I think I'm going to say goodbye to the melatonin. I'm remembering why I've never been in the habit of taking it. I'm already a great sleeper, but for the last two nights when I've taken the melatonin I immediately fall asleep and then wake up 4 hours later ready to go. Last night I was in bed by 9pm and then wide awake before 2 am. I finally went back to (restless) sleep until 4:45. I'm not sure I'll make it until closing every night at Universal. I'll have no problem with the waking up part, only the staying up part. On our last day at Disney a few years ago, I was so tired that I fell asleep on Splash Mountain (what? It is a looooong ride) and also on Carousel of Progress, but that one is not so surprising. And that was before I got sick. What can I say? I've never been super high energy, and large groups of people and extreme stimulation drain me like a cheap battery. So weird that one of my favorite places to be are theme parks. Then again, my other favorite place to be is in nature. So I guess they balance each other out.
I really and truly believe the quercetin and niacin have helped with my brain inflammation. My head doesn't have constant pressure anymore, and I know it sounds weird, but my vision has improved. I remember driving home from the beach when I had covid thinking, "What?? Did my vision change overnight?!," because things were suddenly very blurry. There were a few moments when I didn't think I should be driving, but we were six hours from home and there were no other adults in the car. What was I supposed to do? We made it home unscathed. But anyway, all that to say that I'm only now realizing that maybe I had optic neuritis due to inflammation. I also learned that while anyone can be affected by this, it is most common in Asian and caucasian women in their 30s. It can cause a reduction in color vision, which would also make sense why things became more crisp and vibrant after I started taking those supplements. It can also cause flickers of light in the outside corner of your eye, which is when the vitreous gel inside your eye pulls on the retina. I've also had those. A whole lot a year ago, very rarely now, although it did happen in my right eye just a second ago.
Day 10 of taking Wellbutrin. Do I feel like I have more physical energy? No. Well ok, maybe. I haven't taken a single nap in ten days, so that means something. I went on the wellbutrin subreddit and some people were saying they had to stop using it because the smallest dose made them feel like they were on crack. I'm not having that problem at all. Do I feel like I have more mental energy? Yes. I'm still not very motivated or focused to do anything that really matters (aside from my daily responsibilities.) I did have a brief moment yesterday where I told Owsley that I would like to paint, but if I don't do something the moment I want to do it, that motivation floats away into the ether. My head is much clearer though, although I'm still not feeling any physical sensations or any good stuff from my heart. I do feel like I have returned to my body and I'm no longer floating outside of it. My short term memory still really sucks and it is still really hard to recall previous life events, but I definitely feel like a more capable human being living in the present. I am able to focus when I pray though, and that is a huge positive for me. I had really missed that easy communication I had with the Lord. It is also very nice not to be experiencing depersonalization anymore. It might come back again in the future, but hopefully it will be temporary and not year long.
I am also still having lots of trouble with my thoughts getting scrambled by the time they reach my mouth. Last week I was going to put a card in the mail and I said, "I need to get this to the mailbox before it explodes." I meant before it runs. 'Explodes' doesn't sound anything like 'runs,' but at least we always get a good laugh out of it. Once I referred to a hummingbird as a hammerhead, which honestly, makes a little more sense than the mail exploding.
I downloaded Duolingo five days ago and I am killing it. I only took one year of Spanish in high school, but it didn't come easily to me. Now, it is almost like even though certain ways of learning have been dimmed, others have been activated. I can mentally see/hear the words in English when I read them in Spanish, and this is something I just couldn't get the grasp of twenty years ago. The kids both downloaded the app as well. Owsley is trying out German, and Gage is doing courses in French. Gage is very competitive and is actually taking this very seriously. He regularly asks how many new words I've learned and what lesson I'm on, because even though we are learning different languages, he still wants to be better than me. That is ok. I'm glad he is taking so much interest in this. He doesn't even realize this counts as school work.
If I can remain at where I'm at right now, I would be content. I'm still very different from who I used to be, but I finally feel like the old me and the new me are overlapping, like a Venn diagram. There's the old me and the new me, and I am the chunk in the middle that they both have in common.
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