I was hoping my itching on Saturday and Sunday would be the worst of my withdrawal symptoms, but it’s getting progressively worse. Last night I was scratching my stomach so much that patches of petechiae appeared and I scratched my forearms so intensely that I broke skin and bled a little. Because of it, my husband had to put socks on my hands. I literally slept all night that way. I woke up feeling like an infant. It was a bad time not to own gloves.
The itching isn’t the only side effect, unfortunately. The withdrawal has caused my mouth and throat to become extremely dry. Also, my hormone levels feel completely out of whack. I keep crying for no reason whatsoever. It will come out of nowhere and then will stop just as suddenly as it began. Perhaps the most frustrating of the symptoms is the irritability. Yesterday morning was the most I’ve ever actually wanted to punch something in my entire life and it was completely unprovoked. Every little thing anyone said or did drove me absolutely insane. The commute in was terrible. It was so hard not yelling at people for bumping into me or brushing my shoulder with their backpacks or refusing to move out of the doorway when the train doors opened. By the time I got to my desk, I was super grouchy and I took it out on my coworkers, snapping at them for no reason. I’m lucky they were still speaking to me today – thankfully they are good sports.
In general, I have no ability to focus. I can’t hone in on a topic for more than a few minutes and I can’t compose my thoughts to save my life. I’ve been working on the same email for the last 25 minutes and it’s an email I send every single day. It is only one sentence and usually takes less than a minute. I just feel on edge and uncomfortable. I called my hematologist yesterday morning regarding my irritability and itchiness, but he never returned my call. I simply wanted to know how long I could expect these symptoms to last (assuming they are in fact withdrawal symptoms) and if I could take anything, such as Benadryl, to ease the pain. Since he never called back yesterday, I thought maybe he’d call today, but so far nothing.