As the weather in Texas flip-flops weekly between sunny Spring and snowy Winter, I’ve been dealing with a bit of personal health this last quarter. From my ADHD diagnosis, to trying meds for the first time, to back-to-back sicknesses, then constant migraines, and then I think I got the Norovirus on New Years. A debilitating time for me, but in January it started to turn around when I got some good news…

“It’s not a tumor, it’s a deformity”

In December I saw my primary care physician about a pain in my ankle that was causing me to hobble and at times preventing me from walking in November. It caused a lot of other issues as well; a fire-like pain in my thigh and a bump on my heel.

My doctor thought it might be Chondroma, which is a bit scary to look up, but is like a tumor made of cartilage. That tumor can either be on the surface of the bone or inside the bone. Yikes. I got an x-ray and followed up with an orthopedic surgeon who gave me some good news that it’s not a tumor, but Haglund’s Deformity also known as “pump bump” because a lot of women who wear heels often get it. The pain comes and goes based on how the tendon rubs against the bone spur.

Because I’m not in pain right now, the plan now is to take a non-surgical path and use anti-inflammatories to keep it at bay, saving surgery as a Plan B.

The side effects of ADHD meds

Last time I said I started on Qelbree, a non-stimulant ADHD medication. Non-stimulants take about five days to build up, so there’s no lightning bolt moment of clarity with non-stimulants that others describe when taking Adderall or Ritalin. It’s hard to know if it’s working, but in time I started to feel the effects.

The most notable one was that I was almost immune to environmental triggers like clutter and noise that overwhelm me. Whenever I encountered a mundane task like take out the trash or wash the dishes, I found it a lot easier to pick up and do without a 30-minute prep talk with my brain. That part was great… the side effects though… not so great…

One of Qelbree’s listed side effects is insomnia. Sure enough, I’d wake up every night at 2 AM and be awake for hours. Not quite night-brain anxiety, but just… fully awake. To combat this I read the first four books of the Murderbot Diaries back-to-back. If life hands you lemons, make emo robot lemonade.

The insomnia wasn’t great and I was having horrific headaches, so I switched to Atomoxetine, another non-stimulant SNRI that’s more common. My insurance also said they weren’t going to pay for Qelbree, so that worked out. The also don’t pay for atomoxetine, but it’s 10x cheaper so… I guess that’s a good deal? Lol.

I’d say “the mox” –that’s what we, the moxxers, call it– is working evident by the fact that I’ve been able to focus on some long mundane tasks at work. That’s been helpful. But it’s not without its side effects either. Weight loss is a welcomed side effect (-5 lbs) but another side effect is extreme dry mouth. My mouth is dry, y’all –how dry is it?– my mouth is so dry I’m putting lotion on my gums. My dentist said I need to buy that gel old people use to keep my mouth moisturized.

I guess I’ve been lucky in my life thus far because this is my first time navigating meds and side effects. What I’d like to avoid is taking more meds to counter meds, although my gum lotion already crosses that line.

The rest of the story

This has been a candid personal health issue of Vibe Check magazine. Behind the scenes it’s been less adventurous. A busy new year at work as my team sprints to deliver an “intra-source” design systems project. It –and the 1,000 token sidecar project– have consumed a lot of my brain and time.

My daughter’s mid-way through her competitive cheer season. I’m not the most extreme cheer dad, but I’m a proud one. Cheer has a lot of cross-over with child beauty pageants, but it’s a team sport where kids do flips. And it costs about 5-figures a year.

Hoping this bad health spat is over for now –he says as an ominous storm cloud appears above my head– and I can start employing my hands and brain to do more interesting tasks.

Stats

💪 Wellness

  • Navigating new medications

📖 Reading

My book consumption is becoming athematic and uninspired (except for emo robot). I’m feeling the urge to double down on sci-fi and manga.

Finished

  • Rogue Protocol - Emo robot
  • Exit Strategy - Emo robot
  • Being Wrong - Super recommend. We’re all wrong. A lot. It’s how our brains work.
  • Feel Good Productivity - A productivity book I’d maybe recommend.
  • Super Mario - The history of Nintendo and how it grew its video game business. I loved the inside look at important moments like shifting strategy to react to Sega, Sony, and Xbox.
  • The Power of Habit - A bit like Malcom Gladwell on steroids focusing on the singular issue of habit formation. One good takeaway around harnessing, hijacking, and leveraging the Cue → Response → Reward loop that habits depend on.
  • Disrupting the Game - Reggie Fils-Amié’s autobiography, more Nintendo.
  • The Customer Is Always Wrong - A humorous’ish critique of work, capitalism, customer service, and bullshit jobs.
  • The Startup of You - Self-help in “entrepreneur of your own life” form.

Started

📝 Blogging

An okay blogging era…

📺 Media

TV

  • The Earliest Show (YouTube) - Ben Schwartz’s improv morning show. Perfect in every way. Watched hours of bloopers and cut scenes too.
  • Very Important People S2 (Dropout) - This season is a little rough, not gonna lie.
  • Make Some Noise S3 (Dropout) - Always makes me smile.
  • This Aged Great (YouTube) - Ruining my childhood’s favorite movies one video at a time.
  • The Mentalist (Hulu) - My entire family has decided we all like this B-rate CSI clone.
  • Mantracks (YouTube) - Creationism, lies, and doubling down on lies.

Anime

  • DAN DA DAN (Netflix, Crunchyroll) - Classic nerdy boy meets cool girl high school romance wrapped up in a warm tortilla of magic demons vs weird aliens. The mother’s flashback mini-sode in Ep7 deserves whatever the anime Oscar is, I’ve never been more moved by a piece of television.

Podcasts

🎙 Recording

ShopTalk

🧶 Crafts and Models

Too busy to sit down and hobby, but made one fun piece…

  • AK-47 rubber band gun - My brother got me a balsa wood AK-47 fully automatic rubber band gun. It’s a thoughtful gift and mixes three of my favorites: modeling, soviet history, and trolling my kids and their friends.

⌨️ Open source

👾 Video games

  • Balatro (Steam, Switch, iOS) - Absolutely hooked on this thanks to the ShopTalk D-d-discord.