Hello everyone,

My name is Alan and I'm a 49 year old married male from a southwest
suburb of Denver, Colorado. I was diagnosed with Addisons the first
part of Nov, 2001 after I had an extreme Addisons crisis episode.
They think I have had adrenal insufficency most of my life, but it
came to a head last October and November. For a long time, when I
would get stressed or sick with a virus I would be sicker than what
I should have been and it always turned into an infection or
something else. Like a mini crisis. In the spring of 2001, I had
extreme stress due to problems with two of my sons. (drugs got them
and dropping out of school, running away, assaulted and stole from
us, and several other things. The first of May I had a nervous
breakdown, chest pains, real high blood pressure and many other
things that got me in the hospital for 7 days. During treatment
they had to treat my with a high dose of cortisone so they could
give me a iodine test since I am allergic to Iodine and they needed
to reduce my reaction. Well all of a sudden I got better and I was
discharged with a diagnosis of stress related syndrome with
depression and anxiety. Come to find out, they unknowingly treated
my addisons with the cortisone. I got put on paxil for my
depression and anxiety. After getting out of the hospital I started
to have all kinds of symptoms. Vomiting, Diarhea, loss of hair,
darking of the skin (which I've had several years), loss of weight,
weakness, shaking, muscle pain, almost every syptoms of addisons
they list. I lost 55 lbs in 2 1/2 months. They found that my
thyroid level was way down so they started to treat me for
hypothyroidism. I still got worse and worse and the low blood
pressure and dehydration and low sodium started to be a constant
problem. I can't remember too much of anything that happened after
the 9-11 Trade Towers attack. They say that the stress from seeing
that and reacting like most Americans, and going on high alert at my
job(I'm a Police Detective in Denver) it was the last straw (stress)
my body could take. Everything is kind of a blur for a couple of
months. Two days before I went into crisis in first part of
November, the doctor give me 4 bags of saline solution and I was
still dehydrated. I went home but couldn't do anything but
literally had to crawl to bed. That night the doctor called and he
said he researched my condition and said he believed I had addisons.
He wanted to see me the next day. I went in, he did an injection
test and in an hour I passed out on them and off to the hospital by
ambulance I went. I got to the hospital and my body was shutting
down. They said I had about an hour or two and it would have been
too late to save me. That put a real different perspective on
life. Since then it's been up and down for me. I have developed
fibromyalgia that is very painful and sometimes it's hard to walk or
move around. This addisons disease has changed my life quite a
bit. I am tired all the time, I can not do the simplest thing in
life without wearing out and sweating. Sweating. That's all I do.
If I do anything stressful or just go shopping or do some things
around the house, I sweat and need to sit or lay down to recover. I
run out of breath. I have shakes and my muscles twitch all over
especially when I am laying down or resting. At times my mind does
not work as sharp or as good as it use to and I do get confused at
times. They say you can lead a normal life. Well I don't think I
can but I am trying to do as good as I can. I'm learning to live
with this disease and I think only people with it can understand
what it is like. I hope I did not bore everyone with this story.
It does help sometimes to be able to tell someone about what
happened to and is going on with me. I would like to hear some of
your stories if you want to share them. I'm glad and privileged to
be part of this group. Keep in touch.
Your Friend from Denver, Alan