Testing, testing, testing...

One year after my daugther's birth, in May of 2009, I had an episode that doctors and family have told me must have been an anxiety attack.  I was dizzy, couldn't breathe well, had tingling in my extremities and a sudden onset of diarrhea.  Unfortunately, I was at my son's school concert when it hit.  I drank water from my children's sippy cups to help myself feel better.  I watched the concert standing, and missed half of it because I was in the hallway instead of the gymnasium.  My father in law took me to a nearby pharmacy so I could check my blood pressure, and the next morning I went to my doctor.

She shrugged me off, but ordered bloodwork to make sure everything was okay.  It came back that while my vitamin D was dangerously low, I was healthy and well.  I took big doses of vitamin D for a few months after that, and since then I have associated any quick onset of panic, anxiety or dizziness with a low vitamin D problem.  IBS has also opened up a whole new world of anxiety to me, and it is with me on a very regular basis now.  Leaving my house at all starts shooting questions through my head - did I eat anything that will make me need to run to a bathroom while I am out?  Are there public bathrooms at the place I am going?  Am I going to be able to make it through the morning of volunteering/shopping/taking my children to the park/visiting with my friends without feeling the urge to flee the situation immediately?  Will this be the day that I have an accident in my pants or will I just feel on the verge of vomiting for hours?

The past three years have been full of medical testing for me.  I've had chest x-rays, ultrasounds of the pelvis and abdomen.  I've had ECGs and even breath tests to check out my lung strength and capacity, to test for asthma and other things.  I've had so much blood taken.  There have been urine tests and most recently, I had a gastroscopy, which, just like all the other tests, showed absolutely nothing wrong with me.

Most of these tests have taken place in the past year.  For spring break 2011, I hopped on a plane with my four children and went to stay with my parents at their house for a couple of weeks.  The morning that we were to leave, I was SO sick with anxiety that I couldn't eat a thing.  And the feeling stayed with me for the whole two weeks.  A constant stomachache and nausea that was sometimes overpowering.  There were pains in my lower right abdomen and I felt that there were lumps there too.  Flying home with the kids was even worse than going there - I actually had to rush to the airplane bathroom at one point, fearing that I might soil my pants on the way.  Leaving four kids unsupervised on a plane only added to my anxiety because I was trying to rush...and even after all that...nothing came out.

For the month after that trip, I barely ate.  I cycled through periods of intense hunger, powerful waves of nausea, and weeks of zero appetite.  The constipation was a nightmare.  Lemon-water became my best friend.  I ate saltines and arrowroots when I could stomach something, and when I feared a blockage in my intestines, I tried to eat some prunes to hopefully get things moving.  The weight fell off me.  I went to my in-laws' place for Easter dinner and watched everyone enjoy a feast.

This was not me.  I love food.  I love to eat.  I went to my doctor and she sent in a referral to a gastroenterologist.  Months later, I went back to my doctor for something else, and she sent in a referral to a different gastroenerologist since I hadn't gotten in with one yet.  It took nine months total for me to see the specialist, which I finally got to do in May of this year, 2012.