One Year On 2

So it's been about a year since I first heard of MSA, when I had the appointment at Keck and Dr. Daniel Togasaki said he "suspected MSA." I had never heard of i, and so began the long course of learning and denial hat is now my daily routine. I was also fresh out of the hospital for C-DIF infestation, so freeing myslelf of that was big. I was checking in with Facebook at the lime, and learned that friend Shelly Coon's son had also contracted C-DIF in the hospital, andd she recommended the supplement Sachramyces as the best defense against C-DIF, where I had only been given probiotics. So I added the Sacharomyces,which I recenly learned is fungal, and I've kept the C-DIF at bay. I use Jarrow Sacharomyces with FOS, regularly available at Sprouts and Whole Foods.

My Mom jumped in and offered me caregiver support, in the form of several hours of paid caregiving support from agency Home Instead. They sent several young people over to interview for the position, and Christine and Caleb started working soon after. Christine proved herself professional and mature, she was with us 10 months later, loves pizza and ice cream, and has a good sense humor. We got lucky. Caleb was let go after he decided to drive north for Thanksgiving with his family rather than work. We'd enjoyed his company, he had some photographic skills, but Home Instead deemed availability primary. Shannon replaced Caleb and stayed for 8 months.

The second,  or confirming, diagnosis was with Dr. Jerome Lisk, who I had met at the hospital and, at the time, thought I had Pure Autonomic Failure, another balance disorder. On examination, in October or November of 2015, he described me as a "posterchild for MSA".

My GP, Dr. Soliman, who saw me almost everyday at Arcadia Methodist Hospital, including buying the expensive antibiotic CIVICID, which beat back the C-DIF threatening my life, had me on Midodrine and Fludrocourt. But Dr. Lisk got me quickly on Northera, the latest drug for normalizing hypotension in MSA, ans Myrbetriq and Trospium for "neurogenic bladder".