Congestive heart failure and AAS

[tigerspawn]

I have worked as a RN for 8yrs. I have spent over 20000 hrs. working in the clinical setting not counting nursing school and working as an LPN from my senior year of high school until I received my BSN. I have never seen or heard of anyone having CHF before their 50. I don’t believe that’s what you suffer from. What’s Attention deficit-hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) have to do with CHF? Why would your doctor be running an electrocardiogram on you? Do you have a preexisting heart condition that you haven’t told us about? He would not run an EKG for ADHD. Why were you seeing a psychologists? What other co-existing conditions do you possess along with your ADHD? I agree with Bonaparte your jumping from one medical condition to another and never believing the doctors that are responsible for your care are classic signs of being a hypochondriac. You need to seek professional help from a psychologists before you hurt yourself.

[BBJT200]

I have worked as a RN for 8yrs. I have spent over 20000 hrs. working in the clinical setting not counting nursing school and working as an LPN from my senior year of high school until I received my BSN. I have never seen or heard of anyone having CHF before their 50. I don’t believe that’s what you suffer from. What’s Attention deficit-hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) have to do with CHF? Why would your doctor be running an electrocardiogram on you? Do you have a preexisting heart condition that you haven’t told us about? He would not run an EKG for ADHD. Why were you seeing a psychologists? What other co-existing conditions do you possess along with your ADHD? I agree with Bonaparte your jumping from one medical condition to another and never believing the doctors that are responsible for your care are classic signs of being a hypochondriac. You need to seek professional help from a psychologists before you hurt yourself.

ADHD is unrelated to CHF.
Before being turned down for treatment for ADHD, I was given an EKG test. I was explained to that it's a standard thing in the clinic I went to.
I do not have a known preexisting heart condition. There had been a misunderstanding when I explained my use of ephedrine and caffeine as an over the counter method of treatment for my ADHD. It actually works alright, but it's inconsistent enough not to be reliable. Somehow, after explaining that, I have meth and heroin use in my file. I would assume that another plausible reason for the EKG test was those incorrect records--making sure I hadn't "done any damage with my drug use"

The clinic I used was a college-campus clinic. They ran a program to help people get through diagnosis and treatment for ADHD if they had it. The process took around two months, as everything was scrutinized as much as it could be. The cool thing to do around here is get on adderall for false adhd to use on finals etc. Another reason for them to find any reason not to treat me.

The EKG test was done about an hour after I had taken 24mg ephedrine and 400mg caffeine, but I had no prior knowledge that they intended to do an EKG. I also did not get the chance to explain the situation when presented with the results. Since then, i've been labeled a 'drug user' and nothing I have to say is listened to at the clinic due to the mistake in records. I fought it for a while, but found it was pointless and went elsewhere even though I couldn't afford it. I still have a lot of unpaid bills from this new clinic, but at least I have my medication pretty stable and a doctor who cares about making me into a functional human being more than that extra paperwork they have to do to prescribe stimulants.

The hypochondriac indicators have been there for a few years, but as my ADHD has been treated, I am noticing a big difference personally, as well as others. It caused me to jump from one thing to the next, all day long. My memory was so awful that it was like starting over every day from scratch, so you can probably see where the jumping to conclusions could come from that. I was always on a new venture from day to day, week to week. I couldn't hold a job long because I would get so bored and distracted that I'd have to quit to work somewhere new, in order to keep my sanity.

I never stated that I have CHF. I stated that I have the symptoms of it and that I guess I had some thinking to do.
This meant that regardless of ability to pay, I would be thinking about how to get it looked into and confirmed (or hopefully not)
The symptoms were something I was aware of all the way back to last summer, but was probably related to my ephedrine use.

And no, I am not a recreational drug user. Now that i'm stable on my adderall, I actually have zero desire to drink, do drugs, etc...whereas before it was a constant struggle to convince myself away from the 'why not, everything sucks anyway' mentality.

I was on antidepressants because I was originally diagnosed as having depression. I was in the Air Force for about 4.5 months; half way through basic training I developed an eating disorder due to stress and the way that we were forced to consume entire meals in (I'm serious here) 60 seconds. Otherwise, you'd go hungry. So your choice was to feel seriously ill, or be extremely hungry. The eating disorder progressed as a way to cope with stress, and from there I developed depression (see below). I was discharged for 'adjustment disorder' and given no help whatsoever in regards to my issues that I developed while in. Prior to enlisting, I had a relatively normal life, and no psychological issues. Yes, I had ADHD symptoms but they had not been noticed as a kid and I thought what I went through was normal. Now, I have an "Entry Level Separation," which looks like I gave up or failed in training. This is going to follow me forever, labeling me as a failure. (Thus being even harder to find a job to support myself)

Turns out I had little to no testicular function (due to an accident I had a while back) and extremely low T.
Once I had my test levels back into the healthy range, I felt considerably better. I was still struggling hard with the ADHD, but now that has been taken care of, I do not suffer from depression whatsoever.
I'm stressed out all the time, as I always have been, but not depressed. My entire family is high-strung and stressed out.

I've had psychiatric help. I was "depressed" as they saw. Antidepressants did nothing whatsoever except give me E.D. and turn me into a zombie that felt nothing.
It doesn't help, and I don't feel that I need it to be honest. What did help was getting my test levels back up, and getting treatment for ADHD.
What I need is to get myself into a position where I can reasonably get these issues managed by a doctor, rather than myself.

Because of the blasting and cruising I was doing (due to being on TRT anyway...), I ended up with elavated hematocrit. This returned my lethargy, depression, mood swings, and definitely impaired my ability to think clearly.
After the phlebotomy, I feel great. All of those symptoms are gone. If I had been able to afford treatment from a doctor, the hematocrit would have already been noticed and taken care of.

It's unfortunate that once you get labeled as having depression, legitimate or not, you are also labeled a headcase. Anything you say is less credible, and it's incredibly frustrating.