POTS or MG?

A week ago I started a new medication- it constricts your blood vessels to help with the pooling in your legs and raise your blood pressure. I had some side effects, none that seemed too serious, so I put a message in with my doctor, he said keep taking it and I kept taking it. A week later, I don't think it's benefiting me, in fact perhaps making me worse. I put in another message with my doctor and waiting to hear back.

In question- is it MG or POTS? Then could it be due from this new medication, due from starting aquatic therapy, due from the heat, due from overdoing it? I'm referring to the past few days. Let's start with the biggest concern.

Saturday while making a quick stop at a store with my mom, I chose to walk because the store doesn't leave enough space between displays for a wheel chair. Stores really should fix that problem... if I could use my wheel chair I'd spend more time in there thus probably give them a bigger purchase. But instead I had to walk and it was cut short because my leg pretty much decided it didn't want to work. This was the most mild of the few times this happened. Fast forward to that evening. I shouldn't have, but I wanted to, so I went to church. On the walk in, my leg went dead. And then twice since then.

I'm not talking oh your leg falls asleep shake it and you're fine. I'm talking your legs are already weak and progress to extreme weakness in a matter of seconds. Your leg feels like it is weighted down with bricks and nailed to the ground. Your leg will not move. And then it hits the other leg. This turns into your legs being unable to support the rest of your body and if you don't sit down right away you will most likely fall to the ground as your legs collapse. Luckily all of the times it happened it was mainly just the one leg that I like shuffled/slid that leg, walking with the other til I got to a chair to sit down. I had to sit the entire church service and I always feel bad about that but then again it's better I'm there and sitting than not there at all. I use the wheel chair when someone goes with me. But when I'm alone which I've been trying to do more, I can't use the wheel chair because my arms are just as weak as my legs and I can't push myself.

Anyways, I still don't think I'm describing it well. It's scary. It's never happened before. Even when I was in the hospital, I had all over weakness and trouble breathing and swallowing but my legs alone were not to this level of weakness. This is unable to move at all- weakness. So I'm resting as much as I can right now with "breaks" of walking to the bathroom and back or to the kitchen and back etc. Sounds ridiculous but it's what I have to do. I could go off on a tangent on this topic... I'll try to remember that for a later post.

Next concern, I'm supposed to be taking my blood pressure regularly because of this new medication. And I have an ox sat meter that I was told to use after my PE, so I take that every now and then especially if my breathing is worse. Well just over the past week, since starting this medication, both have not been very steady or stable. My blood pressure has been above normal- which is crazy because it never does that. And then it will drop to very low again. Most concerning to me was a bp of 93/83... not the numbers alone so much but that they are 10 numbers apart!! Not many know about pulse pressure but it is the difference between the two numbers. 40ish is normal. Anything closer than 20 is very alarming. 10 you really should be in the ER. More concerning was this was just after I did some light cleaning maybe 5-10 minutes just disinfecting around the house. (See I do try to be as active as I can!) So this would be considered "after exertion". I immediately laid down and as time went on the numbers grew further apart. I told my doctor and I'm waiting to hear back. That's scary and indicative of a heart problem. POTS can be considered a heart condition but not like that. Furthermore, my o2 readings have been dropping like crazy. They should be 99-100. Ever since my PE they've been 95-99, never reached 100 again (and when I was in the hospital with the PE dropped as low as 79). Well in the past week its been dropping often to 90, 80s and hit 79 three times. My meter might not be exact but even just comparing to what is my norm off this meter, a bit scary. Asking the doctor about this as well. Lord, please don't let me have another clot, or a heart condition, or a lung problem, please!

Well, that was a long paragraph. Oops. Anyways. What else? I think that's enough, don't you? This is what I've been thinking though. I've been pushing myself a bit, obviously- cleaning, aquatic therapy, church, store... yowza! And it's not been worth it. I feel my quality of life is better when I do very little but give it my all, than if I try to do more but have nothing left in me to give to it. Of course I'd rather feel my best and do all I can at my best. But the fact is my body isn't nearly at its best- close to its worst its been and has been like that ever since I went in the hospital in March. There's been no improvement. I've learned how to deal with it. But then people tend to make me feel like I need to do more even when I can't and when I shouldn't- so I push myself and I pay for it. I think I'll go back to where I was before this past week... where I spend most of my time resting, enjoy more time blogging or writing or creating things to sell or doing surveys for a bit of cash, watching old movies before the movies took a turn for the worse, catching up with friends if only by email... I enjoy it. And most importantly doing that allows my body what it needs in order to make it through each day. I was always fast paced, I may as well enjoy being slow paced while its been handed to me. Gosh I'm just rambling now.

I'm hungry. See I can work up an appetite just laying in bed. Why? Because what you see is me laying down. But what my insides are doing is constantly running a marathon. This athlete needs to eat.

Ciao!