Still the fat girl inside...

I can't believe it's almost been a year since my surgery. All I can say is WOW to how far I have come! I'm happy and glad things have gone well, but that mind still has the Cushings fear.

As you've seen from previous posts, I get nervous when I start to have symptoms that may be similar to Cushings. I think most of those symptoms were due to me being off all female hormones. I've now been off those particular hormones for a good 6 weeks now. I feel good, a hot flash here and there, but otherwise good. My numbers came back low, so I expect to feel some deficiency symptoms here and there. But overall I feel good.

I'm still confused on the GH symptoms as I feel worse on it than off. I have to call Dr. L again soon to get my IGF-1 tested again. My carpal tunnel is just so bad, even on 3x a week now. I hope to God it's not permanent. Hubby keeps telling me to have the surgery done to relieve it; but I don't want to go there. Yet.

In any case, I wanted to share some new pictures. And my most recent thoughts about it. First of all, I have lost 35+ lbs and many more inches. I need ALL new clothes. I'm not a shopper at all, so I don't know where to start! I used to shop at Avenue, where it's all size 14 on up. But NONE of those clothes fit me. They were too big!! As it turns out, I'm down to a size 10/12 now. I don't think I've been that size since I was a teenager!!!!! My husband was telling me I was barely a size 14/16 when I met him!! Scary.

In any case, so last week I went to the store. I went to the misses aisle, but felt really WEIRD being there. Like there's a fat girl, searching in the misses dept. I picked up a few shirts, a few shorts and then there were the bathing suits. Oh geez. Bathing suits were the death of me in the last few years. Hated trying them on, hated to see what they looked like. But for some reason, I started looking at bikini tops. Could I?! Could I pull it off?!?! Nooo.... Maybe... So I grabbed two that I liked and tucked it between all the shirts and shorts. Didn't want anyone seeing this fat girl taking something that wouldn't dare look good on her. I was truly that embarrassed. But I tried everything on in the dressing room. Some things fit and some didn't. I left trying the bikini tops on for last. But I did it. The first one...ehh...maybe it doesn't look bad! The second one....wow. I just had to stand and look at myself for quite a few minutes. Is that really me in the mirror!?!? I actually liked it. I thought it looked ok on me. Now my bottom half is not as "nice" as my top half, so I just stuck with buying the top. I'll wear my bathing suit skirts that I have that will match as well. So I walked to the check out, and paid for all the stuff I wanted. I even got red when the lady checked out the bikini top.

I took everything home and tried on the top again. And again when my kids got home (aren't kids really the most honest people!?) and then again when hubby got home. Here's what they saw... And then of course the sideways pic...
Ok, so now that I've posted it, please share your thoughts. Don't get me wrong, I still have "love handles" I need to work on. And I still have the extra skin around my belly button from my twin pregnancy. It gives me something to work for tho (for the things I can work on). I like this person I see there. I may not be that fat girl on the outside like I was before, but unfortunately, I may always feel like it on the inside.

Feelings. . .

I'm feeling a tad bitter about this disease today. And not because of anything it's doing to me now, but what it's done to me in general. But I have to back up and explain.

One of my very best friends, who also has twins, just gave birth to her third child yesterday. We were both trying early on, we both had miscarriages, but she continued to try and I got sick with this stupid disease. She got pregnant and I got a tumor. Now I love her to death and I'm so very happy for her. But when I went to see her baby today, after I left, I got upset. Happy tears of course, but envious because I really had wanted to get pregnant again and to know what it's like to have a singleton. But because of what happened with this disease, I can't have anymore kids. Now that my pituitary and all it's hormones have been messed with, I can pretty much never have kids again. And even if I could get pregnant, I'm not sure I would. I would be afraid this disease would come back again, since I believe getting pregnant was what started this whole thing for me.

So then I started just crying, because I was just mad at what this disease has done to me. I wanted to blame something, someone, but I couldn't. And then I felt guilty. Guilty because I was lucky enough to even get pregnant, let alone with twins. I have a very beautiful girl and a cutie patootie boy who I am blessed to have. Yes they are growing up and are 7 now, but I know that some of the gals with Cushings don't get to have kids at all. All these feelings just surfaced tho.

After awhile, I was fine. I went about the rest of my day and I hugged my kiddos tight tonight. But will I feel those feelings every time I see her baby? Or even my SIL's baby when she has her baby in a few months??? I hope not. I want to move past this disease. I don't want it to make me feel bad. I'm past it and I don't want to think about it again. At least I wish it was that easy!!

Bout of weirdness...

I had a weird "feeling" last night. Probably cuz I overdid it, but I was fine, then all of a sudden I felt like I was going to pass out.

My son has had baseball games for the last few days (to make up for rain days) and by yesterdays game, I guess I was just tired! I don't know. I actually took my daughter to Walmart (cuz she hates sitting at his game and I can relate!), then we got to the field to see the last hour. I was fine at the game! After the game we went home, so son and hubby could change, and then we went to dinner. By the time we got to the restaurant, I just did NOT feel right. Woozy, like I couldn't focus and was going to pass out. Thankfully we got our drinks fast and we ordered an appetizer. I drank my soda hoping the extra caffeine would help. Thankfully after maybe 10-20 minutes it passed.

I'm not really sure what it was, but the only thing I can think of was that it was quite hot yesterday. I assume the heat takes more out of me?? I'll have to be wary of that as summer approaches. But other than that bout of wierdness, I'm ok. I just bought my new 'slimmer' swimsuit and I'll post pics of that in another post when I can download my camera.

Happy Mother's Day!!

I want to wish all the mother's that read my blog a VERY happy Mother's Day!! Especially those moms that also have Cushings or have a child with Cushings. Because being a mom with cushings around in one form or another, is very hard. Because as a mom, it's hard to be sick. You are the one that's in charge of everything. You have to do everything. Everyone relys on mom. It's also hard to see a child sick that you can't help or take away the pain. To see them get tests after tests... It breaks your heart to see them have to go through this. This disease is just evil.

So today is your day mom's!! I hope you get your time to be waited on and while the worry of your kids won't go away, hopefully you can give yourself a break for one day. We ALL deserve it.

My kids made me these awesome cards that made me cry. It was so sweet. Hubby made me breakfast and took care of everything for the day. It was sooo nice. We really need more days like that. ;) I hope everyone else had a great day too!

Weaning and Doctors suck.

Well, I was on 10mg for all of one day (Friday). I was so upset about the results I saw on Thursday, that I had decided to wean down to 10mg, since I assumed Dr. L would want me to slowly wean off so I could test. I was actually fine during the day, other than being headachey, tired and having no appetite.

Then I got a call from Dr. L's assistant that he could talk to me within the next few hrs. I was happy about that! He ended up calling me about 5pm EST. He basically told me to quit worrying. That those numbers really don't mean much to him. And because I don't have any symptoms that would signify that it was back, he says I need to stop worrying. When the Cushings is coming back, it will definitely show itself. The other symptoms I AM having, are probably due to to my other hormones - specifically the female deficiencies. Ok, that makes sense. He does have a way of making things sound reasonable. So he made me cautiously optimistic.

My local endo called me an hr after Dr. L did and I gave him the run down of my labs as well and he said I should be worried. I explained what Dr. L said and he - in not so many words - said Dr. L was wrong and I should be concerned. Talk about not helping me at all and bring me back down. I knew I had to think positively, but not knowing who to trust surely doesn't make that easier.

So I ate a little dinner, played with the kids (as much as my exhausted body would allow at that point in time) then within an hr after dinner, I got the runs horribly. Then I just felt like I couldn't keep my eyes open. I just wanted to sleep. So after hubby and I put the kids to bed, I went to bed myself. I think I fell asleep before my twins did. Then when I woke up Saturday morning and I had a horrible headache. So, I went back up to 15mg. I took it easy the rest of that day and let my hubby deal with the kids. I was feeling somewhat better in the afternoon, but it basically took me the full 24 hrs to recoup.

I felt some sort of relief in knowing I still needed the meds. I know I have to give Dr. L the benefit of the doubt since he's gotten me this far. But I will continue to have my doubts. But I can tell you for a fact, hormones AND doctors...suck.