Well, so far so good, blood tests were awesome, health was great, meds the doc gave me are working. Now to see the psychiatrist my general medicine doctor sent me to.
Nervous as all get out as we arrived at the psych office, butterflies jumping all over my stomach, and as most of know probably have gone through, you sit in the office and twiddle your thumbs until they are ready for you. This was no different, a good 30 minutes I paced a busy office waiting, but the time came, but first side visit to check blood pressure and pulse. Agggggaiin lol.
The nurse got busy taking my pressure, and kind of looked up at me strangely, asked if I worked out, or what's the deal, it was 99/65, as nervous as I was I had great blood pressure and pulse were spot on. She said that's the best she'd ever seen come through here. Well gee, aren't I special lol. Anyway, felt pretty proud to say the least, I was here to see my next doctor in stage of fixing my issues, and already felt tons better.
Not a lot to say about the doctor visit, we chatted about basically what I've been writing about in my past blogs, up til present. He prescribed one new drug beyond what I had been on, recommended I talk to a psychologist in the the same office and sent me on my way after 45 minutes or so, but that's really his job is to just monitor my medication, and that's just fine.
So, off we went, the rides in the car getting easier and easier, I'm sure the meds take a great deal of the credit, but that might be giving that too much, I'm really seeing the light now, and pushing hard to get over this, so fair to say, the meds help get me what I need to accomplish.
Two weeks until the psychologist visit, so I spent that time worrying about that visit lol. Not as must as I used to worry, but it's still there, having that little furrball of a pup at home to chew on me really took a lot of my worries away. Sure glad I could be there for him to chew on, not like we didn't spoil him immediately with toys or anything, but apparently I taste better.
What's so nice now, is anxiety, or panic attacks more so are really very far and between now, I get little blips on the screen, but they don't last long, and I'm now able to do things I've been stuck without for years, mainly getting in a car. But what to me was important at that moment in life, is this puppy isn't going to have to live through my anxiety and fears like my last 2 dogs did. Simba got to grow up with me not having any worries in the world, no anxiety or panic, until he was about 7, and it hit him as hard as it did to me.
Simba...... that dog was so wonderful, his life changed dramatically when anxiety consumed my life, no long walks anymore, no car rides whenever we wished, no run on the farm. Don't get me wrong, he led a great life with lots of excercise, just not how it used to be with me, Jeanne had to do it more so now. But whenever a panic attack was coming on, even before I knew it, that dog would come over and put his head on my lap, and look up at me, sure enough, panic attack, and he'd stick with me, through thick and thin. Special dog.
Niko, poor dog, got to know me with the worst panic I'd ever seen or heard of, although he only lived 3.5 years. He only had about 6 months of that time where he didn't see me with lots of anxiety and panic. My heart is heavy for that.
But Loki, he's going to continue where my past family was, and what I've learned about how special your best friend is, in this case it's my beloved dogs, I'm doing whatever I can for this pup to make sure he has what I feel I took from my other two buddies, even if the little turd would rather chew on me than his toys.
Week to go, Loki and I continue to explore my new world of more or less panic free-dom, teaching him tricks, and how to behave, walks runs, playing, holding and loving that little squirt. I continue to cook, some cleaning when wife makes me, and working outside keep the rest of my anxiety mostly at bay, might as well go see the psychologist.
Once again, sit and wait in the waiting room, only a 3 minute drive to the Dr. office so it's not bad at all, but 30-45 minutes sitting in a small room packed with others with probably same issues I have, isn't how I like to spend my time. Finally, get to meet the psychologist, sweet lady, first meeting so I guess really all we did is "meet and greet", talk about my 10 years of this anxiety crap, some goals, what I'm doing, how I'm feeling.
My one big goal? I want to be able to actually go shopping, probably Walmart, I haven't been able to go in a car, to a store or anything but this latest string of doctor visits for 10 years, so that's what I want to do.
Only advice she gave me on this day, drive by the Walmart at least a few times, get to know the route make it comfortable for you. Then take it from there. Hmmm ok.
Well, you'll next get to read that I went far greater and further to this advice then I ever thought I'd be able to EVER do again.
Thanks for reading,
Lance
