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http://mastcelldisorders.wallack.us/yabb/YaBB.pl Support and Encouragement >> Support and Encouragement >> Having "One of those days" http://mastcelldisorders.wallack.us/yabb/YaBB.pl?num=1307653784 Message started by nelson1600 on 06/09/11 at 10:09:44

Title: Having "One of those days"
Post by nelson1600 on 06/09/11 at 10:09:44

I'm tired, irritable, flushing from head to toe off and on all day (normally just the face and chest); itching from head to toe ALL DAY; rashes and hives coming and going; can't keep my thoughts straight; in and out of the restroom; nauseous; and trying to chase the kids around while I work.

It's one of the worst days I have had in a long time and I am beginning to confirm my original suspicions. I seem to react worse when the pollen counts are up, insects are out, and when the Texas heat kicks in...

I'm driving my wife and kids nuts with the temperature in the house; I've got the thermostat on 70 and the ceiling fans on in every room because it seems to help more to feel air circulating non stop. I feel guilty because I'm sitting around in a T-shirt and shorts while everyone else scrambles for long sleeves, jeans, and blankets.

I hope everyone else is having a better go at it than I am today...

~Lucas

Title: Re: Having "One of those days"
Post by Riverwn on 06/10/11 at 11:39:06

Hi Lucas,
Do NOT feel guilty about the AC being on. Hon, youre playing it wayyy too close to the edge right now. Youre reacting bigtime. If I did that the next step for me would be shock and 911. No running, NO heat, NO stress, clam and cool air and relax.. Remember what you told Rachael?? Time to take your own advice lol... ANYTIME you start reacting in the least, time to take an extra antihistamine.. You might need to up your meds for awhile if you are being exposed often to something you are reacting to (like pollen). Please take care of yourself. Thats wayyy too dangerously close.. Eat light when you feel bad ok?? and nap when you need to.
Hope it helps
Hugs
Ramona

Title: Re: Having "One of those days"
Post by nelson1600 on 06/10/11 at 13:05:40

Ramona you are so great!

:) I was afraid of "overdoing" my antihistamines... But I doubled up on everything when I took my evening round last night and low and behold I have had such a better day today.

When I woke up I felt so great that I thought I should double up on my morning regiment; but decided not to and instead just see how the day went. I've been great; I even managed an hour in the pool with the kids (Chlorine was a bad area for me last year) and I seem to be fine at the moment. On a scale of 1-10 my energy has been an 8 practically all day.

I think I need to talk to the doc about the MC stabilizer that Lisa mentioned in response to another one of my posts; because even though I have "felt" better today I have still had flushing and rashes / hives. Hopefully he can add something to the regiment to help control my skin reactions.

And on a side note -- your advice always helps; thank you sooo much!

~Lucas

Title: Re: Having "One of those days"
Post by Riverwn on 06/10/11 at 15:08:35

You are so welcome Hon! I was helped by everyone is this board to be able to help others, just like YOU are helping them now :)
Hugs
Ramona

PS Try Quercitan 1 a day. Buy it on ebay cheap. It helps me alot! I hope youre on GastroCrom?? You need it and KUDOS for being smart enough to up your meds when you needed it!! Straights AAAAs for you!

Title: Re: Having "One of those days"
Post by missybean on 06/11/11 at 03:59:59

May I suggest ice packs. I have hives right now and I find moving ice pack around my body where it itches helps a lot. I only leave on for a little while and then I move it. This of course would be good if cold triggers you. I'm really liking the ice packs in fact .....maybe I should make a shirt that has inside pockets throught where you can slide in ice packs. Women going through menopause would love it too.
Melissa

Title: Re: Having "One of those days"
Post by Lisa on 06/11/11 at 20:25:34

Having hives and flushing, or diarrhea, etc, these are what we call breakouts. These reactions are such that show that you are indeed reacting and that you are on the edge of progressing into further, more dangerous activity. It indicates that you've got too much activity and that your antihistamines can't account for all the extra activity, your usual day of meds can't handle it all.

Let's make this practical: A cold/flu.
Having a cold or flu will call the mast cells into action cause this is what they were designed to do- defend your body from invaders. Well, they're going to produce mediators. Well, your body is already over producing MC mediators on a daily basis so having a cold/flu will only add on to the overload. Therefore, you have to increase your meds to compensate for the higher mediator release/burden that is going on. What you normally take won't be sufficient to handle the extra MC activity, thus breakouts occurr.

Stressfull day at work:
This scenario is typical in that the day may start out just fine, but you get to work and your boss tells you that you have a report to crank out for the emergency 3:15 meeting. This puts you into high gear to gather that information together and to have it written up, proofed and printed with 25 bound copies within 4 hours! It means giving order, running around checking on things, talking with people and going beserk and even skipping lunch! Your adrenaline kicks in and the other stress mediators do to and this in turn triggers your MCs and thus begins the flushing, hives diarrhea, etc. You have no choice but to up your meds in compensation!!

Extremes of temperatures/medical procedures:
This is one of the major triggers for most of us for MCs are easily physcially activated! If you read some articles about the process of doing surgery on a masto patients when their spleen has gotten too big, this will teach you how sensitive the MC is to physical activity. These kinds of case studies comment on how the surgeons must precisely plan just exactly how they are going to remove the spleen on these patients for the very handling of the tissue will cause massive degranulation of mediators into the blood stream! This is why we can't go into saunas or hot houses, or jump into the snow like those polar bear people who do that kind of craziness. This is why we can't go running the Boston marathon or racing around the block for anything which causes our bodies to physically sweat has called in the mast cell into action. It physically aggitates the cell itself and this physical aggitation makes it open up and release it's mediators.

When this kind of situation happens, you must physically get yourself out of the situation which has offended your MCs - so, if you are too hot, you need either air conditioning, or a cold shower to bring down your body core temperature. If you are physically active and it's caused you to have breakouts, then you need to physically stop doing what you were doing, be it sit down and rest, or even take a nap. To compensate, you need to up your meds. This is the same for any kind of polen going on as well cause if you are already allergic to pollen and the such, then your MCs are going to be normally activated. So, during allergy season, you must compensate for this excess activity which is totally normal for your MCs to be doing, only in us, it's overkill! So this is why you compensate for the overkill!

Foods/drinks:

These are often choices you make to eat what is a known trigger. The best thing is to avoid it. But sometimes you don't realize it's going to cause trouble. If you are having a good day, then that chocolate may not be an issue. However, on a bad day that chocolate could be the last drop in the bucket and it then causes overflow and a huge mess. In this case the antihistamines are what helps to wipe up the mess, after the fact. On a bad day, the bucket is already borderline and any extra triggering is going to make the mess. If the day is good, then that extra piece of chocolate isn't going to be a big deal. This is like physical activity - on a good day, like in the winter, a walk around the block will be great, but in the summer heat, it will put you in the hospital! The extra medications may be what keeps you out of the hospital for you are compensating for the extra triggering that happened.

I hope this helps make more sense as to why one time we can do something, another time not, and how we work with the overloads and compensate for them in return.

Lisa

Title: Re: Having "One of those days"
Post by nelson1600 on 06/13/11 at 03:27:21

Lisa you are so amazing when it comes to breaking things down. I think that this is extremely helpful information and really helps make sense out of our reactions.

~Lucas