Awake

Long time, no updates. We've had some wonky DSL issues at the house which have made posting challenging, but more importantly, we have been out soaking in the summer and enjoying ourselves. I'm more awake and ready-to-go than I have been in years, and I have one thing to thank for this remarkable change: thyroid medicine.

As I posted previously, after years of testing low-normal, my body finally launched a full-scale assault on my thyroid that put my blood test results into the danger zone. I was told that it would take at least six weeks of medication to really feel any difference, but I would say that two weeks in I was waking up a little easier, three weeks in I could tell that my mood was much more steady and my body was less achy, and by one month, I was feeling like a new person. I'm six weeks out now, and I barely recognize the person I was before the medication. It is some kind of miracle---there is no other word for it.

A lot of people told me that, after I finished my masters, the time I used for studying would fill in with home stuff, and I'd wonder how I ever got through school in the first place. I guess I have felt some of that, but truthfully, the bigger question I now ask is, "How did I ever function with that sluggish thyroid?" To describe the level of fatigue, soreness, moodiness, dry skin---I could go on and on---would be impossible, because I didn't even realize how out-of-whack that state of being was until it finally ended. Really, how did I function? My poor family---I must have been a gem to be around sometimes, walking around like a zombie. Bless them for sticking it out.

Mike and I celebrated our tenth anniversary on July 31st, and as we talked about my new, awake, steadier self, my husband said, "I feel like I just got back the person I married. You are yourself again." I don't think there is better testimony than that for the power of thyroid medication, except to say that I feel like that person, too, and I really missed her.