March 2014 - Neglected my emergency kit

A bit of a gap since my last update, pretty much because there hasn't been much to say. Which is a good thing!

One thing that did come up recently was the subject of my emergency Hydrocortisone injection kit, partly because of my recent few days off and holiday to the Isle of Wight and partly because of a chat to a Twitter contact of mine who is an Addisons patient. Last year I went to an education day at the QA Hospital Portsmouth to teach me how to inject an emergency dose of Hydrocortisone (HC) if I ever needed to. The circumstances of ever needing to are quite specific, such as if I have a bad dose of vomiting which means I cannot keep down my HC tablets or if I have a major trauma such as a broken bone. I do not make enough Cortisol of my own, the body would normally produce its own or give me more as and when needed, but I make a low amount and not enough for daily life and certainly not enough for a stressful situation such as a broken bone. So the emergency kit should be around me at all times in case I need it, as that injection could essentially save my life by giving my body the Cortisol it needs to fight infection or stress. But that kit it isn't always nearby. I've been a bit remiss in paying attention to it, and chatting to my wife made me realise she is quite worried about it, and chatting to the Addisons patient - who quite the opposite of me has several kits available to her (one with her at all times) - made me realise I'm not taking this quite seriously enough (whilst not erring on the panic side of things).

OK, so I haven't got Addisons Disease, but I could end up with similar symptoms if I have an 'Addisonian crisis' or 'adrenal crisis', in fact I did last June**. But the end result, i.e. a severe lack of Cortisol, amounts to the same thing. So what I'm going to do is ask the doctor for another emergency kit....I need to re-order the Cortisol injection anyway as it is nearly out of date. The reason for the 2nd kit, is that the current kit lives in the medicine cabinet at home, but what about when I'm at work in Portsmouth, or away on a business trip to London?....not a lot of use is it? So my 2nd kit will live in my work bag, which will be with me wherever I happen to be working. The other kit will remain at home. Of course, when I go away on holiday the kit comes too as it did this last week. But again, not enough thought given by me....the kit remained in the holiday cottage, not a lot of use if we are out and about and I need it. So it needs to live in the car whilst we are away, somewhere it can actually be of use. So nearly 10 months in since my operation, I'm still learning. Yes on the 28th of this month, it will be 10 months since my Pituitary Tumour was removed, amazing.

** My wife and I have very different memories of my adrenal crisis from last June. My memory is, well, in fact I have very little memory of it, which is the whole point really. I was very ill and was admitted to hospital in a right state, so I haven't got any bad memories of the actual event only the aftermath of recovery. Whereas my wife has very acute memories of my descending into illness, being incoherent and almost losing consciousness on several occasions and Deb was really stressing out about trying to get me admitted in the first place. Back then neither of us really understood what an adrenal/Addisonian crisis really was. Luckily we both are a lot more educated now!


I need to pick up my prescription for my amended Testosterone dose, which the doctors surgery finally got around to sorting out....it was a bit harder than it needed to be but we got there in the end. I can also pick up my blood test form to check out my vitamin B12 levels to see if we can rule out another potential reason for my numb/tingly leg. Lets see how that pans out.

So that's my latest update, over and out!

March 2014 - health & fitness musings

I suppose since I had my first real health scare last year, I have become a lot more aware of how unfit I have become, and that I want to do something about it. I guess there is always a catalyst to make you do something, a Pituitary Tumour was mine.

However, I can't entirely blame my lack of hormones for my reduced fitness levels over recent years, although undoubtedly they were a factor. You've got to really want to do something before it fights its way up your priority list.

Thinking back to my youth, I was a Postman for many years and made me hyper-fit into my late 20's and early 30's. Through my 30's I did 7 years of circuit training 2 or sometimes 3 times a week. Played Badminton a lot, cycled a lot.....but gradually this tailed off. Probably only in the last 5 to 7 years and probably due in part to getting older, lack of effort, and lack of hormones. Thinking about it recently, I can tie down a point that I really realised that my fitness had gone downhill, although I had ignored it until now. Deb and I joined a Badminton club in an effort to get into a routine with our playing, we thought going to a club weekly would both increase our fitness, and make our game better....neither worked very well for me (quite well for Deb though). In my first week there, I badly sprained my calf muscle....up until that point in my life (about 5 years ago) I had never sprained a muscle. Although they didn't think they were, these club members were really rather good Badminton players, much better than us. So to try and make up for my lack of playing skill, I tried to make up with physical ability...and what was the first thing that happened, I injured myself. We played quite regularly for the year we joined, and my game probably got better, but I barely won a game all year and was pretty fed up by the end. I was struggling, but didn't understand why.

Then in the last few years, I would start to get tired when out of walks, have energy crashes and feel generally 'lacking', all of which I know now was due to the Pituitary Tumour.....but I was thinking was just down to me being a lazy devil, which in part of course was true.

So although I have started doing a lot more walking and a bit of cycling (and this is working well), I decided that I needed something else a bit different. So I have been doing Pilates, in a men-only class, for the last 9 weeks. I knew that my 'core' needed a lot of work and this was more than proved in the first week, painfully proved. I didn't know a lot about Pilates other than what Deb had talked about as she has been doing it for about 18 months. What I didn't realise is all the other muscles Pilates affects, and just how much of that muscle I haven't exercised for a long time. My back is very weak, arms, legs you name it. The other thing it has highlighted is just how much suppleness/mobility I haven't got in my hips, back and shoulders. I just can't get into some of the positions required by Pilates....I am improving though. This is probably less to do with Pituitary matters, and lots more to do with sitting at a desk for years hunched over a computer. I am determined to sort this out during the year. My least favourite Pilates exercise so far is "the 100"....it's bloomin' hard work (it might not look it.....)

At least now I have the correct amount of Testosterone floating around my bloodstream, I have a good chance of building muscle now, so all my hard work won't go completely to waste.

Lastly, another thing occurred to me, panic attacks. In the year or so before my operation, I had several episodes that we put down to me having a panic attack....for no obvious reason most of the time. I read a story from a fellow Pituitary patient who has been suffering with panic attacks, and I suddenly realised, I haven't had any since my operation. Not sure what the link is, but I am sure there is one.

First blog post in March, over 9 months since my operation already.....