Trouble Sleeping (updated)

It’s just past midnight on Saturday and I can’t sleep. The main issue is the peripheral neuropathy again. No pain this time but the numbness is overwhelming. It’s been slowly getting worse over the past several months, but since I was preoccupied with my heart issues, I haven’t blogged about it that much. The numbness is pretty constant and goes about a quarter way up my calf. Since I still have some edema, it does feel a bit bloated, like the skin is being stretched. It’s probably just false feeling; if I can’t feel pain, I’m not going to be able to feel anything subtle.

My back is also a bit sure. I’ve staring at my iPad too long while sitting on my bed. Add the constant chest pain/pressure when I lie down, it’s hard to relax and fall asleep. The problem is that I have dialysis in about 5 hours so I need to get some rest. I’ve been kinda falling asleep on the dialysis chair and that’s definitely not good for my back.

I read online on some websites that dehydration can make neuropathy worse. I think the dialysis center is drying me out but the edema in my ankles say otherwise. I asked my new endocrinologist about medication for neuropathy and she mentioned gabapentin and Lyrica. She said both are not good drugs for someone with kidney issues. So unless the pain is unbearable, she doesn’t like prescribing those type of drugs.

Sigh… for some reason, I always had the thought that modern medicine can fix everything. Then I find out there are lots of chronic conditions that have no cure, and patients basically suffer their entire life with these conditions.

==========

Update: 8/1/2020

So it”s about 4:00 am and I didn’t get any sleep this morning. Okay, maybe 30 minutes here and there. At 3:30 am, my big to on my left foot started hurting. As I mentioned before, the neuropathy pain episodes are coming fast and furious. Usually I get a few weeks of respite between attacks but now it’s days. I still think it may be dehydration from dialysis lowering my dry weight, but it could be just coincidence. What has helped relieve the pain sometimes is walking or just kicking out my leg violently. I think that moves the blood down my leg to get a bit more circulation. I found this on Amazon:

The way it’s designed allows for both foot and calf massage. I also found that sometimes massaging the calves will cause nerve response in my feet. It has a 4 1/2 star rating with over 1,000 reviews. However, it does cost $250, though if it gives me some relief, it will be totally worth it. I’d pay $100k for a machine that stops the neuropathy numbness and pain.

At this point, I may as well stay up and prepare for dialysis. Not going to get any sleep in the next 30 minutes. I guess it’s napping in the dialysis chair again. At least it’s Saturday and there won’t be any doctors or staff calling on us patients.

==========

Initially, Amazon showed Prime delivery for tomorrow if I ordered with the next 15 hours with one-day shipping. I decided to wait until after dialysis to make the decision since it was $250. When I just checked again, the delivery date has moved to Friday, August 7th, and there was no explanation given. It still had the Prime tag so delivery should have been Tuesday at the latest. I was going to order anyway but decided to search online for other stores. One of the search results was Vybe Percussion which sold percussive hand massagers. They also carried the same foot massager with free shipping, also delivering on August 7th. However, they also had a coupon code for 20% and the code worked. So instead of $250, I ordered the massager for $200 (plus tax). I guess you should always do a quick search before buying anything at Amazon (or Costco) since sometimes there are better deals to be found.

Hopefully it works, even slightly, since $200 is still a lot to waste if it’s ineffective.