- Joined
- Nov 18, 2014
- Messages
- 4,887
- Reason
- PALS
- Diagnosis
- 08/2015
- Country
- US
- State
- South
- City
- The Beach
I'm back again for another rant. It seems like my health gets more and more complicated each week.
Late last year I felt some pressure in my lower belly. I was also urinating frequently but felt my bladder wasn't emptying. I asked my PC doc to order a urinalysis to see if it was a UTI. I had only one UTI in my life and the symptoms were entirely different but I had the bladder thing before and the urologist had to go in and stretch my urethra out. It worked 10 years ago. The urinalysis showed white blood cells as did the routine one before (six months prior.) I assumed it was a UTI but decided to go to the urologist so he could ultrasound my bladder and test for UTI at same time and get it right.
He did the sonogram and said my bladder was completely empty and leukocytes in the urine was common "in lots of women." The pressure came and went for about another four months. It got pretty bad about three weeks ago so I ordered a patient-paid urine culture online and took it to my local lab. Meanwhile, I had gone to a GYN who thought it might be a yeast infection and gave me some diflucan which I didn't take. The PAP smear came back normal and there was no yeast. He didn't culture for bacteria. I also had a return visit to the CR surgeon to evaluate the fissure. He said the burning I was still getting was from a small new fissure but he was confident that I could use the cream, keep taking stool softeners and heal it.
When I got home I had the results from the culture. Sure enough, I had a UTI. I looked at the results and antibiotic recommendation. I was allergic to three out of four effective drugs for this type of bacteria. I called the GYN and he faxed an order to the drugstore. I started taking the antibiotic that day (four days ago - Nitrofurantoin Mono/Mac) No relief for the first three days.
Yesterday I decided to test my urine Ph and it was acidic. So I ate and drank some base food/drink and noticed an improvement, probably a coincidence. I had also dramatically reduced sodium so the water could flush out my kidneys faster (just trying to use some common sense because I felt like I was retaining water.)
Today I woke up with vertigo. Here's where it gets interesting. I've had vertigo in the past and was misdiagnosed with Meniere's. I ended up going to University of Pittsburgh Balance Center in 2005 for two days of testing. The results were cervicogenic vertigo, dislocated TMJ, and migraine associated vertigo. I had damage to both vestibular nerves and he said he doubted my Meniere's diagnosis was correct even though I experienced ringing, fullness, and vertigo episodes because my hearing was so good. He said my hearing was so good I was in the top 1% of people tested. From that point on I noticed that when I chewed things like popcorn or overused my neck I would get mild vertigo episodes or constant dizziness that could last days, weeks or months. They seemed to decrease a lot when I stopped working because my neck movement from looking down, then back up on the computer (sometimes for 5-8 hours a day) went away.
So today, when I bent over, I had a bad episode that made me have to sit down. It took several minutes to correct. I decided to take my blood pressure and it was 83/65. I normally have low blood pressure but thought it might be orthostatic hypotension. I ended up taking an antivert to see if it helped. Then I made a protein shake with lots of potassium-rich ingredients and shook some salt into it.
Being an OCD problem solver I went online to look at the side effects of the antibiotic. Very few but it did say dizziness in people over 60.
So I decided to just distract myself by going on Facebook. First post I saw was a PALS who almost died from a bladder infection. Good grief. It's OK to laugh because I'm laughing.
I hesitate to tell all this stuff to my primary care tomorrow. She'll probably suggest I go back on Xanax.
I couldn't help thinking about all the anxiety-ridden DIHALS people with their multiple non-ALS symptoms as I was typing this post.
Late last year I felt some pressure in my lower belly. I was also urinating frequently but felt my bladder wasn't emptying. I asked my PC doc to order a urinalysis to see if it was a UTI. I had only one UTI in my life and the symptoms were entirely different but I had the bladder thing before and the urologist had to go in and stretch my urethra out. It worked 10 years ago. The urinalysis showed white blood cells as did the routine one before (six months prior.) I assumed it was a UTI but decided to go to the urologist so he could ultrasound my bladder and test for UTI at same time and get it right.
He did the sonogram and said my bladder was completely empty and leukocytes in the urine was common "in lots of women." The pressure came and went for about another four months. It got pretty bad about three weeks ago so I ordered a patient-paid urine culture online and took it to my local lab. Meanwhile, I had gone to a GYN who thought it might be a yeast infection and gave me some diflucan which I didn't take. The PAP smear came back normal and there was no yeast. He didn't culture for bacteria. I also had a return visit to the CR surgeon to evaluate the fissure. He said the burning I was still getting was from a small new fissure but he was confident that I could use the cream, keep taking stool softeners and heal it.
When I got home I had the results from the culture. Sure enough, I had a UTI. I looked at the results and antibiotic recommendation. I was allergic to three out of four effective drugs for this type of bacteria. I called the GYN and he faxed an order to the drugstore. I started taking the antibiotic that day (four days ago - Nitrofurantoin Mono/Mac) No relief for the first three days.
Yesterday I decided to test my urine Ph and it was acidic. So I ate and drank some base food/drink and noticed an improvement, probably a coincidence. I had also dramatically reduced sodium so the water could flush out my kidneys faster (just trying to use some common sense because I felt like I was retaining water.)
Today I woke up with vertigo. Here's where it gets interesting. I've had vertigo in the past and was misdiagnosed with Meniere's. I ended up going to University of Pittsburgh Balance Center in 2005 for two days of testing. The results were cervicogenic vertigo, dislocated TMJ, and migraine associated vertigo. I had damage to both vestibular nerves and he said he doubted my Meniere's diagnosis was correct even though I experienced ringing, fullness, and vertigo episodes because my hearing was so good. He said my hearing was so good I was in the top 1% of people tested. From that point on I noticed that when I chewed things like popcorn or overused my neck I would get mild vertigo episodes or constant dizziness that could last days, weeks or months. They seemed to decrease a lot when I stopped working because my neck movement from looking down, then back up on the computer (sometimes for 5-8 hours a day) went away.
So today, when I bent over, I had a bad episode that made me have to sit down. It took several minutes to correct. I decided to take my blood pressure and it was 83/65. I normally have low blood pressure but thought it might be orthostatic hypotension. I ended up taking an antivert to see if it helped. Then I made a protein shake with lots of potassium-rich ingredients and shook some salt into it.
Being an OCD problem solver I went online to look at the side effects of the antibiotic. Very few but it did say dizziness in people over 60.
So I decided to just distract myself by going on Facebook. First post I saw was a PALS who almost died from a bladder infection. Good grief. It's OK to laugh because I'm laughing.
I hesitate to tell all this stuff to my primary care tomorrow. She'll probably suggest I go back on Xanax.
I couldn't help thinking about all the anxiety-ridden DIHALS people with their multiple non-ALS symptoms as I was typing this post.
