For the most part, I’ve transferred my neurological care from the neurologist that I was seeing one town over to the local pain management clinic here in my city. My primary care doctor was, and has been, in full support of this and thinks that it was (is? how do I phrase this?) the right thing to do. We discussed Botox when I was seen for the first time, which I am amenable to attempting… we just need to get insurance approval for it, or know that insurance denied the clinic’s attempt to seek approval for it from me so that we can appeal the denial. So far, no one relevant has heard anything back about whether it was denied or approved… so I guess that’s a waiting game, and we’ll see when we see. In the interim, and to have it on hand in the event that I need it, I’ve been prescribed Fioricet again, and we are currently working on getting me the highest dose and frequency of that medication which works, but not go beyond that unless we have to so that I don’t inure to it the same way triptans do in that they no longer work on me at all. “Fioricet is love, Fioricet is life” has become one of my biggest inside jokes, because to be honest, it works decently…

For me, for someone who very often doesn’t get a lot of pain relief other than by waiting it out, this is huge.

I also found out that I am on nearly the largest dose of Gabapentin. That is 3,000mg, and I am currently on 2,700mg. I’m also not sure if I’ve mentioned it here, but I’ve begun to develop peripheral neuropathy on my left side due to it… but as long as it helps migraines, which it does, I am reluctant to give that up unless I am made to give that up. The only major downside to this is that I am left-side dominant. My left ring finger, left pinkie finger, and the area going downward from that to my elbow is numb now. I also can’t bear weight on or with my left hand. But like I’ve said, if it makes a sizable dent in the pain, I am willing to live with all that.

The back of my left foot is also numb, which means that I have to be careful walking, but… see above, heh.

So Twitter actually suspended my account for criticizing new Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett, which surprised me… because of all of the things to crack down on, let alone suspend me over, it was that criticism that broke the camel’s back. I appealed the suspension as soon as I became aware that it had happened and began e-mailing Twitter support after they initially e-mailed me, once per day when it became apparent that they could expedite my “permanent” suspension but not bother to have someone take a look at it to see whether or not it was justified (it wasn’t). But it honestly figures that they can expedite a “permanent” account suspension (and not allowing me to create new accounts in spite of the fact that sorting this out has taken forever), but slow-walk an appeal. We really need better social networking sites.

I am also sitting on a Facebook post block that expires at the beginning of next month for telling someone who is extremely religious not to evangelize to me. They also criticized the fact that I am a leftist, so I criticized them for blindly following their religion of choice, and look where that got me. Both Facebook and Twitter seem to “crack down” harder on users that they can, with reasonable suspicion, ascertain to be AFAB (assigned female at birth) or female, going to almost herculean lengths to protect straight white men… and religious, straight white men at that. I am honestly not sure which of them, between the two, is worse.

I’ve begun to be seen at the local pain management clinic for my migraines with the goal being to start Botox at… some point. We’ll have to find out which point that is. In the interim, I’ve been put on Gabapentin to see if it would be a better preventive medication than Topamax and Trokendi… weren’t, and what I’m pretty sure the rest of my preventive medications have been. I’m not sure how well it’s working because I literally can not feel most of my left hand, the back of my left foot, and random, smaller areas on my left side.

So now I have to sit here and think about what I am willing to “trade” for less migraine pain. Wonderful.