I survived my first injection...

I finally got my medication, Copaxone, this past Wednesday. We met with the nurse yesterday afternoon so she could train me and Doug on how to give the injections. The nurse has had MS for the past 15 years and has been on Copaxone for 6 years and has not had an "episode" in 6 years. First she went over everything from the areas to inject, what to expect afterwards, skin reactions, traveling with the medication, etc. She answered all of our questions and then we got started on the actual injection training. YIKES!!

I am so thankful for my "autoject," which is the automatic injector. You just put the prefilled syringe into the autoject, place it on the injection site, and click the button. You have to count to 10 before you remove the needle from the skin to make sure all of the medication is released. She let me pick which area I wanted to inject, I went with the back of the arm because I figured it would be the most awkward area to reach. The areas you have to choose from are the back, fleshy part of the arms, top of the thighs, the stomach area just below the bellybutton, and the low back/hip area. You have to rotate areas every day and cannot do an area more than once a week. So, I sat down and rested my arm over the back of the chair to roll the fleshy part up, which still didn't give me a lot to work with. I took a deep breath and clicked the button. I didn't even feel the needle go in because it's so tiny and only goes in about 6 millimeters (on the autoject you can adjust how far the needle goes in depending on how much "thickness" you have, luckily I don't have much, so it doesn't need to go in very far). For the first 30 seconds I felt nothing. Then all of a sudden it felt like a wasp was stinging me. It got more and more intense for about 10 minutes. After about 15 minutes all I felt was soreness in the arm. I had a giant red welp at the injection site, which the nurse said was very normal. She also said the stinging was normal, she just didn't want to warn me about it before because she knew I was already really nervous. The injection site bled a little. The nurse said it doesn't usually bleed unless you hit a blood vessel, which doesn't happen often. But, of course I would hit one on my first try!! The red welp went away after about and hour. I had a red dot at the site for the rest of the evening and this morning you can't see anything at all:)

Today my arm just feels a little sore and bruised, nothing too bad though. The nurse said every injection reaction isn't the same. Some possible side effects are chest tightness or chest pain, dizziness, nausea, or vomitting, but these aren't very common and they should only last for 15-30 minutes if they do occur. The usual side effects are at the injection site and include the burning and stinging pain, itching at the site, redness, welps, swelling, lumps, bruising, and bleeding. Sometimes the welps and/or lumps may last for a week, luckily mine yesterday only lasted 1 hour. So, it's kind of an experiment every time! The nurse said the first 6 months are the toughest because that's how long it takes the body to recognize the medication. After a few years she no longer had the stinging pain or the injection site reactions because her body got so used to the medication. So, if I can stick it out for a while I think it will get better.

I'm really going to try to not complain too much about the injections because yesterday I was briefly reminded of what the alternative is. I saw a girl with MS in the waiting room while we were waiting for the nurse. She was probably in her early 20's and had to have her mom's assistance while walking and she was shaking a lot. I almost burst into tears knowing how blessed I am that they caught my disease so early and that I have access to such awesome drugs. I just pray that my body responds well to the medication, so hopefully I don't end up like that girl or like the other MS patients with disabilities. It's kind of scary to see what could happen. Anyway, on a more positive note.....I survived my first injection!!!:) I have to do the injection around the same time every day. So, we'll see how this evening goes....

I'm just so happy to have started my journey to SLOW this disease. I can do whatever I want now and know that my body is being protected by Copaxone. I'll have to have a MRI done in 3 months to check the lesions on my spinal cord. The goal of the medication is to minimize them, make them inactive and prevent any others from forming.

Thanks so much for your continued thoughts and prayers!

Here's a great quote from "The Secret":
"The secret of health for both mind and body is not to mourn for the past, worry about the future, or anticipate troubles, but to live in the present moment wisely and earnestly."