Re-up

We’ve re-upped. I’ve made contact with our new supplier*, given him the readies**, and my daughter is shooting-up*** again.

*been to the chemists

**handed over a GP’s prescription

***having a daily injection of growth hormone
(Do you ever think you might have watched Breaking Bad and The Wire a little too fervently? No? Just me, then).

She was on growth hormone for just over a decade from around the age of around five.  Although it was slightly more uncharted territory when she was little, it’s since become widely accepted to be beneficial for people with Prader-Willi Syndrome, and there’s some solid research to back this up. It helped my girl's body composition, strengthened her muscles, improved her motor function, gained her some height (before her spinal fusion put the brakes on this) and increased her energy levels and alertness.

But, a couple of years ago, my daughter's endochrinologist took a decision to stop the drug. I have no idea how I sleepwalked through that. I took my eye off the ball. Hell, I took my eye off the ball, left the field of play, showered and went home to Netflix and chill. My usual squeaky-wheel stubbornness was inexplicably oiled over. Enough of the euphemisms: I allowed a poor decision to be made and didn’t challenge it as I should have. 

However, my niggling doubts about the course of action - or rather course of inaction - got nigglier, and my wheel started squeaking again. After a series of discussions* with her endochrinologist (*‘discussions’, ‘pleadings’ pick a word), and after a test which proved that she did have growth hormone deficiency, my girl is back on Genotropin.

My daughter has absolutely no anxiety about being jabbed in the thigh with a needle every night. She did have a slight wobbly ‘6 on the Panic Richter Scale’ episode in the GP’s surgery when she found out that we no longer need a big dial-up plastic pen thingie to load a cartridge with her entire week’s dose into and that each of her doses now comes in its own throwaway syringe. (No, I don’t know why this was so important to her, but it was finally solved by referring to the syringes as ‘cool little mini pen thingies’).

So under supervision, before bed tonight, she pushed the plunger on her cool little mini pen thingie. And as the liquid flowed into her, the relief flooded into me. 

Talking Heads - Drugs