It's been a hell of a month. I made light of it in a post before, but I've spent pretty much every day between that post and this one in the grips of a hypochondria that I've otherwise mostly held at bay since childhood. I've been to the doctor at least once every week, and had an x-ray, a nerve conduction test, and an MRI. I've been prescribed everything from special shampoo to muscle relaxants to antibiotics. I'm fairly sure that I actually succeeded in worrying myself sick last week. What I have to show for all that now is a doctor's recommendation that I try physical therapy to get my back (which I've abused for years with poor posture) right, and hopefully alleviate the issues in my legs.
Now that I have some sort of diagnosis, I can feel myself starting to come out of it, but it's far from over. I still wake up in a mild panic once in a while, my mind racing to the disturbing facts I learned and cannot unlearn before I forbade myself from visiting WebMD (by actually blocking the domain on my router). My heart rate still routinely jumps up over 100 beats per minute whenever I think about checking my heart rate. My hands still shake a bit when I take time to see if my hands are shaking. I'm less of a wreck than I've been, but still a bit wreckish.
I don't especially like posting about this stuff. But I've had to come to terms with the fact over the last month or so that I'm so susceptible to this kind of thing that it can completely lay me out, so I guess I'd better start dealing with it. So this is...that. I guess. A record of me being convinced this afternoon that I'm okay, despite not always feeling that way.
It's also a way for me to send a little anonymous support back out into the Internet, which provided not only the ammo for me to start feeling this way, but also (when I learned to look in the right places) a fair amount of comfort in the knowledge that lots of people freak out like this.
So, yeah. I completely lost it for most of June. But I'm back now. I think. Who needs a drink?
Next on the list of things I'm going to have to swear off of to keep myself sane: watching Mets games.
