was, so this is how your vision goes (with MS) closely followed by staring at the computer screen has done this, although it has never happened before.  So I decided to ring my husband.  I started the conversation with you are not going to believe this, but my uni day has changed from Tuesday to Thursday.  There was some discussion around this... about who would now be available to look after our son.  I introduced the eyesight issue with, but this probably isn't going to matter much when I won't be able to see the board, my eyes are doing something w-e-i-r-d.  I can say for once, Ryan was the one who was more in a quandary than me.  Make sure you don't drive the car - well actually I thought I'd drive into the city and pick you up - hello - of course not!

I called to speak with my MS nurse, but it was her day off and so I spoke to another one, who called me back after half an hour.  By that time my vision was restored.  In theory, for it to be considered an MS relapse it should last at least 24 hours, so I guess I fall short by 23 and a half hours!  Maybe it was looking at the screen for too long, but it's never happened before.  The nurse I asked if I was tired, I wasn't but I did mention I was feeling off and gastro had taken up residence in my home.  The following day the nurse called me again to check up, but my vision was normal.

What to do?  Make a note and tell my neurologist about it at my appointment in March.
Have a great weekend.

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