My New Favorite Recording- Review and Audio Recording

My new favorite recording is a 1990's version of Allegri's Miserere. The French soloist, Patrick Husson, was about 30 years old when this performance was captured digitally to be played in perpetuity. He sang the "top solo" which reaches a high "C": two ledger lines above the treble staff, and which repeats several times. The rest of the choir was a typical boychoir. I like Husson's version of this famous piece for two reasons. One, I like his tone quality. It is larger than a treble (boy) and has a darker, fuller color. Second, his breath capacity is larger than that of a boy. During the solo sections, the high C falls step ward down to an F, where every boy I've ever heard will take a breath and continue on with the solo. Husson does not take a breath there, but carries through giving a chilling effect as he follows through to the G and holds it seemingly indefinitely.

Patrick Husson sings "Miserere Mei Deus"

Pill Trouble

I talked with my psych nurse practitioner's RN. She's going to talk to my NP about my zyprexa dose/prescription. I don't have enough to last at the 7.5 rate (the rate she told me to stay at rather than reduce to 5) for the month. I just need a new script for 7.5 but the insurance might not pay for that as its only been 15 days since I got the last one. (But I thought that didn't matter since its a new script??)

I also found that one of my pill boxes broke. The top came off and pills were out of three of the compartments. What a puzzle! I think I got it back in order, but I need a new box. Probably time anyway, as I've had these two for years.

Not trouble, I got my lowered Rexulti dose. (I had been on 4 mg, now on 3 mg.) I didn't take any for the last 2 days because I couldn't get my script. The half-life of Rexulti is apparently 91 hours, so no big deal. I took a dose after I picked up the med this afternoon.

Voices in My Head

They are telling me to stab myself in the heart and in my chest. I'm not listening but it does show that my meds are messed up.

Friend asks if I'm safe and I reply: If it happens again I'll call PDocs nurse back I guess.

She replies: Good plan. Try distractions too

What are some distractions? Reading, tv, talking to a friend on the phone, singing... Definitely singing! Its not choir day today though. Oh well. I could at least listen to music. That would help a lot!

I listened to one of my favorite CDs - Peter Schrier- and I feel a lot better now. No more voices. I thought the music would take up the synapses that the voices were and it seems to have worked. I'm going to talk to my friend who is a therapist and who used to be a behavioral pharmacologist about this (including what I wrote about in "Pangs of Impending Disaster" about the "doom" feelings.)

One Step Back, One Step Stays the Same

I got a message from my psych nurse's registered nurse. She said she'd emailed my psych nurse practitioner who said to keep my zyprexa the same for a while (don't decrease it tonight) and decrease Rexulti to 3 mg from 4 mg. I haven't taken the Rexulti at all today because I don't have the 3's; I was just at the pharmacy and they said they were talking to my psych nurse's office about the script. So I dunno how that will turn out, at the moment. Not taking any can't be good either.

Pangs of Impending Disaster

I keep feeling faint but it only lasts a few seconds and then I'm OK. I try to eat small meals throughout the day. My primary dr says I have pre-diabetes but hopefully with continued weight loss (I've lost almost 20 pounds) that will go away. I hope it's not the Rexulti. I reduce the zyprexa to 5 mg tomorrow (!).

Plus I constantly feel I've forgotten something important like my keys or purse or cell phone and don't know where they are. I'm constantly checking for these items. I also don't want to drive for fear I'll get lost.

I have had a good day. Amazing performance in church choir, then hung out with my son and a friend.

I feel like something bad is going to happen. I'm constantly on edge and anxious- unless I'm singing. I notice it doesn't happen in choir.

Pangs of impending disaster keep happening.

Up Rexulti Down Zyprexa

Saw my psych nurse practitioner today. Told her about the menacing girl. She upped my Rexulti to 4 mg (max. dose) and decreased my zyprexa down from 10 mg to 7 1/2. I'm getting a script for 2 1/2 mg of zyprexa for the remainder of the time that I'm on it so I don't have to keep cutting pills in half and such. I just called the pharmacy: They don't have the Rexulti in stock so they'll get it in tomorrow. So that means I'll take the old dose today. (Edit: I found a left-over 1 mg tablet so I added it to a 3 mg tablet and voila! Four mg!) We talked about exercise and Fitbits. She said my weight and cholesterol should drop once Zyprexa is out of my system. Yippee! Let's hope they do. The scale at their office, by the way, says I weigh 7 pounds more than I do at home. Is that my clothes or what? (Do home scales have a built-in "niceness" margin of error?) I should be off the zyprexa in six weeks. Good riddance!

Malevolent Grin

I was sitting in one of the "comfy chairs" at Starbucks drinking my Venti latte when a 20-something girl came and sat across from me. She kept staring at me and grinning this malevolent grin. I'd look up, she'd grin; I'd look down again. Quickly, I looked at her and then down and then back up again, whereupon I found her to be gone! The door was behind her with glass walls and she was nowhere to be seen. I don't know where she went or how. I'm tempted to think she was a very vivid hallucination: she wasn't very complicated, but she did look very real. That smile though- I'm not sure what that meant; it was like she was going to hurt me and she knew it. I'm glad she disappeared!

And Zyprexa Makes its Exit

Here I am weaning off Zyprexa, and this happens. The last two days I've had a nasty cold (with fever) and had to go to the ER because I had chest pain and my INR was subtheraputic. (I.e. my blood was too thick.) Then I get a call from the doctor I saw a few weeks ago about my liver. I knew I have fatty liver disease. But now, they say its the next stage up and the only other stage left is cirrhosis. Cure? Lose weight. Why did it happen? They didn't say, but I looked it up and it seems that Zyprexa is well-known for fatty liver disease. Imagine that: Very high cholesterol and now one step away from cirrhosis of the liver. Zyprexa is evil! I hope Rexulti doesn't do this.

Anonymous Before Diagnosis

Three years before I was diagnosed, I had an online affair with a man my father's age. This went on for months. I told myself it was only online not for real. Then, soon after, I got divorced. I started sleeping with many strangers recklessly. I would also talk really quickly and insist that the person listen to my important ideas. You could find me on my bike riding and singing at the top of my lungs. Years later - after diagnosis and meds - I finally met the man I wrote the sex stories with. I was with my then-boyfriend. It was awkward. Nothing like I'd pictured. There was also a man I talked with every day on the phone that I took off to meet. I live in Michigan ; he was in Georgia. After 3 days of my refusing his advances he sent me packing- literally. And there were many one night stands in between as "dates". Some of them unprotected and most of them very anonymous. I'm glad I finally got diagnosed in 2006 and put on Depakote. (And started therapy.) I'm lucky I didn't get into more trouble than I did.