She has her reasons and they’re not wholly without reason of a sort, but I am just not willing to be swallowing bottle after bottle of mega-concentrated vitamins every day until I croak. She appears to be one of these people who thinks if she takes enough pills and shots and potions she’ll pickle herself and live to be 150, and that’s fine for her but I can’t and won’t live that way. She didn’t understand that.

I wasn’t really sure what to do. I was going catatonic again. Finally I realized that I just had to open my mouth and say whatever came to mind, otherwise I was just going to leave wanting to die the way I do every time I go to a doctor. Instead of speaking I ended up weeping, half-screaming, and cussing. I weep a little but I never come close to screaming in front of someone I don’t know well and I don’t cuss in front of anyone, so this was a bad, bad, bad, wicked bad sign.

Eventually she realized I just can’t take all these supplements. So she said I didn’t have to. I won’t end up diseased if I don’t. Meanwhile the stress of taking them and feeling like someone else is dictating my life and treating me like a sad sick old woman is taking my health down.

Yet it seems to me that just not taking any supplements is going to be a black cloud over my head too. I am low on B vitamins and on D vitamins and I know that, and that’s probably not great for the long term. Also on days when I get really stressed I feel like I’m a “quart low” on something, and I wonder if that isn’t the depletion of some vitamin.

So I wonder about something. I did some research and found a multivitamin – one, single pill like a normal being might take – that would go a long way in terms of boosting all the things that I’m concerned about. I wouldn’t mind taking that each day, along with the one supplement I was already taking that I know from experience does make a major difference for me. Two pills a day, I can do.

Then there are those wicked bad days where the emotional strain is so bad I feel like I’m dying…sometimes I’m afraid that wiped-out feeling is the last of some kind of vitamin bidding me a fond adieu on its way out, so after a really horrible day it might feel like self-care rather than self-abuse to take some kind of high-potency isolates.

So far, those ideas don’t make me want to punch myself the way taking all these isolates every miserable morning has done. This idea feels like I’m in control, doing what makes sense to me, living like the relatively young and healthy (if mildly to moderately disturbed) person I am. I can’t afford to order the multivitamin right now but I will once I get paid. I’ll see how this works for me. Actually if I can even feel settled with this plan I’ll close out the goal. 2 years ago

For all the good they’ve done my adrenals, the sewer will have more use for them than I do. I am not taking any more of them. I’ll work on my stress through other means, thanks.

And tomorrow I talk to my doctor about these vitamins. I would really like to flush these isolates down the toilet also and just take a multivitamin like a normal human being, given that apparently there’s not anything wrong with me. I’m wicked sick of feeling like a cancer patient or a hepatitis victim, having to get up in the morning taking bottle after bottle in hand and sucking down the contents.

I don’t feel any different than I normally do. Sometimes I start to wonder if all of this “treatment” is just a scam to get an extra several hundred dollars out of me anyway. Maybe with my anxiety and depression the first time I came in, I looked like a good “mark.” 2 years ago

Initially I was planning on being very formal and treating this doctor like the authority figure everyone in my life seems to think she is but I’m sick of this being a whole huge factor of my life. I’m tired of wasting time and money and I don’t plan to mince words at my next appointment so here’s my updated list of planned questions…

• About this herbal formula: I don’t want to take it anymore. It’s not doing anything. I would rather address my stress reactions through other means on the psychological and spiritual level for now. [If she argues with me she needs to tell me how long is this supposed to take to work anyway, and what is this that I’m ingesting?]

• About these B and D vitamins – if I’m reading the labels right, she’s got me taking dozens to hundreds of times the recommended daily intake of most of the nutrients in each of my vitamin supplements.* Is she giving me dosages this incredibly high in an attempt to have my body build up a reserve of them? If so, I would like to make plans for a regular maintenance routine – I’d like to know what that would consist of and when we can start it. (I would prefer a carefully chosen multivitamin that is available to me over the counter or online so that I am not constantly returning to the clinic for my supply.) [If not, can she please explain to me why I need dozens or hundreds of times the recommended daily allowance of this?]

• About the blood test that got all this lunacy started – since I’m the one who has to ultimately take care of myself every day for the duration of this life, I’d like to have the same data she has. Can I please have a copy of my lab results to refer to?

• 2 years ago

I talked to the doctor early about the B6 complex that was making me pee in technicolor and giving me breath like I don’t know what, and apparently that’s normal. Glad to hear it doesn’t bother her, after all it’s her life, right? All that matters is what she thinks of my quality of life.

Anyway that still leaves me with some questions…

• About this herbal formula
  1. What exactly am I taking here? I’d like to know what I’m ingesting, please. (I would have asked at our last appointment but I was so overwhelmed I didn’t notice that there was nothing written on the bottle other than what it’s for and how much of it to take.)
  2. It’s not helping my ability to manage stress that I can see. Does that mean it’s just helping my adrenals over the long term or does it mean it’s not doing anything?

• About these B and D vitamins – if I’m reading the labels right, she’s got me taking 200 times as much B12 as the recommended daily value, 125 times the recommended B6, 33 times the thiamin, and 12 times the riboflavin and D. Most of these are water-soluble so far as I’ve read so I wouldn’t worry about a dosage too high causing problems but this really seems ridiculous. Also D is fat-soluble and too much can create a problem.
  1. Does she think the generally established guidelines for the intake of these vitamins is accurate in the first place?
  2. Is she giving me dosages this incredibly high in an attempt to have my body build up a reserve of them?
  o If so, does she anticipate a point at which I can take a lower dose for maintenance? Maybe even just take a well-chosen multivitamin rather than being a walking pharmacy? How do we determine when the time comes to stop building up reserves and settle into a regular maintenance routine?
  o If not, can she please explain to me why I need dozens or hundreds of times the recommended daily allowance of this? I mean, supposedly all that’s “wrong” with me is adrenal fatigue, and as rough as I’ve had it I really doubt that the stress has wrecked me that badly already.

• About the blood test that got all this started…
  1. Since I’m the one who has to ultimately take care of myself every day for the duration of this life, I’d like to have the same data she has. Can I please have a copy of my lab results to refer to? 2 years ago

Ever since I started going to this physician everyone I know has been on her bandwagon. Essentially everyone seems to be saying “take your supplements – that must be what’s wrong with you – you aren’t taking half a dozen supplements a day like the nice angelic doctor lady told you to. But now you have her and her miraculous pills so you can go to supplement heaven with the rest of us – yea!”

Well I’m sorry but I’m not quite ready to carry her in a litter to the nearest po tree and scatter rose petals at her feet just yet. Now that I’ve gotten past feeling like a pathetic sick old lady for taking all of this, some coherent questions are coming to mind. She’s going to have to explain a few things at our follow-up appointment in a couple of weeks.

• About this herbal formula
1. What exactly am I taking here? I’d like to know what I’m ingesting, please. (I would have asked at our last appointment but I was so overwhelmed I didn’t notice that there was nothing written on the bottle other than what it’s for and how much of it to take.)
2. It’s not helping my ability to manage stress that I can see. Does that mean it’s just helping my adrenals over the long term or does it mean it’s not doing anything?

• About these B and D vitamins – if I’m reading the labels right, she’s got me taking 200 times as much B12 as the recommended daily value, 125 times the recommended B6, 33 times the thiamin, and 12 times the riboflavin and D. Most of these are water-soluble so far as I’ve read so I wouldn’t worry about a dosage too high causing problems but this really seems ridiculous. Also D is fat-soluble and too much can create a problem.
1. Does she think the generally established guidelines for the intake of these vitamins is accurate in the first place?
2. Is she giving me dosages this incredibly high in an attempt to have my body build up a reserve of them?
• If so, does she anticipate a point at which I can take a lower dose for maintenance? Maybe even just take a well-chosen multivitamin rather than being a walking pharmacy? How do we determine when the time comes to stop building up reserves and settle into a regular maintenance routine?
• If not, can she please explain to me why I need dozens or hundreds of times the recommended daily allowance of this? I mean, supposedly all that’s “wrong” with me is adrenal fatigue, and as rough as I’ve had it I really doubt that the stress has wrecked me that badly already.

• About this B complex vitamin she gave me…
1. Does it come in a form that won’t make my breath smell like stomach acid all day or turn my pee canary yellow?

• About the blood test that got all this started…
1. Since I’m the one who has to ultimately take care of myself every day for the duration of this life, I’d like to have the same data she has. Can I please have a copy of my lab results to refer to? 2 years ago