Amantadine day 3

As is often the case on weekends, I woke up with a migraine that shut me down for most of the day. I even had to cancel my piano lesson, and I was all ready to KILL on the C.P.E. Bach “Solfegietto.”

 
I’ve had many discussions about why migraines tend to hit me mostly on weekends. Maybe I consume more caffeine than I realize during the workweek and I crash on the weekends without it. Maybe my illness-addled brain politely waits until it knows a migraine won’t disrupt any major plans and only then does it unleash the kraken.

 
Maybe someone’s trying to contact me about my warranty.

 
But now there’s the unknown universe of miserable Amantadine side effects in the mix, and I’m just gonna give in and chalk this morning up to that.

I was able to make myself functional enough by 3:00 to work at the meals program where I volunteer. (Side note: The people we’re serving are growing in numbers, and quite a few felt the need to inform us that this was their first time needing to get a free meal. The fact that new visitors are self-conscious and almost apologetic for some reason always hits me the hardest.)

My body and brain had only 50% battery power by then, but I still went to see a superlative production of a show some friends were in. I was seated by my mom, and she pointed out that I was noticeably less shaky. My brain was in crowded-theater mode and I was already subconsciously holding myself still, but the more I paid attention to it, the more I realized I was spending WAY less energy than normal trying to hold myself together. But maybe I was just still exhausted from the migraine.

 
My litmus test is putting toothpaste on my toothbrush. It’s been maybe a year since I started having to set my toothbrush on the counter to get the toothpaste on it because my hands were too shaky to do it when I was holding both things in front of me. And that was still the case just now.

 
But as I sit here typing this, only one foot is swinging and twitching. Usually both are on fire 24/7. It’s really quite remarkable. So I’m cautiously letting myself think the Amantadine is finally letting me SIT THE FUCK STILL LIKE A BIG BOY.

Amantadine day 2

I was noticeably more light-headed all day, but in a slightly loopy way and thankfully not a stand-up-and-black-out way like I was last night.

My ears have been screaming EEEEEEEEE! at me all day. Seriously. EEEEEEEEEE!

I had two video calls at work where I could see in real time how much I was fidgeting and rocking and twitching.

 
It’s breathtakingly exhausting spending all my energy trying to hold myself still, so I was very glad to climb under a blanket and a cat after work and nap on the couch (see photo).

Amantadine isn’t a psych drug, which would usually require me to endure weird (or uncomfortable or downright miserable) side effects for a few weeks while I waited for its efficacy to manifest or not manifest itself. So I’m in uncharted territory here as far as what to expect and how long to tolerate it before I decide whether or not the drug is doing its intended job.

 
Originally an antiviral used to prevent Influenza A, Amantadine is now primarily an antidyskinetic used to help control the palsies and involuntarily movements of Parkinson’s disease and my close personal friend tardive dyskinesia.

 
The only other tremor-control drug I’ve tried is the anticonvulsant Gabapentin, which didn’t seem to do anything for me except on the morning when I accidentally took two doses and literally felt like my heart was stopping and my eyes were crossing so hard that my optic muscles might rupture. So, yeah. I immediately started weaning myself off of THAT trainwreck-in-waiting.

 
If I were to judge Amantadine after just these two days I’d say it’s an abject failure as a tremor suppresant because I’m exponentially more twitchy and tremory. My increased orthostatic hypotension (my tendency to experience blackouts or near-blackouts when I stand up) is pretty alarming to me. And I disconcertingly need to monitor myself for a potential skin rash called Livedo Reticularis, which my neurologist and I both agree would be a fun, indeterminately ethnic drag name but that he warned me is also a very dangerous development potentially worthy of a trip to the ER.

So for now I sit (and twitch and rock and tremor) and wait. I think I’ll give it a week before I decide if these side effects are worth enduring—or if I even think the drug is working. I’ve lived with and learned how to manage tardive dyskinesia for 15+ years, so I’m in a devil-you-know/devil-you-don’t holding pattern until I decide which devil to live with (spoiler alert: I’ll probably pick the one with the cutest butt).

In the mean time, I have a kitty to snuggle up with …

Miss Amantadine Capsule

Day 1 on a new (to me) drug that may or may not help calm all the twitching and fidgeting and rocking and tremors of my tardive dyskinesia.

 
Tardive dyskinesia is an often permanent side effect of any number of psych drugs. It took over a decade to find the right drug cocktail to let me function and participate in life like a normal (ahem) person, and I’ve been really cautious about tinkering with the pharmacology since then—even if it could potentially make my body finally SIT THE FUCK STILL.

 
But my neurologist decided yesterday that I’m at a place where my psychotropics are working (more or less) and I’m able to observe my intrusive thoughts and bipolar episodes and frustrating side effects with a degree of objectivity in case I start to plummet … so he launched me on a new pharmaceutical adventure that I started this morning.

 
So far, the only thing I’ve noticed is a chronic inability to avoid typos at work. But it’s shivery-cold and I’m a feeble 56 and I’m jacked up on Diet Coke and I’ve been snorting a substance I got in a corpse-strewn alley from a one-eyed walking tattoo named Prison Killer Dave, so the cause of the typos is really anybody’s guess.

 
As of this writing, the only real takeaway here, of course, is that Amantadine is a pretty alpha drag name.