I want to apologize to the whole #fediverse community, sincerely, for my recent behaviors over the last 4 months.
If i have been rude or even short tempered with any of you my apologies you likely did not deserve it. Read on if you’d like to know the story and you can decide if I should be forgiven or not.
I know several months ago I made a similar apology, and this may fall on deaf ears, but I hope some of you will hear me out.
First off my last apology came at the face of an Israeli mob death threat on both me and my family. That added a lot of stress at the time and certainly led to me being a bit rude with some people, not an excuse but I do want to rehash it a bit for context. Many of you have noticed since then I do not go out without an open-carry weapon on my hip, this is why.
That said that is not the source of this apology but it is loose related.
I have been dealing with some health issues that, while not life threatening they have severely limited me in some ways. Specifically a very severe sleep disorder. The sleep disorder, and a brain fog that made it very hard for me to think and function normally. In and of itself these werent the root cause, there were underlying issues. But my attempt to treat the symptoms (since the underlying causes we unknown) actually led to a worsening of symptoms long term despite providing some help in the short term. I will explain.
Most of my life I had ADHD as a diagnosis, but it had never been a hindrance to me, in fact I saw it as something that improved my intellectual abilities overall. However this diagnosis allowed me to receive an adderall prescription to try to address the sleep disorder and brain fog, not to treat the ADHD directly, which I have been on for about the last 4 months. It was a low dose (20mg once a day in the morning to wake up). At first it addressed my symptoms with amazing results, but over time it led to a cure to my sleep issue but the brain fog got much much worse. In addition to that my irritability when interacting with people was worse and I have been quite dis-tempered with some of you, and I am deeply sorry for that if this describes you. It certainly continued to cure the sleep issue however and since normal sleep is needed for me to do my work i felt i needed to continue.
Recently however I decided to take matters into my own hands and stop relying on doctors. Instead I got labs through shady means to test for things doctors were dismissive of and wouldnt in the past let me get authorization to have tested. Namely my testosterone levels, thyroid hormone levels, and various blood sugar indicators. These tests revealed three underlying issues: 1) A severely low T-level (so low the tests couldn’t even register trace amounts) 2) An extremely high Thyroid-stimulating hormone, 3x above the maximum normal range 3) metabolic disorder causing blood sugar and insulin irregularities (which likewise led to extreme runaway hunger).
At this point I found a doctor who was finally willing to listen to me, armed with a mountain of ill gotten blood tests and managed to convince her to test me properly for verification and finally treat my underlying diseases.
As of about a week ago I started treatment for my underlying diseases, needing to take injections of about 3 drugs, soon to be 4. Knowing that the root cause could finally be addressed I figured around the same time last week I could quit both the adderall and the sleeping medication entirely. Now that the underlying treatments are starting to work, and the old treatments out of my system I feel the best I’ve felt in years. I already lost 16 lbs, my brain fog has mostly evaporated, and while my sleep is still recovering it was quite improved last night… So while i have a ways to go to be 100% I am already back to my old self, how I used to be before the brain fog began. and certainly doing better than I was doing even 6 months ago.
I will do my best, going forward to treat you all with the respect and due consideration you deserve. Again my apologies.
@freemo You haven't been short tempered with me that I recall, but just to say sorry you've had all that and glad you're (from the sound of it) on the right track now
Most of the QOTO crowd are always quite nice, so its never been a problem. Largely the issue was with others i am less familiar who might have been "pushing it" but otherwise not deserving of an outlash.
@freemo Thank you for your honesty and humbleness.
I’ve never noticed any rude behaviour so I’ll skip that part.
What I do know is that Medical Doctors are overall conservative and unwilling to think out of the box.
They were lectured that Testosterone is evil and need to be avoided, while the opposite is true.
Brain fog is often the result of low testosterone. But many more symptoms are caused by low T, like Ostoperosis (lack of bone density), lack of energy, sleeping problems. loss of muscle tissue (Atrophy) and off course a low Libido.
For many years doctors thought that Testosterone caused Prostate Cancer while more and more evidence learns that men with low Testosterone levels are more likely to develop Prostate Cancer. Young men, who are walking Testosterone bombs don’t develop Prostate Cancer, whil aging men with declining T-levels do.
Long story, but what I mean is that your gut-feeling was right. You were right to circumvent the ‘normal’ pathways to discover what was going on in your body.
Testosterone is life! Men and even women cannot do without it. Low T-levels will cause ilness and possibly severe risks.
I’d like to commend you on your quest en encourage you to proceed. You will ad years and quality to your life.´
I predict that maybe in about 10 yrs or so, the medical world will take a complete other stance toward Testosterone and TRT will become a regular treatment, which is a lot cheaper than battling symptoms and fight off Prostate Cancer.
@sergeant Low-T was the bulk of my problem. It wasnt the main factor for weight and hunger, for that i needed semaglutide. But everything not related to hunger and weight is 100% the low-T I think.
That said low-T was effecting weight as a minor factor. While the combination of T + S is showing much better results than either of these would do alone.
Thanks though, and I agree, the medical world has a ways to go yet not just on this but in so many areas… for as far as we have come with medicine we still only have one foot out of the dark ages.
@freemo Thanks for sharing. It's interesting.
I almost don't want to offer help but it's in my nature (I'm aware offering can just occupy time or your real needs)...
but I can hop into a Jitsi chat 🎤 almost anytime... probably to give you a contrast or temporary different scenery more than any correct way (so you work it out using someone dumber and seeing 'not that' which I don't mind being the one serving!)
More thought maybe by you needed on what's healthy / needed but I think you should really trust me and time is passing too. Time is now sir and sharing the load is more fun! I'd love to do it all myself if we can iterate and find some things- I have such a good opportunity now... and you can get your word out through me to help what you need...
I'm conscious too much text chat sometimes so audio can be therapy and outlet.
Anyway love you to my man in the most neutral sense / respect / love for freedom etc. hehe
The doctors kept assuming I had sleep apnea... To be fair all the symptoms did fit with sleep apnea, my weight, my need for long periods of sleep, brain fog, all of it. Despite that they sent me to sleep studies over and over again and the sleep studies never came back with anything indicating apnea. As far as they could tell I just had a lot of trouble falling asleep. So I got a diagnosis of delayed sleep phase disorder.
But no matter how many times they rules out sleep apnea every new doctor insisted that must be it and refused to seriously consider anything else.
As for food groups, not really. I do have a celiacs test pending for shits and giggles but im not expecting anything from that. I have been using a continuous glucose monitor (im not diabetic though) and the blood respond to various foods has been very revealing.
I know opinions can be quite unwelcome when it comes to helping people find explanations for their conditions, most of all when it comes to psychiatric ones. I know I have strong opinions about these in general, but i am far more cautious about it with individuals.
Would you like to hear my un adulterated thoughts on those issues and what they may be. Or would you rather I just wish you luck?
So my first question is, how solid of a diagnosis is your apnea? was it borderline? Was it confirmed with a follow up?
It seems sleep apnea is the go to for a lot of things because its easy. A true diagnosis is nuanced and requires a high quality doctor and equipment. It also is distorted by the fact that the equipment and/or location of the study means your sleep will not be typical and thus you may demonstrate some symptoms that you wouldnt otherwise present at home when well rested.
The best sort of sleep study is one where they do the full study in the hospital, and then send you home with a light weight monitor for you to sleep with for a week or more at home. If your sleep study didnt include both of these aspects I would be a bit suspect of that part.
I get periods of hypersomnia where I can sleep for 14 hours plus.
Hypersomnia is slight counter to apnea. Apnea usually makes it hard to get deep sleep, so I’d be a little suspect (not too much) by this property. I too have this pattern. My sleep disorder is delayed sleep phase disorder, but it manifests as going to bed every night 1 hour later and then having hypersomnia once I fall asleep (10 - 14 hours is quite normal for me). For me this appeared to be cost first and foremost by the low-t, that treatment alone is improving it already, and secondarily by my hypothyroidism. If you havent been checked for both of those that would be my first suggestion, with or without the apnea.
I’ve been putting that down to autistic burnout.
However, I’m still not 100% sure about the autism diagnosis. Most of the time I don’t feel any real problems but other times I’m like no I feel autistic af.
So this is where my opinion may get a bit divisive. I am of the opinion that in the UK and the USA (and maybe canada) that autism is massively over-diagnosed, by atleast 90%+ in high-functioning cases. Not to say there arent high-functioning autists, there are. But they are far more rare than the diagnosis suggests.
What i think is happening is a bit of an underlying flaw in psychiatry in how it reasons about disease and a bit of a runaway effect in the societies of those countries. Psychiatry assumes the majority of a population is “normal” and as such any of those in the minority struggle to cope with society are the ones experiencing disorder. Psychiatry utterly fails once 51%+ of a society enters into psychosis because the tools stop working. What I think has happened is our societies have become so overwhelming toxic and bad for mental health that an overwhelming majority of these populations have developed one of the many forms of personality disorders, leaving a small minority of healthy “normal” people. Since psychiatry operates on the fundamental assumption of normality in a society psychiatry unfortunately tries to find a reason why normal people in the minority are struggling to function and thus assigns them as the person with the disorder, and deems the larger majority with the personality disorder as the “normal ones”… this causes huge amounts of false autism diagnosis instead of addressing the real cause, the personality disorders the other half of people have.
This only became extremely obvious to me once I started living among European people and seeing how I went from feeling “what is wrong with me” to “wow literally all of america is diseased”
@mxtthxw FYI I boosted my response to you in case it would help othrs. If you dont want the visibility on that please just let me know and i will be happy to unboost.
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