Feels like Fall

The last few days have been perfect weather. By perfect I mean sunny and crisp with a slight breeze and not hot. Fall has always been my favorite season. Call me a nerd, but I always looked forward to back-to-school time. I can't believe August escaped me and I didn't manage to post a single blog entry. There has been a lot going on in my life not only health-wise, but dental-wise. If you know anything about me you know that dental work scares me more than anything in the world. More than spiders, more than puppets. Even more than the ER visits. Crazy I know. That's how much I hate dental work. But dental work, or more specifically oral surgery, is how this whole mess started. To make matters worse, my old oral surgeon, his wife and two kids are now featured in a tv commercial for a local wildlife park that plays multiple times per day. A painful reminder of the surgeon who singlehandedly ruined my life. Sadly, his oral surgery practice is still in business, but perhaps he's realizing he'd better find a backup plan and has taken up acting.

Back to the dental work: turns out I need a root canal, possibly two. Oh the joys of having TMJ. I can't blame it all on TMJ, I probably eat way too much candy and also have bad genetics to blame. Every relative I know has multiple crowns, fillings and root canals. There's probably no escaping it. Root canals cost about 2 grand per tooth and that doesn't include the crown (only about a grand) that they have to put on after the root canal. So only 3 grand per tooth...no big deal. I am trying to put it off as long as possible not only because of the cost but also because my TMJD has improved a bit lately thanks to a physical therapist who is familiar with both TMJ AND EDS. He has been doing ultrasound treatments on my jaw joints as well as some postural exercises and hands-on work. I would hate to screw up all my progress with a goddamn root canal where my jaw will be propped open for hours on end.

Another new issue and what I'm assuming is an EDS-related issue is hip and lower back pain. I have two hips that pop in and out all day long and have for quite some time now. However, I have ignored all the popping for many months until the pain became unbearable a few weeks back and I began having to hobble around like a geriatric patient to get from point A to point B. The pain radiates to the insides of my knees and makes my thighs weak and shaky, much like the jello-legs I described in an earlier post. The whole experience has been very unsettling and my physical therapist wants to evaluate all this tomorrow and determine whether the problem is originating in my hip joints themselves or radiating from something wrong with the lower back. I am not sure which would be worse. I just hope it's fixable. I am tired of living on extra-strength tylenol that merely takes the edge off enough to sleep for a few hours at a time before being reawakened by pain.

In terms of POTS, my resting heart rate and blood pressure has been running shockingly normal lately! By normal I mean my hr has been resting in the high 50's to mid 60's and when I stand it rises to the 80's or 90's. Still not normal, but heck, not half bad either. My blood pressure varies anywhere from 90's over 60's at night before bed all the way up to 130 over 85 in the daytime when I'm up and about. I am thrilled with these numbers and proud of my body for finally starting to behave again (did I mention I am actually sweating a bit again?! And thrilled about it?) Which is why I was so bummed at urgent care today when the doctor informed me I was having  PAC's or PVC's (extra or skipped heartbeats that feel like palpitations) that he could feel with his stethoscope. I am confused. My vitals all looked so pleasantly normal, yet my heart is now trying to thud it's way out of my chest. He instructed me to see my cardiologist tomorrow for further testing. I am hoping it's some sort of a simple, straightforward fix for a change.

I have a few exciting back-to-school giveaways coming up on the blog and plan on being back here in full force for fall. I have missed writing/venting and think I really need to continue writing simply to maintain my own sanity if nothing else. Hopefully I can help a few readers in the process too. :)