24th June 2008
You have many of the symptoms I have had for 4 years or more, you tend to lose count. This past winter I started with another case of Bronchitis, only this time I started sleeping 16-20 hours a day. They kept asking if I was depressed. I had some of the same pain you have.
Thought it was my heart because in 2004 I had back surgery, picked up an infection and had a heart attack. My heart is fine but they could never get the heart rate down with out medication.....so they just said I was tired from the lopressor.
Well, they did a few tests and said they couldn't help me. I went back to my Pc and did something you might not want to do but I needed to go back to work. For the first time ever I cried and told him he had to help me.....he had to find what was wrong with me. So he looked patheticly at me and said he would do some more blood work.
Well, he did, he called me 4 days later to say I had Sjogren's disease and he set up an appointment with a Immunologist. Now the immunologist tells me he doesn't think the blood work is right...I don't look like someone who had Sjogren's.
He wants to do his own blood work. Okay by me. He calls 5 days later to say, yes, I have Sjogren's but his blood work also showed I had autoimmune hepatitis. This doctor went and got all my records for the last few years and my liver enzymes were consistly high. Not one of the specialist said a word regarding my liver enzymes to me..its autoimmune, my body was attacking itself.
I went to an endocrinologist for years to balance my hormones due to a hysterectomy, she did complete blood work every 6 months and didn't notice.
I now had to see a liver doctor. He doesn't think I have a liver problem but he decides the only way to know for sure is to do a liver biopsy. Guess what, I have cirrhosis. The reason why I who never slept was now sleeping all day was from the encelophphy of the liver which was affecting the brain. One perscription and my brain is functioning and I am feeling good and not sleeping all day. Not quite back but I now have 2 good doctors.
I also want you to know I am 56 years old, never much of a drinker, never smoked, worked as a hairstylist (inhaling chemicals) from 15-47 because I went form asthma to COPD, iI had to give up my career I built and loved...went back to school and a new career. So I worked all my life.
So don't let anyone tell you its not real, you know if something is wrong. Keep trying and ask your doctor or insist he do more extensive blood work and test you for Sjogren's. Now, you won't have everything I have but if you let it go on you will. Be your own advocate. ;)
gcb in pgh
Thought it was my heart because in 2004 I had back surgery, picked up an infection and had a heart attack. My heart is fine but they could never get the heart rate down with out medication.....so they just said I was tired from the lopressor.
Well, they did a few tests and said they couldn't help me. I went back to my Pc and did something you might not want to do but I needed to go back to work. For the first time ever I cried and told him he had to help me.....he had to find what was wrong with me. So he looked patheticly at me and said he would do some more blood work.
Well, he did, he called me 4 days later to say I had Sjogren's disease and he set up an appointment with a Immunologist. Now the immunologist tells me he doesn't think the blood work is right...I don't look like someone who had Sjogren's.
He wants to do his own blood work. Okay by me. He calls 5 days later to say, yes, I have Sjogren's but his blood work also showed I had autoimmune hepatitis. This doctor went and got all my records for the last few years and my liver enzymes were consistly high. Not one of the specialist said a word regarding my liver enzymes to me..its autoimmune, my body was attacking itself.
I went to an endocrinologist for years to balance my hormones due to a hysterectomy, she did complete blood work every 6 months and didn't notice.
I now had to see a liver doctor. He doesn't think I have a liver problem but he decides the only way to know for sure is to do a liver biopsy. Guess what, I have cirrhosis. The reason why I who never slept was now sleeping all day was from the encelophphy of the liver which was affecting the brain. One perscription and my brain is functioning and I am feeling good and not sleeping all day. Not quite back but I now have 2 good doctors.
I also want you to know I am 56 years old, never much of a drinker, never smoked, worked as a hairstylist (inhaling chemicals) from 15-47 because I went form asthma to COPD, iI had to give up my career I built and loved...went back to school and a new career. So I worked all my life.
So don't let anyone tell you its not real, you know if something is wrong. Keep trying and ask your doctor or insist he do more extensive blood work and test you for Sjogren's. Now, you won't have everything I have but if you let it go on you will. Be your own advocate. ;)
gcb in pgh