My Story Zig-Zags

After organizing my thoughts and memories, I've come to realize that I still have a lot to tell you. So, rather than dragging this on for a month, I'm just going to start putting more in one post. Be prepared to read a long post!


So, its January 2009. I have just started this new anti-depressant. I'm having a hard time adjusting, and am totally embarrassed! I didn't want anyone to know what kind of medicine I was taking! Other than my immediate family, I didn't tell a soul. Even my own sister and brother-in-law didn't know for months.


Once my body started to adjust, I thought I was feeling a little better. So, encouraged, I re-enroll in all my classes from last semester at Garrett College.....


Bad Idea #3!


All through February and March things seem to be going at least OK. I'm trudging through classes, and I've learned to live with the awful side effects of the medicine.


And then April arrives. My dear Grandma Rosina passes away from complications after open-heart surgery. My body goes crazy!


I can't focus. Nothing makes sense anymore. My brain is literally in a blur.


Yes, I had to drop all my classes at GC. I was starting to realize that my body wasn't handling stress the way most bodys do. Yes, my whole family was upset about Grandma, but my body's reaction to this stress seemed different than theirs.


A few months go by, and I'm now working at a very low stress job. My father had hired me to do the bookkeeping work at a local corner store. I seemed to be able to handle that ok, although I wasn't working very many hours.


While reading the news paper one Sunday afternoon, I notice an ad from a local College saying they would be offering a Certified Nursing Assistant/Geriatric Nursing Assistant course for 10 weeks over the summer. I was so excited! I looked up all the info on their website, and was enrolled by the end of that week.


This 'break-up depression' that my doctor had diagnosed me with seemed to be under control with the medicine. So, without even thinking about how I was feeling, I plunged into summer school.


All through June I'm feeling great! I have a 104% so far in my classes, and I'm thinking I'm back to normal. However, near the beginning of July, I wake one morning not feeling right. I was dizzy, had the shakes, my stomach was upset.


By the time I left for school I was so dizzy I didn't think I was going to be able to make the 25 minute drive. I made it though, and told my professor right away that I wasn't feeling well. Conveniently, I was in nursing school, so in just a few minutes my classmates had taken my pulse and blood pressure. My pulse was 98 (normal is 72) and my BP was somewhere around ---way to high! My professor gave me an excused absence and sent me home. I was fine by the next morning so I went to school as normal the rest of the week.


It was getting closer to the end of the semester, and clinicals were just around the corner. Class was getting really stressful really fast!


By now, I had started to have more and more of these mornings where I'd wake up not feeling quite right. Only by God's grace was I able to shove through these days, pass my classes with flying colors, and complete clinicals right along side my class mates.


It's now August 2009. I passed all my written exams and skill evaluations and have received my CNA/GNA license --- which I proudly framed and hung on my bedroom wall :-)


Now that I have my license, I want a job!


Bad Idea #4!


After only a few weeks, I'm hired at a local nursing home. I did NOT want to work in a nursing home! My hope after completing my training was to work in home health care. However, it was a job and I was broke!


Only a few days at my new job go by, and those 'not quite right' mornings start showing up again. Only this time, they're 100% worse! I literally couldn't get out of bed! As soon as I would wake up, I'd start crying and screaming, I was dizzy, I couldn't put two thoughts together, and there was no way I could function.


Because of all this I had to call off work several times. One morning it was so horrible my own father wasn't strong enough to get me out of bed. It was like I had the strength of 200 men. My muscles would tense up, and I would roll into a fetal position and there was no way you were moving me. It wore me out so much, that I would easily sleep 40 out of 48 hours.


The horrible thing is, I'm telling you this now, but I don't remember ANY of it! All this is from what my family has told me. It was like I would black out during it all.


I had an episode one morning that was so bad my parents took me to the emergency room. However, by the time we got there, I had 'calmed' down, and was starting to feel a little more 'normal'. After talking to the ER doctor, he diagnosed me with Panic and Anxiety. Anytime any little bit of stress would enter my life, I would lose control.


A family friend recommends a new doctor. Not wanting to go back to my previous doctor...who at this time I was still upset with for 'mis-diagnosing' me.....I agree to see the new doctor. He promptly doubles my anti-depressant dose, and gives me a prescription for a narcotic Anxiety medicine.


Lets see...what number are we up to now? 5? Yes, I believe so.....


Bad Idea #5


The prescribed narcotic gave me an awful headache and made me so sick at work that I was throwing-up in the residents bathrooms. You can't take care of someone else when you're feeling as awful as I was.


At this point I'm grasping for straws. Anything that will make me feel like the 'old Kristin'. I start attending a new young adult Sunday school class at church. That didn't work....I can't tell you one thing we talked about, or who was there each week. My brain was zoned out!


Work just didn't seem possible at this time, so I had to resign my job due to medical reasons. My supervisor was great. She totally understood, and said she would hire me back as soon as I got feeling better!


We are now in November 2009. I've been off work for about a month. What I'm about to do next appeared to be a good idea at the time, but looking back now I realize just how stupid it was. I hadn't been working for a month, or doing ANYTHING else for that matter, so I had no stress in my life.....obviously I would be feeling better.


So what dumb idea do I have? I accept a position at a Pediatrician's Office. A full 40 hour a week job. This is during Swine Flu season, so its HIGH STRESS!


This isn't just a bad idea...it's a dumb idea


So....DUMB Idea #6


I'm not sure what I was thinking. But I guess when you can't put two thoughts together, you can't really be expected to think through decisions before you make them.


As soon as I start working again, the panic and anxiety attacks come back. A few mornings I had to pull to the side of the interstate on my way to work because I suddenly wouldn't know where I was. I would call home from the side of the road in complete panic! Sometimes I would make it to work on those kinds of mornings, sometimes my mom would have to come find me sitting along side the road and take me home.


I loved the job.....when I was there. We knew I had to do everything possible to keep this job. So my Mom went to a pharmacist who specializes in herbal supplements. She tells him my health history, and takes me in to see him.


Finally, I've been waiting so say this for oh so long....


GOOD Idea #1 :-D