The last few weeks have been quite an unpleasant adventure; a throwback to the beginning of the year.  From the moment I retrieved my first Azathioprine pill from the ‘useless medication’ basket on top of the fridge, I felt rank.  I’m talking room-spinning, head-pounding, limb-aching, swallow down the vomit sort of rank. A bit like morning sickness come to think of it, with a touch of flu thrown in.

I had been hoping that it wouldn’t be so bad the second time around. Clearly, I was wrong.  If anything, those lovely little chemicals seemed to get to work even quicker than before.  By the first night, I was woozy and spaced out, by the second day my head felt freakishly large and I couldn’t handle bright lights or noise.  By the third day I had ground to a screeching halt; I was as good as useless.  I spent the entire day on the sofa, gazing at the cracks on the ceiling and feeling bleak.

Like before, it felt as though I had ice water running through my veins and a pair of car battery chargers clamped to my fingers, releasing wave upon wave of electric shocks through my limbs. My bones felt crushed and my chest felt constricted.

When I did make it off the sofa, I didn’t so much walk as drag my carcass around the house. Going upstairs was a painful exercise, both painfully slow to watch and painfully sore to do.  Much like a centenarian climbing a very steep hill, I progressed one very tentative step at a time, pulling myself up by the handrail.  It was a pitiful and tragic experience.

By the end of the first week back on the tablets I was gradually starting to adjust. Still absolutely shattered of course (is there any other way to be?) but no longer knocking on death’s door.  By the end of the second week I was turning a corner.One more restful weekend and I reckon I’d have been feeling pretty sprightly by now, as I headed into the third week.

But then I went shopping.  Or should I say, then I went on an 8-hour shopping extravaganza. It was great to be back out of the house and acting ‘normal’, but what was I thinking. Fun it may well have been; sensible or overly restful it was certainly not.

Thus the third week dawned and lo and behold, I felt like I’d been hit with a sack load of wet cement.  Back to Square One, I shuffled, feeling sheepish, silly and incredibly sore.  Self-sabotaging mission: complete.

Rewind to Day 96.