I went to see my endocrinologist about a month ago. It was my routine appointment (that is usually every 6 months or so), but it was a new doctor (the other one retired early). I had been anticipating going to see her because I was anxious to have her run extra blood work and give me an overall checkup because I have been exhausted since July.
I mean, at the time, I had mono and it was completely expected that I would be exhausted for a while. I spent two weeks pretty much in the bed. I spent two more weeks only working part time hours and sleeping the rest of the day. My regular doctor told me if I took it easy and got some rest that I should recover. But if I didn't seriously get some rest, it would linger.
I took her for her word. I did rest. I didn't overdo anything. I underachieved. I know it's hard to believe because I am usually stoking 85 coals in the fire, but I really didn't do anything. My husband took care of the house. The projects (kitchen and bathrooms) that we had been so diligently working on just went into a state of limbo. When my husband started walking 2 miles a day to get back into shape, I went a few times but ultimately decided it was too much. If I wasn't at work or asleep, I have pretty much been sitting in my recliner.
So here we are 6 months later and I feel like whatever lingering fatigue leftover from mono should be gone. I had decided in my mind that something must be off in my vitamin levels. Since my husband and I had gastric sleeve surgery nearly six years ago, it's really easy for some vitamin or mineral level to get out of whack. We take a lot of supplements, but over the years have had to change up the mix several times to get everything to stay around normal.
So I asked her to run several extra things on my blood work, and she wanted me to have an MRI to check in on my pituitary tumor. It was not visible on my last MRI, but that was over 10 years ago. Since I have some unexplained symptoms, it had been so long, and she was new to my case, she wanted a look. I went and had the MRI on Friday.
Today, the radiology report was available online and the blood work came back weeks ago. All of my vitamin levels are in range. Nothing is out of whack with that. The radiology report noted that my pituitary is still misshapen (as it was in the last MRI I had), but the tumor is not visible and overall my brain scan was unremarkable. They didn't only look at my pituitary, he noted that everything in my brain was normal.
So here we are. "Nothing" is wrong. But I am tired all the time and have the motivation of a rock. Not just regarding the unfinished projects on the house, but for pretty much anything. I do what I absolutely have to do, and the rest is falling by the wayside. I feel like I am disappointing people, but I am sure that is only in my mind.
I wasn't sleeping very well, so I decided maybe it was because I was drinking an afternoon coffee at work. It was mostly as a pick me up because I am so tired in the afternoons, but I sort of felt like if it was affecting my sleep, it was keeping me in a pretty vicious loop. So I cut out the afternoon caffeine. This usually means that by the time I go to bed (at least on work days), I am super exhausted. But I am not having trouble going to sleep (or staying asleep).
I started questioning if I needed a new pillow, or maybe we needed a new mattress. The thing is that I am not uncomfortable. Before we bought this mattress, I woke up aching all the time. Like I had to get out of the bed because continuing to lay there was painful to my hips, neck, and back. I don't wake up like that now. But I am still tired all the dame time.
I am supposed to go back to the endocrinologist on January 9th. I anticipate she is going to pull out my blood work and my MRI results and see the same thing I do: nothing. But where does that leave me? Going back to my regular doctor to follow up on mono that should have been resolved months ago?
The only other thing I can think of that could be a problem is my blood sugar and insulin levels. I have hyperinsulinemia, which means my body overproduces insulin when I eat sugar or carbs. So, if I eat sugar/carbs, my blood sugar spikes, my body spikes insulin (more than I even need), so my blood sugar drops. I will get the shakes and feel kind of faint which is easily resolved with eating some sugar, but that just starts the whole process over again. I don't usually eat a lot of carbs without something else to balance out what my body is doing (protein, fat, etc), so these drops in my blood sugar don't happen daily.
But I would say they happen weekly either because I only eat something sweet, or I don't eat (too much time has passed). I am starting to wonder if the highs and lows of my blood sugar roller coaster is causing the fatigue. I was doing pretty well with staying with a relatively low carb diet until I got mono. Carbs are my comfort food, so not feeling good usually leads to eating more of them. That's really the only other thing that is different since July.
I have already decided to go back to low carb after the holidays. I knew that it would be too difficult to do that at Christmas, so I just eliminated the battle and decided it would make more sense after all of the end of the year celebrations are over. I am hopeful that maybe it's just my diet that is the problem. Because at this point, it isn't looking like I have a whole lot of answers coming from anywhere else.
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