Posts filed under 'Autism / Asperger's'
March 14th, 2007 1,300 views
So much going on. New meds. Well, not exactly new. Same as the last meds only in a different formula and dose of pill. Started yesterday. So far, so good. I can breathe. Hopefully the new kind of pill will not give me the same kind of allergic reaction as the last time. I realized when I picked it up this time that ‘trouble breathing’ is listed in the package insert as a possible allergic reaction, not as a side effect.
The good news is that the side effects of strattera are finally wearing off. My body feels more normal and the strange sores that I’ve been getting underneath the skin on my hands and feet has almost completely disappeared just as suddenly as they appeared shortly after I started taking the meds. Mystery solved. All those blood tests for nothing.
It has been very hard to work. Even hard to play. I am half playing while I am writing this. Turning in quests. It has been fun playing warcrack with the mac guild, the Reservoir Dogcows. Nice folks. I still haven’t played much in groups, but when I did, they were very helpful. Tsayad the night elf hunter (that’s me) is almost level 40. That is a cool thing in world of warcraft. For hunters like Tsayad, it means you can start wearing mail armor instead of leather. It also means you can get a ‘mount’, which is an animal that you ride on so you can go a lot faster. For a night elf, the standard mount is one of several giant cats. Cool.
I have so much work to do. I sure hope these meds kick in soon! I wonder if I will ever be able to read again. I suppose I should be patient. There are good things too.
We got a harness and a long lead for Nikkyo and have been taking her outside in the backyard. She likes it 
Mostly she sniffs the other cats and eats grass. Cats sure do like to eat grass.
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Filed under: Autism / Asperger's, Random
Tags: books, life, meds, nikkyo, plugins, warcraft, wordpress
March 3rd, 2007 2,231 views
Our house is held together by duct tape. Ordinarily, I am a huge fan of duct tape, but using it to hold floor tiles together, lock doors, and replace drywall is getting kind of old. On the other hand, it works pretty well for all of those things, so I am also thankful for it.
Unfortunately, duct tape will not fix everything. After a month of increasingly regular visits from roto rooter, we now have a lovely home video of the inside of our pipes which was taken by them yesterday. In the line between our bathroom and the city main, there are several breaks, some roots, a couple of fractures, cracks, and one large hole. Nice. The entire line needs to be replaced if we want to be able to remove roto rooter from speed dial.
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Filed under: Autism / Asperger's, Random
Tags: autism, life, meds, ramble
January 27th, 2007 2,244 views
Last night, me and d went to a meetup of the Albany Asperger’s Syndrome meetup group. Six people showed up at Au Coquelet Cafe in Berkeley and I am pretty sure it was a good experience for everyone. This meeting and group were different than anything I have experienced so far.
The conversation went pretty smoothly and covered some interesting topics. One person is about to undergo a bunch of testing in the hopes of getting an official diagnosis so that she can better explain to her family that she has Asperger’s. She feels that she needs the official backup in order to be taken seriously and believed.
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Filed under: Autism / Asperger's
December 28th, 2006 4,176 views
First, for the mac people…. Try this: hit ctrl-opt-cmd-8 on your keyboard. It is my new favorite mac thing.
Medi-cal approved my new meds! Very exciting. I’ve been taking them for about a week now. Hopefully they will work. I always have so much hope. Strattera is the new drug and it is usually prescribed for ADHD. Apparently, it sometimes works for autistic people too. I sure hope so. So far, I only feel side effects. They are not so bad as usual, but still pretty strange.
I have been very tired and falling asleep at random times, which is not something I usually do. Also, a little dizzy and nauseous, but not as bad as I usually get from switching drugs. The strange part is that everything seems kind of surreal. I have been more spaced out than usual and feeling very ‘out of body’, even when I am doing things that are completely in my body, like walking or driving or using the elliptical machine to avoid going stir crazy and beating up our tiles and furniture. It is a strange drug induced haze that I don’t really like, and can’t really get out of. I am hoping it will go away when the meds start to kick in and am avoiding increasing the dose until it isn’t so bad anymore. I am still taking my ‘old old’ meds along with the Strattera. If things go well, I may be able to stop taking them at some point. That would be nice.
Sometimes I am so tired of living in this test tube and having no idea what life will be like from day to day. It is really hard to make plans for anything. I want to go to Florida/Baltimore in April. Soon it will be time to get tickets but I have no idea if I will be able to travel. My 40th birthday is a month from today and I have no idea what I want to do. I like birthdays and am especially excited about this one. It seems like an accomplishment, even though it is really just another day. When I was younger, I never thought I would make it to 40. I don’t even think I wanted to make it to 40. As it turns out, I am glad to still be here.
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Filed under: Autism / Asperger's, Random
Tags: autism, life, meds, ramble
November 27th, 2006 3,134 views
Work has been very busy lately. I have one very big job, and possibly several other smaller jobs coming up. I am hoping to be able to partner with d. We will try a test run with one of the smaller jobs. We have almost completely opposite skills and completely opposite ways of working. I think that is a good thing. She is very organized about the initial process of signing up a client, including managing expectations, writing contracts, and charging realistic prices based on actual time worked, rather than pulling some random number out of the air like I tend to do. She is also skilled at graphic design and has experience making web sites. If I had my way, I would stick to the (x)html/css and back end coding for the site and do technical support for the client after the site is complete. I would leave the business stuff, front end design, and client management to someone else. Could be a match made in heaven if we can somehow merge our oppositeness into a working business.
It is getting harder to keep up with school. The ’side-effect’ of feeling better lately is that I have lost the super-focus that I was having when I was undermedicated. I have also been very twitchy and shaky which is quite annoying. It is a strange balance. It is still hard for me to get out, but not as hard as before. The main difference is that I am not completely exhausted like before. I can do a wider range of things, but am back to having a one second attention span. Going to see the doc on wednesday, but not sure if I am ready to continue experimenting with new meds and/or doses and timing of meds.
I am tired of waiting and waiting to find the right combination of drugs and going through long periods of terrible side-effects until the next drug or dose kicks in. I will probably keep experimenting, but am thinking of taking a break for a while and going back to figuring out ways to make myself feel better even when things aren’t so good. It has been very hard to do that while continuously messing with my meds, and I am hoping that taking a break will help, at least in the way of keeping things stable for a while. One of my best skills is adapting to life under less than ideal circumstances. It is impossible to adapt to something that keeps changing.
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Filed under: Autism / Asperger's, Geekery, Mac Stuff, Random
Tags: life, ramble, warcraft, work
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