that waiting thing again

I had my scan yesterday and it went fine, took my steroids and benadryl and didn't have any reaction to the dye. Only problem is I've slept really badly the last couple of nights because of the steroids. I woke up constantly all night long, both nights. Today I am so tense from the waiting for the results and whatever leftover jitteriness from the steroids, that I don't really know what to do with myself. I'm home with Z., she's doing something quietly in the living room. A. took the day off work but is out having lunch with some friends he used to work with (an annual thing they do this time of year). I'm kind of glad he's out as his anxiety is not helping mine. I realized that part of the reason the waiting anxiety has gotten so much worse is that A. is not hiding his anymore, or maybe I'm just better at seeing it. But right now I need him to be saying that it'll be okay, no matter what the results are we can handle this, stuff like that, but unfortunately he's too close to the fear place I am in to do that for me I think.

My hope is that my scan results will be ready in the morning, but am prepared (kind of) for them to be delayed till Friday because of the holidays. The imaging center was really packed on Monday. Probably trying to get their tests done before the end of the year because of insurance, I know I was since my out of pocket limit was reached a while back so this scan won't cost me anything.

I go see the pain management dr. tomorrow. The tricyclic antidepressants don't seem to be doing much good. On the one hand, I'm still taking just as much ibuprofen/tylenol as I was before and I am still having pain that breaks through that. On the other hand the pain is more in the low to mid levels of the 1 to 10 pain scale, rather than the upper levels, and I have been able to sleep on my side again (it had been months and months since I had stopped being able to sleep on my pain free side). Other side effects have been a rise in my resting pulse rate (by 10 to 15 points), constipation (which I think I have finally gotten under tolerable control), and not sleeping so well (I wake up a lot more, but now that I can sleep on my side I can fall back asleep faster). Another odd thing which is probably not related, but who knows, is that I have had more allergy attack days in the last month than I usually have in a whole year (sneezing, runny, tickly nose kind of things that go on for a day or two or three). So, we'll see what he thinks we should do next tomorrow.