Magic Grass

When I was little - about 4 years old - my family lived together in England, and had just recently moved to the base housing the military had there. Next to our house was a little park. It was so close by, and the area was so safe, that my parents let us go play at the park by ourselves one day (my mom could watch us through the window). I think my sister was about 3 years old at the time.

Anyway, we were excited because we didn't have any adults there with us, but we soon encountered a problem. My sister didn't know how to swing on the swing set all by herself. I tried pushing her for a while, but then I got tired, and I wanted to swing on my own too. So I tried to teach her how to do it. But to no avail - she just didn't understand. Then I had an idea.

"Here - try this", I said. Then I reached down and pulled up some grass and placed it on the swing. "This is magic grass - if you sit on it while you swing, you'll be able to do it without anyone pushing you." Then I placed some 'magic grass' on my own swing to prove to her that it would work. That's all it took. Without any further instruction, my sister sat down on the grass and started swinging back and forth. I didn't understand it at the time, but I look back and am still amazed that the placebo actually worked. It was a really fun day :)

So why bring up the story? Well, I was thinking about hormones the other day, which got me thinking about mood swings, which made me think about swinging, which triggered the memory.

But that's what I really wanted to talk about in this post - mood swings!

So, my hormone regimen has consisted of injectable delestrogen and spiro for the past year and a half. I've reached a point where it's pretty stable. I had days with mood swings, but they were few and far between, and mostly pretty mild. Then about a month and a half ago I introduced progesterone into the mix. OMG! Now I know what mood swings are really like.

So anytime you change your regimen, your body needs to adjust to the new hormone levels. Also, if you levels get super low you get more moody (this tends to happen right before my next injection). Again - I'm fairly stable, and can usually have control over my emotions during this time, but I can tell it's going on. Being tired or stressed while your levels are low, however, will have a profound effect on your mood swings. Being tired, stressed, and having low E levels and adjusting to progesterone are a VERY bad combination.

The worst part about mood swings is that you can tell they're going to be there. You can look at the calendar and say "that day my levels are going to be low, so I should be extra careful not to snap at people or get unreasonably mad at them." And some days you can. But on the bad days, the really, really bad days - you can't. You *know* your irritable. You *know* you shouldn't let things get to you. And you *think* that you're being reasonable with people. But then after you think about it, and your mood changes (which could be instantly, or a few hours later) you realize what an absolute bitch you were. And then there's the moments where you just can't take it anymore, and you need to just break down and cry - and you don't even know what 'it' really is! But you know it's there, and it's too sad or too much for you to handle, and all you can really do is just sit down and cry about it for a while.

But then you go home, and you fill up the syringe with the super thick fluid from the little glass bottle, and push the needle past your skin and into your muscle. Your hand shakes as you push the plunger, and then - then it's better. And you're calm. And the world all makes sense again ^_^