Starting a New Medication

What a week, man.

Okay, well I am scheduled to start an infusion medication for the Crohn's disease next week; it's called Entyvio.  I don't know much about it, other than it won't flare my MS unlike other Crohn's meds like Remicade.

Am I shocked I have Crohn's?  Not one bit.  But I don't really have Crohn's symptoms, so I have to take their word that the inflammation is consistent.  I am hoping that the med will reduce things enough, but I am feeling like the surgeon on Wednesday is going to tell me I need to go under the knife and have a resection.  I might need to have surgery in any case just to fix the bladder fistula, which I would probably welcome at this point, with the only exception to that feeling being that I am trying to get started at a new job here very soon and am anxious about the time frame for recovery.  On the plus side, this particular location is notorious for taking a long time to "get in the system" (goodness knows it has already taken me a month to finalize everything, though I am expecting my offer this wee), so I am praying that it will take just a little bit longer and work in everyone's favor!!

I also had a meeting with my neurologist this week.  I mentioned my struggles with spasticity, which have been particularly bad this last year (remember the foot attack at the Safeway incident?)  So, she put me on Gabapentin.  I'm slowly tapering that up, but probably won't take a huge amount as I am not really in need of that much of a change to be honest.  Though I have not had the "eek I am about to have a spasm" feeling for the last few days since taking it, which is great, because I had three incidents of it in one night less than a week ago!

My neurologist was none too pleased that I was unmedicated for so long.  I know that I made that decision for two reasons - 1, I couldn't afford the Gilenya with my Kaiser insurance for some reason, and 2, Steve and I were thinking that we might have a baby again this year.  So being unmedicated made sense, as long as nothing bad happened between now and August.  Well, that clearly did not happen!  So she talked me into getting started with the Copaxone generic, called Glatopa, which is a daily injectable.

OY.  I did it tonight, and man, this one hurt.  I remember doing the subcutaneous injections with the Acthar years ago, but don't remember anything hurting this bad.  I do recall one side of my abdomen hurting more than the other, and I feel like the left side was the better side, but I could be wrong and will need to go back and look.  But it's been two hours since my injection and the site is still pretty painful.  I am glad I did not get the heart-shattering, painful, "sense of impending doom" that some people get with this, haha, but pain is still no fun.

I will continue to update, and might give a video about doing the injectables one of these days.  The best highlight of my weekend was a new baby - - I brought home a 2 month old ball python.  I love her so much!   Her name is Kaa.  I haven't had a snake in years, and I just adore them.  2 year old daughter had a healthy sense of hesitation regarding the snake, but warmed up when we were putting her away - let's hope they grow together to love one another :)

Love to all,
MSloan