Relapse

I've been blanching and freezing carrots and green beans, chopping chard for morning stir fry, processing and freezing basil pesto, and composting our spring lettuce and cilantro plants that have bolted and become bitter... planting in their places kale, spinach, snow peas, and more lettuce that I hope we'll be able to enjoy early this fall. I've also murdered hundreds of cabbage worms (This is becoming a yearly tradition.) that had eaten our smoothie kale (our nickname for curly-leaf kale that grows really well all season here unless it is being eaten by hundreds of voracious cabbage worms). Now that the worms are gone, the kale is resurrecting itself. I'm hoping to start adding it to our smoothies again in the near future.

I've also been wrestling with the conundrum not only of a relapse of symptoms related to auto-immune junk, but some added symptoms that I've never before experienced. I'm getting the fridge and the grocery list ready to put myself back on a modified AIP, backing way off the caffeine, trying to take time out to get some mild exercise, and forcing myself to chill out.

While I'm dealing with several auto-immune diseases, the diagnosis that gives me the most angst is Hashimoto's Thyroiditis. I've been enjoying a relatively long "balanced" period, but typically I'm either making too much thyroid hormone (The current situation.), or not enough.

I was placed on an iodine supplement close to a year ago to counter an under-active thyroid, and while it absolutely corrected a lot of problems for a while, I'm currently under the impression that it's helped knock me back into hyperthyroid mode. I took myself off of it for about a week and a half, started to feel a bit more like myself, and then tried one on Monday just to experiment and make sure it was one of the culprits. Tuesday I felt like death and Wednesday morning I had a panic attack on 7 making my way to the new Leesburg Wal Mart. I had to exit at business 7 and go home a back way after taking several minutes to get myself calmed down in a church parking lot. Trying to mask the symptoms for my kiddos, I pretended that I was lost and grabbed up my phone to look at my map apps, simultaneously trying to breathe deeply, blink back tears, and pray while losing an argument with Jonathan who knew exactly where we were.

I also took myself off a thyroid supplement I'd been taking, which, like the iodine, had wondrous effects when I first started taking it, but is now, very likely, working against me. Initially, I started taking them every other day. Now I'm off completely.

I figured I'd flipped over to hyperthyroid when I started feeling anxious, irritable, and tense again more often than not. My normal heart rate is on the low side of normal, so when my heart starts to race, I know something's up. Another weird but apparently common symptom for some folks is plantar fasciitis. I get it in my left foot when I flip over into hyperthyroid mode. I didn't even realize it had started up again until some folks noticed I was favoring my right foot at church. Just a few days after that, it was full blown and I was ordering new athletic shoes.  

Heart palpitations and mild anxiety are pretty common with me, but the extreme anxiety and panic attacks associated with driving are pretty new. My first panic attack behind the wheel was February a year ago on a return trip from Tupelo, MS. I was trying to drive on I-81 for Jason so he could relax a bit. I had to exit just a mile later. I didn't seem to have trouble in slower town traffic until I had to drive Melanie to an eye specialist in Ashburn several months later. I struggled a bit there (mostly in the faster sections on 7), but since I had to do that drive many times before her eye issue was resolved, I managed to struggle through and get over it relatively quickly. Now I'm getting on the highway and devolving into full-on panic almost immediately. At first I thought I was just panicking on overpasses and mountain passes. Last week, I managed to drive over the mountain and long-ish Shenandoah River overpass to Charles Town, WV. While I did struggle quite a bit, with God's help, we made it without a full-blown attack. It was a shock to experience one on Wednesday heading the other direction on a relatively short, level jaunt.

Since the fridge and the pantry were pretty bare, I had to go to Giant this morning. While I actually struggled to drive there (three to five minutes from home), thankfully, I only experienced mild anxiety on the way and almost none on the way home.

We've started school as I continue to prep for the coming months. The kids are learning how to help at home and be fully-functioning members of the Allen team, but they still really need me to be on as much as possible. My little guy can sense that mama feels yucky in increasing intervals and his preferred method of helping is constantly attempting to make us all laugh, which just really makes me want to cry. He senses and internalizes that too. So while I work out how to cope with and treat this latest relapse, I don't want to lose sight of my biggest and best job. I want to make sure my kiddos know that their pain and their triumphs are just as important, if not more important to me, than my own. They are awesome kids.

I'm currently pre-reading some of their "textbooks". Jonathan began reading a biography on his own this year called Poor Richard (Benjamin Franklin). He is giving me more detail in his oral narrations than I wrote in my pre-reading notes. This is neat because it's been our target from the beginning. The idea is that it will eventually all translate into detailed and fluid written communication. I was more overwhelmed about this aspect of our school year than any other, and he is definitely rising to the occasion and exceeding my expectations. The jury is still out on whether or not Melanie will start to read the same books on her own when she completes her reading program this year. In ways she is a better reader than her brother (better at decoding difficult words - he still does a lot of guessing - more laziness than anything I think), but she hasn't reached his level of comprehension. Most likely, I will hold off with her until next year.

I don't want to divert my attention from raising, ministering to, and educating my kids. So this health stuff really frustrates me. And while I feel like the Lord is protecting me from falling into the grip of depression and defeat, I do not want these setbacks to dampen my children's experiences.

The other day, I took an afternoon to look at all the activities and necessities available in and near our town and accessible by slow back-country roads. Turns out I can get to co-op, the new Wal Mart, camp, swimming lessons, ballet, gymnastics, the new doctor, and soccer without topping a mountain, crossing an overpass, or getting on the freeway. Do I want to stay in that rut? No way. But for now, I'm not completely grounded and I can give myself some margin to breathe.

And while I pre-read school books for my kiddos (My occupation for at least the next eight years or so.), I'm also pre-reading and completing some personal Bible study/quiet time materials I purchased to work through in an effort to test them out before handing them over to Jonathan and Melanie in a few years. The first is an in-depth study of 1 Peter. I'm just going to have to purchase new booklets for the kiddos because I've decided to make this one my very own. It is perfect material for the current situation. While I'm combating this with prayer, a highly anticipated doctor's appointment in early August, exercise, herbs, essential oils, supplement addition and removal, and some serious grit, nothing beats the power of God's word to set a heart and mind straight.

I've been hesitant to share this because I'm always concerned that in a faith community, folks assume that anxiety, panic, and fear denote a lack of faith or some hidden sin. Well, that's definitely possible here (I'm constantly asking for more faith and for eyes to see my own blind spots. I know they're there!), but it's also true that these issues are triggered by unavoidable chemical imbalances. We are fallen creatures after all. So for anyone else out there that might be facing this, you're not alone! Let me encourage you to ask for help and ask for prayer. I'm trying, and failing a lot, but I have hope that this will be a short season. Something I'm also considering is finding some Christian counsel or psychiatric help that I can easily access either by phone or a back roads. 😊 Now that I've had panic attacks while driving, even when my thyroid situation has leveled out, I'm concerned that I will panic anyway in those same scenarios. I want to be safe on the road, especially when my children are riding with me.

Here's hoping my struggle will help someone else.  While I don't wish this kind of thing on anyone, just a quick Google search is all I need to know that what I'm dealing with is all too common. If you're lumped in there with me, take heart and ask for help! 💗

FYI: While thyroid disturbances (including early-onset thyroid disease and cancer) are actually hereditary on both sides of my family, the symptoms are sometimes mistaken for bi-polar disorder and other mental illnesses. Lithium (a common medication used for bi-polar disorder) actually causes even sub-clinical Hashimoto's Thyroiditis to kick into overdrive. Mis-diagnosis in that scenario can often have grave consequences.