What a Difference Six Hours Make

I went to both Dr Movahed and Dr Keller yesterday and I think they came up with some things that are helping me.

I talked with Dr Movahed about all the things that have been bothering me.  Much as I has suspected, he said that it was all very normal and that I was still doing very well and he was still very happy with my condition.  What he was not happy with the fact that I had gotten 2.5 hours of sleep the night before.  He asked how much I'm sleeping and I told him about five hours a night, usually in one to two ours stints with long periods awake in between.  He was concerned about that and pointed out the being sleep deprived stresses the body, a stressed body produced cortisol and cortisol inhibits healing.  From Wikipedia: "Elevated levels of cortisol, if prolonged, can lead to proteolysis (breakdown of proteins) and muscle wasting.^[9] Several studies have shown a lipolytic (breakdown of fat) effect of cortisol, although, under some conditions, cortisol may somewhat suppress lipolysis.^[10] Another function is to decrease bone formation.^[3]  So he recommended I take a sleep aid.  I totally wasn't interested in that be he not-so-gently insisted.  So I got a prescription for clonazepam which is on-label used for panic disorders and seizures.  But he said that he's tried a lot of medications over the years and this is the one that works best for his patients, allowing them to sleep and sometimes helping with muscle pain as well.

Then is was to Dr Keller.  I talked with him about he same things.  He decided that he was going to try dropping my elastics from a 6 (whatever that means) to a 2.  This would elevate the tightness and the clenching.  We decided to go ahead and fix the broken bracket too so we could return to the original elastics configuration.  Being in the loosened elastics has made me feel so much better.  He gave me some 4 elastics as well, in case I didn't feel like I was getting enough support from the 2s.  But, so far. I'm happy and going to stick with them.

Last night I took the clonazepam and got a solid six hours of sleep.  I felt so good this morning!  One problem?  It also tended to try to fall over for no reason and stared at air molecules.  Dr Movahad said that might happen but that it should clear up in a few days.  But I was so happy to feel good that I didn't mind having to make James come home from work to drive me to P.T. (neither of us felt I was safe to drive).  That and the fact I don't hurt from the elastics are making me a much happier camper.  And look what I can do to prove it!

Yeppers, I can smile!  Yay!

So at the moment, I'm feeling better about things than I have in about a week.  And I think everybody is grateful for that!

See everybody later!