As Ben, quite simply, explained it to me, your pituitary gland is the main control system for the way your body chemically works. It has 5 responsibilities:
-Production of cortisol- the hormone needed to deal with stress.
By 'stress' i dont just mean exam worry (although it does cover that too). It means basically anything that isnt what your bodys completely natural state is. Eg. Exercising, squeezing a spot, drinking alcohol, getting the flu, growing etc. It also, along with other things, fuels your organs to operate.
-Production of Anti-Diuretic Hormone (ADH)- the hormone needed to regulate body fluids
It tells your kidneys when to stop filtering into your bladder. Eg. when youre asleep, when youre dehydrated etc. The absolute lack of this is the reason I naturally piss so freakin much. My kidneys were never ever told to stop, so they just filtered and filtered, whether my body needed that fluid or not, woosh out it comes!
-Production of TSH- a hormone to stimulate the thyroid
Your thyroid is responsible for your general metabolism, bone maintenance, muscle strength, heart and digestive functions, regulating body temperature and more. And without it youre likely to be fat, tired and weak.
-Production of sex hormones
These help with your reproduction functioning, they stimulate different parts of the body retrospectively to produce differnet hormones which help regulate your reproduction fuctions eg. Periods for women. They also help with development of sexual characteristics, so determine things like how hairy you are, how big your boobs grow etc.
-Production of growth hormone
Growth hormone isnt only needed to grow taller but it actually helps for body composition (muscle to fat ratio, muscle mass, metabolism of fat) as well as your mood.
Although all five functions are pretty important to life, the former three are sort of urgent to get controlled. Without any cortisol or your thyroid working, your fuel tank is empty and your body and organs wont have anything to run on and with no ADH youll be peeing out all the fluid inside your body so that you will become dehydrated and just continue to drain yourself. The other two however, arent as cruicial. So I was discharged started on the first 3 hormone replacements (Hydrocortisone for cortisol 3x a day, Levothyroxine for TSH once a day and Desmopressin for ADH 3x a day) and scheduled to begin the other two after being tested as an outpatient.
I dont have a huge desire to have children or periods right now so the testing for oestrogen took a back seat and growth hormone came first. Today I went for my blood test which will indicate my natural levels (i wasnt allowed to take my two afternoon hydrocortisone the day before or my scheduled one in the morning so Id been feeling pretty shit for a while) which they will then use to compare to the bloods they will take on the 29th during my insulin stress test.
From what i gather, the insulin stress test is basically.... Shit. I, again, wont be able to take my hydrocortisone the day before or the morning of, and they will induce me feeling hypoglycaemic ( hungry, shaky, sweaty, palpitations, headaches etc.) and then leave me like that for two hours whilst taking my blood every 15-30 minutes to see how my body (doesnt) cope. FABULOUS. I then get given some food and am allowed to take my tablets.
Although the IST isnt barrels of fun, its only two hours and I desperately want to be started on GH. Aiding fat metabolism (not general, so I still get my vitamins from my carrots and broccoli!), letting me build up some muscle and tone, improving my general mood... Whats not to love ??!
... It only comes in the form of daily injection 😫. Although Ive had a change of heart now, people always used to say I should follow in my mothers footsteps and be a nurse but I always pushed it aside and said 'nuh-uh no way' because the thought of syringes freaked me the f**k out. But since this whole saga began and having to be stabbed at like a pin cushion, I have marginally overcome my fear enough to consider nursing and there is no better way to completely conquer it than to make injections and needles a normalised thing. I have gotta start somewhere.
Ive not really got much to say about the appointment, aside from the fact I felt like absolute shit because i couldnt fall asleep until 3am the night before (also slightly worrying seeing as I hadnt had any hydrocortisone since 8am) and continued to for the rest of the day. It also didnt help that the trainee nurse blasted the air con up and tried to freeze me to death. I didnt actually inject myself during the injection lesson, Kemi just taught me how to mix the powder in the vial with the injection solution and then brought out a plastic pad that she pretended was my thigh and stabbed. 2ml of solution, change the needle to a blue one after mixing and before injecting, into the thigh at a 90 degree angle and retract a tiny bit to make sure youre in the muscle and haven't hit a blood vessel. Sounds simple enough. The lesson was for my emergency hydrocortisone injection (if i cant retain oral tablets eg. Vomming or having the shits or if im in major shock) so im not 100% sure if its the same for the GH too... I hope it is though. I think I might possibly be able to cope.
Ive not really got much to say about the appointment, aside from the fact I felt like absolute shit because i couldnt fall asleep until 3am the night before (also slightly worrying seeing as I hadnt had any hydrocortisone since 8am) and continued to for the rest of the day. It also didnt help that the trainee nurse blasted the air con up and tried to freeze me to death. I didnt actually inject myself during the injection lesson, Kemi just taught me how to mix the powder in the vial with the injection solution and then brought out a plastic pad that she pretended was my thigh and stabbed. 2ml of solution, change the needle to a blue one after mixing and before injecting, into the thigh at a 90 degree angle and retract a tiny bit to make sure youre in the muscle and haven't hit a blood vessel. Sounds simple enough. The lesson was for my emergency hydrocortisone injection (if i cant retain oral tablets eg. Vomming or having the shits or if im in major shock) so im not 100% sure if its the same for the GH too... I hope it is though. I think I might possibly be able to cope.
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