Candor Creek

My guardian during depressive evenings. I went three months and nearly two weeks with no epipen (!!!!!!) which was a huge milestone for me. Avoided it twice in that time by taking a certain med during what I call pre-anaphylaxis, but tonight's attack descended hard and fast. I almost thought I'd need the second pen. Now is when I'll own up to the weird depression I've had for a week - and you'll see why in a moment. A particularly rough two weeks of PMDD came and went, I was good and active for about five or six days, and then the paralyzing fog knocked me out again. Finally called psych doc so that she knows and we are not adjusting meds yet for various reasons, all of which I agree with. One of these is that one of the symptoms of MCAS can actually be depression (and anxiety) due to all those mast cells mucking things up in that blood/brain barrier. This means that if I'm having an inflamatory response the depression could be a side effect of that. Fu...

Another musician on drugs. It's kinda amazing what can happen when you're on (and adjusting) proper medication and are working with a competent and caring psych team that is capable of putting up with your extensive medical issues. I'm aware that most of the people reading this probably don't know that I have any musical hobbies at all save being a proud alto - but my musical inclinations were early and strong. One of my earlier memories is being just under five and figuring out the interlude to "Fool on the Hill" on the little blue recorder I had gotten at Disneyland that day. I grew up in a singing family where we'd put on the tunes and harmonize: Mom took the alto part, my sister took soprano, and I took/figured out the third part. It turned out I had perfect pitch and subsequently taught myself several instruments by ear - none well, but I had good starts. I started writing four part harmonies by high school. I unfortunately learned that these...

The chocolate I'd be eating... if I wasn't in a flare. :( I have the clarity right now, so I'm talking about a difficult topic. It's one of those mini-essays I write that sometimes stops me from getting sicker, and I need all the help I can get right now. The PMS/PMDD is right on time, which is actually a giant, relieving sign that I may be headed out of this flare soon. The second half of a cycle is always more reactive for many women, both for allergies and MCAS. Being a very rare two weeks late in Jan/Feb (!!!) due to the stress of losing my dog made me super reactive and directly resulted in my current MCAS flare and prolonged recovery. ...but it also means that the Monster is back, and I hate, fight, and fear her. I'm now laying here, still recovering, with this constant psychic pain, this rage. It's physical.  It's in my chest and arms and shoulders. I actually twitch. The emotion always comes first, and it quickly wraps itself around any nea...