Hi there @jenniferhunter. You are right……those little squamous things are the ones that like to float around and multiple in your body. It's the basil ones that don't migrate; they just get bigger. So…..I do go twice a year to have everything to do with skin examined. I was such a CA beach girl ….you know, with the iodine in the baby oil.

Thanks for acknowledging the itch. And yes I keep ice gel packs in the freezer. They often mean the difference between sleeping and screaming. I am testing two new topicals……each one for two weeks. I also am using a compression sleeve on my arms so I can't attack them. I remember those itches inside the casts…….when things were healing.

Jay had the Moes surgery on his forehead. That worked well. How are you doing today? Riding the horse yet? I remember how good it smelled to go in the barn at 5:30 a,m, to treat Keo Raff's feet in the summer.

Thanks for checking on me. I so appreciate all of your assistance. Speaking of that, I have just had an amazing MFR treatment. When I understand it better, I will run it by you.
May you have peace and ease.
Chris

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Greetings…welcome to our first reunion, Sarah, @emyliander, and Ellen @helenfrances. It certainly does seem like it has been a long time since we had an update and a timely conversation? Sara, @emyliander, how is your new home? Are you all moved in? I have to ask…..do you have a garden for your flowers? And I hope your daughter is tucked away at her special school or is COVID19 still mandating that she remain with you.

And how about you Ellen, @helenfrances? You, in June, were waiting to complete a withdrawal from Clonazepam and continuing to do research and some shared decision making about your road ahead with your neurologist.

I think in June, we were all talking about how cognitive impairment at the mild stage was affecting our lives. Do our life partners and families recognize our somewhat staggering memories? I think you were looking at a shared support group or class with your husband Sarah. And I was asking you to get a medicine review to make sure those stomach issues were being taken care of.

I will share with you a couple of medical hurdles that I find challenging right now. I found a tiny crunchy nodule on my sternum which ended up being squamous cell carcinoma and was promptly surgically removed. Now I wait like so many others who receive a cancer diagnosis of any kind.

You're not going to believe this one…..I sure didn't until I had spent several days in what I call an itch bomb. It is called neuropathic itch and does its annoying work inside your body. No matter how hard you try you can't scatch it because you can't reach it. So now I am being a guinea pig for different medications to see which might work best without side effects. At the end of two weeks, I make a switch and we see what happens with a new trial.

So…fill me in and fill me up with news and highlights. It seems like things are pretty quiet with the travel restrictions. I must admit I am hungry for a play at the Gutherie. Dinner at Sea Change…..actually sitting in a restaurant might also be nice. Shoot, I would even go to our adopted granddaughter's softball games if I could remember the day. And that is where I will end for tonight. I am noticing greater difficulty with recent memory especially when I am talking and lose my thought. I see people either trying to help me by feeding me the words or looking away as if they haven't noticed.

How are your memories holding up………do you have any tricks or hacks to share? As Ellen says…write any time. And I say…..do it now or you just might forget. My very best to you both……..I would love to hear from you.

May you have peace and ease.
Chris

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Hi,
I am 63 yr old female and have been reading the boards relative to effexor xr withdrawal (highest dose 2015 375 mg), slow taper to May 2018 took last dose of Effexor XR 37.5 mg May 28th 2018, I started to have some balance dizzy issues in April and then by first week in June I had horrible anxiety (not my usual, had to be from the Effexor withdrawal), nausea, jitters, balance, dizzy issues, depth perception problems, was sensitive to light and sound, thought I was losing my mind –long story trying to make this shorter. Over summer through present time I have had gradual relief, still have some balance, dizzy issues, depth perception and mental challenges, which brings me to my latest diagnosis in subject line. (I was and still am taking wellbutrin XL 300 mg/daily for depression). I am not depressed and my anxiety has been reduced greatly (I think in part due to stopping the Effexor quite honestly), not taking any additional medication for anxiety – don’t need it! Praise God!

One of the changes I noted as Effexor was tapered was cognitive decline. Having difficulty multi tasking , making financial spreadsheets, challenging to make sense out of complex situations or interrupting the difference between 3 different options for scheduling (as an example–these are all things I have been really good at — until April/May of this year). Met with neurologist, (primary care ordered brain MRI which was neg), he ordered over 20 labs and they were all within normal limits and he referred me to neuropsych for testing – showed deficits in visual spatial ability, graphomotor reproduction of complex visual figural information, weakness in divided attention in verbal fluency format, block patterns and abstraction ability. “not severe enough to warrant a diagnosis of dementia but not normal, so mild neurocognitive d/o; predominately executive and right hemisphere pattern of deficit present etiology not clear in light of normal MRI. They are thinking perhaps i am having ophthalmologic migranes/seizures (only experience in right field of vision) and this may be part of what is impacting my cognition.

I will have follow up more specific/detailed MRI in May 2019, in mean time I am “to remain concerned but not consumed over these results”, call or make appointment if symptoms increase, (balance, dizziness, cognition etc).

Long story shorter I know that wellbutrin is typically not prescribed for people with known seizure d/o; from what i have read and know (i am RN behavioral health) wellbutrin can lower seizure threshold. Can you help me find any research or information that may relate to effexor withdrawal and or wellbutrin potential impact on cognition or correlation with optical seizures impacting brain function. I will have follow up more detailed MRI..not until may 2019, . I have been trying to put most of this puzzle together myself, I had to request initial MRI in June, request referral to neuro, self referred to opthamology and found my prescription was way to strong — leading to some of my depth perception and balance problems — new script/glasses now helping somewhat.

I appreciate any feedback you may have. Thank you, Barb

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Hi @emyliander, how are you? It's been awhile since we heard from you.

@helenfrances, I'm so glad you got the technical issues worked out and were able to log back in. Happy to have you back.

@artscaping, let's get this discussion going again. I miss your posts and conversation here.

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Good afternoon @dougjanehaltom, @erikas Welcome to Connect. We are delighted to have you join us. And thank you Erica for introducing these folks to me. I hope you are getting excited about coming to Mayo in January for the MCI program. And it sounds like it couldn’t be soon enough. I think if I could have any gift for Christmas that I really want and need it would be to be able to cope with my MCI better and become a more organized and contented human.

How long have you been dealing with memory issues? And by the way….are you a male (Doug) or a female (Jane) or someone else? That will help me get everything in the right bucket. I need a little help every once in a while.

At this point in your journey you are working not only on your memory challenges, like appointments and “to do” lists, you are also fighting depression over the thought of becoming a burden to folks in your life.

I wonder if you have been sent any reading assignments or video offerings by Mayo. Perhaps not. If it were me, I would forget what I had read of course. I would need to experience it. It would also be helpful to know if any of your medications or other treatments affect your cognitive efforts. Sometimes just changing the time of day for your dosage can help with the items on your daily calendar or to do list. Foggy brain doesn’t reside here anymore.

Regarding being a burden …… may I propose that you stay in the present, the here and now. I am fortunate that my life partner has been a therapist and knows all the soft kind reminder messages. He rarely, if ever, becomes agitated or perturbed with my….”I forgets”, “I don’t remembers” and “what did you say?” Sharing your experience with your significant other is a huge help…….my wonderful love goes to all my appointments and supports most of my efforts.

So what do you do right now? Here is what works for me……when I can’t remember why I have gotten up and walked to another room only to stand there dumbfounded I just try this…..quiet my mind and stand very still. If I breathe quietly and wait……all of a sudden it will pop into my brain…oh…yes check on the toothpaste supply. The same strategy also works when trying to remember what someone just said. Be quiet, do not talk, request a moment and wait for the other person’s words to return to your mind. It is really important to answer their question or comment as quickly as possible.

So…those are my prizes for today. I will leave you with this memory. My father had Alzheimer’s and my mother ran smack into cognitive decline. It is reassuring to know that my neuropsychologist has told me that I have skipped Alzheimer’s just by my age. Yippee! I am thankful. Have you had any of the tests? How did you do?

May you be content and at ease.
Chris

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Good afternoon @dougjanehaltom, @erikas Welcome to Connect. We are delighted to have you join us. And thank you Erica for introducing these folks to me. I hope you are getting excited about coming to Mayo in January for the MCI program. And it sounds like it couldn’t be soon enough. I think if I could have any gift for Christmas that I really want and need it would be to be able to cope with my MCI better and become a more organized and contented human.

How long have you been dealing with memory issues? And by the way….are you a male (Doug) or a female (Jane) or someone else? That will help me get everything in the right bucket. I need a little help every once in a while.

At this point in your journey you are working not only on your memory challenges, like appointments and “to do” lists, you are also fighting depression over the thought of becoming a burden to folks in your life.

I wonder if you have been sent any reading assignments or video offerings by Mayo. Perhaps not. If it were me, I would forget what I had read of course. I would need to experience it. It would also be helpful to know if any of your medications or other treatments affect your cognitive efforts. Sometimes just changing the time of day for your dosage can help with the items on your daily calendar or to do list. Foggy brain doesn’t reside here anymore.

Regarding being a burden …… may I propose that you stay in the present, the here and now. I am fortunate that my life partner has been a therapist and knows all the soft kind reminder messages. He rarely, if ever, becomes agitated or perturbed with my….”I forgets”, “I don’t remembers” and “what did you say?” Sharing your experience with your significant other is a huge help…….my wonderful love goes to all my appointments and supports most of my efforts.

So what do you do right now? Here is what works for me……when I can’t remember why I have gotten up and walked to another room only to stand there dumbfounded I just try this…..quiet my mind and stand very still. If I breathe quietly and wait……all of a sudden it will pop into my brain…oh…yes check on the toothpaste supply. The same strategy also works when trying to remember what someone just said. Be quiet, do not talk, request a moment and wait for the other person’s words to return to your mind. It is really important to answer their question or comment as quickly as possible.

So…those are my prizes for today. I will leave you with this memory. My father had Alzheimer’s and my mother ran smack into cognitive decline. It is reassuring to know that my neuropsychologist has told me that I have skipped Alzheimer’s just by my age. Yippee! I am thankful. Have you had any of the tests? How did you do?

May you be content and at ease.
Chris

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Thanks, so much, Chris! I am 70. Does this mean that Iwill just have mild Cognitive impairment or will this go into Alzheimers? I am trying to do everything that I can to avoid getting worse. Is that even possible? I am so thankful for this support group!

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Hi Chris, I also am laughing to myself, “I hope you are adapting to the refreshing nature of Spring “. Are you kidding, we just had 8” of snow ! Actually we could see signs of Spring before the snow covered it up and they will be there when the snow melts.

I am an animal lover, having at present to cats and a rescue dog Molly, 3yrs old.
I am originally from England and have a brother in Queensland Australia.

Actually I think this time of isolation makes things a little easier on the memory, because I don’t have to remember to go anywhere. The exception was a chiropractic appointment which I forgot, but they they were able to fit me in later that day.

My husband does help with our daughter, but being female the majority of it falls to me.
Our house sale has been postponed till the beginning of May and we’ll reassess then.
I was thinking yesterday about the running of the household in our new home and setting up an equalizing of responsibilities but we haven’t talked about it yet.

Next on my list of things to do is to find my credit card and bank card and the paperwork that I need to send out for my daughters medical care in NY. I’ve been looking for a week now.
How is this restricted time period for you, is it easier or harder ? What are the main problems your memory causes for you ? Right now, for myself I’d say appointments, when I have them, and loosing things.
What I do for myself is get up around 6am and enjoy an hour or so to myself while everyone is in bed. I’m reading again a book “Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff”
They are up now so it’s time to eat breakfast.

Thank you for writing, enjoy your beautiful State and a quieter time.
Sarah.

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Hi,
I am 63 yr old female and have been reading the boards relative to effexor xr withdrawal (highest dose 2015 375 mg), slow taper to May 2018 took last dose of Effexor XR 37.5 mg May 28th 2018, I started to have some balance dizzy issues in April and then by first week in June I had horrible anxiety (not my usual, had to be from the Effexor withdrawal), nausea, jitters, balance, dizzy issues, depth perception problems, was sensitive to light and sound, thought I was losing my mind –long story trying to make this shorter. Over summer through present time I have had gradual relief, still have some balance, dizzy issues, depth perception and mental challenges, which brings me to my latest diagnosis in subject line. (I was and still am taking wellbutrin XL 300 mg/daily for depression). I am not depressed and my anxiety has been reduced greatly (I think in part due to stopping the Effexor quite honestly), not taking any additional medication for anxiety – don’t need it! Praise God!

One of the changes I noted as Effexor was tapered was cognitive decline. Having difficulty multi tasking , making financial spreadsheets, challenging to make sense out of complex situations or interrupting the difference between 3 different options for scheduling (as an example–these are all things I have been really good at — until April/May of this year). Met with neurologist, (primary care ordered brain MRI which was neg), he ordered over 20 labs and they were all within normal limits and he referred me to neuropsych for testing – showed deficits in visual spatial ability, graphomotor reproduction of complex visual figural information, weakness in divided attention in verbal fluency format, block patterns and abstraction ability. “not severe enough to warrant a diagnosis of dementia but not normal, so mild neurocognitive d/o; predominately executive and right hemisphere pattern of deficit present etiology not clear in light of normal MRI. They are thinking perhaps i am having ophthalmologic migranes/seizures (only experience in right field of vision) and this may be part of what is impacting my cognition.

I will have follow up more specific/detailed MRI in May 2019, in mean time I am “to remain concerned but not consumed over these results”, call or make appointment if symptoms increase, (balance, dizziness, cognition etc).

Long story shorter I know that wellbutrin is typically not prescribed for people with known seizure d/o; from what i have read and know (i am RN behavioral health) wellbutrin can lower seizure threshold. Can you help me find any research or information that may relate to effexor withdrawal and or wellbutrin potential impact on cognition or correlation with optical seizures impacting brain function. I will have follow up more detailed MRI..not until may 2019, . I have been trying to put most of this puzzle together myself, I had to request initial MRI in June, request referral to neuro, self referred to opthamology and found my prescription was way to strong — leading to some of my depth perception and balance problems — new script/glasses now helping somewhat.

I appreciate any feedback you may have. Thank you, Barb

Jump to this post