(I know you are all waiting for a blog post and I am eager to write it, but concentration is just BAD; I can't right now. I have a pretty violent non-hyperactive ADHD.)
I saw my psychiatrist recently. I was all excited because I had managed to prepare a lot (drew a graph of my ADHD med's efficacy, prepared a few pages of symptoms and a basic analysis of my problems according, prepared a list of achievements completed or under completion, etc.) and the psychiatrist appreciated that. We were able to spend a nice hour speaking about my ADHD... Then, as I was almost done with the ADHD part, he told me time was up. [I was all "go to hell", since at every previous appointment, every time I said "but I'll skip that, I have to hurry, we don't have much time", he had told me we had more than enough time, and that if time was needed we'd take it so no problem...] So we didn't even have time to vaguely talk about GID, which is really bad.
Something came out: The reason of ADHD meds' low efficacy on me is most probably the antacid I am taking daily. I tried to stop it and it helped, but hearburns were a real annoyance, so stopping it is a no-no. Recently, the doctor lowered the dose but made me take two a day because the little effect was not long enough, but this is worse than one dose, so he'll try giving me the same dose as before but twice a day. But I am not optimistic. It's obvious that my antacid is a serious problem for this ADHD med to work.
With a little research, I had prepared a short list of medications and had targeted two that should have allowed me to bypass the antacid problem: Vyvanse and Daytrana.
Vyvanse is a medication, without any acid-melting coating, bonded on the molecular level with an amino acid, and the enzyme that undoes proteins, supposedly present in both the blood and the digestive system, frees the medication. This is supposed to make the medication's absorbtion unaffected by the stomach's pH. I told that to him, but he told me antacids also impaired the production of that enzyme, so I was screwed anyway.
Daytrana is a patch dispensing the same molecule as Ritalin. It's mainly made for children who forget their pill at school or do not want to be ridiculed because they take medications. This looks awesome, right? My antacid can't have an affect at all! But he told me we didn't have that here. Apparently, it's not available in Canada.
My psychiatrist seems to say that antacids will always be a curse for me and that there's no way around it. He says we would probably "try other molecules" in hopes that one would be so effective the antacid's effect would be irrelevant. In short, if you have treated heartburns and ADHD, you're screwed.
This is very sad and I have trouble accepting this. I would really like to have another person's advice on this, and it would be great if another doctor could have advice for me.
This is one point. Another is that I would like another psychiatrist/doctor's advice on the long wait, the unexplained "you are not ready" and the very, very annoyed look my psychiatrist gives me each time I try to get an endocrinology reference. This man has an excellent reputation and is even recommended as the "one and only GID expert" in my area, but I would want another opinion, one from an experienced gender doctor of his caliber, to validate this. You people are great, but you have an undeniable bias, and you are not doctors...
The psychiatrist gave me another appointment on NOVEMBER 7th, which is quite a while away, but he told me it was not possible for him to give me anything sooner. This is really annoying. Ever since starting to see him, my shoulders seem to have broadened, my Adam's apple has gained volume, my body and facial hair have expanded in area, colour and growth speed, my scalp hair has been falling at a frightening rate (I swear, the back/top of it is really FRIGHTENINGLY thin now, I hate this!) and my voice has been falling...
In the light of these concerns that leave me pretty depressed/dysphoric, I would like to ask, is there any way I can get something that acts as an anti-androgen legally and fast? I'm afraid by the time I get the actual damned treatment I ask for, I will already have lost all the luck I had when I first requested to transition, two years ago... Is there something I can get to at least limit the damage?
I will try asking something to my family doctor on September 13th, but chances are that she'll refuse to interfere with "the expert". Maybe I'll be able to get finasteride for my hair, though. That is, if she believes me. She'll say I'm imagining things since my hair "isn't that bad", as its original thickness makes the phenomenon almost invisible -- for now. But I know how much it has thinned...
So I would like to have your comments and suggestions, but would also really appreciate it if someone could link me somewhere I can ask for a real expert's opinion.
