Thank you for your response.
As for my respiratory rate, I measured 15 breaths per minute, but I guess that it's not faithful to what happens, because my breathing is different if I focus on it or if I don't think of it.
My breathing problems seem to be related to a kind of irrepressible nervousness, though I'm not sure if nervousness causes bad breathing or the reverse. Also, I'm very constipated these days, I wonder if it could be linked.
Some additional information on my case:
- I have been taking anti-histamines (desloratadine) very regularly for long periods of time when I was younger, before POIS onset (approximatively between 2008 and 2014, I'd say, and much less frequently until 2016), first because of my allergies which were thought to result in eczema, and then because of my cholinergic urticaria (which manifested only when I went bathing). At the time, desloratadine didn't trigger any special nervousness, which it now does, at least during POIS episodes (but they never really end). I report this because some people here seem to think that prolonged use of anti-histamines can in fact increase histamine production and allergic sensitivity.
- In 2019 I suddenly developed a mild phimosis and had an injury of the frenulum. I don't know which caused which: one day pulling back the foreskin became a bit more difficult and painful, notably in the frenulum, and a few months later, when I had a rare sexual intercourse with a woman, my frenulum was injured and bled. Since then, stretching the frenulum is very painful, pulling back the foreskin when I have an erection is impossible, the extremity of the glans seems permanently irritated (there is a point, just at the junction of the frenulum and the urethra, which is now abnormally red, like an inflammation or a little cut which doesn't heal), and having a coitus is impossible (too painful). "Fortunately" I don't have a girlfriend. When I saw a urologist recently, he estimated that the frenulum should be removed. As for the phimosis properly said, its intensity varies through time: most of the time it isn't really obvious, there is just the frenulum problem which prevents me from pulling the foreskin, but sometimes the foreskin is much more tight and adhesive, to the point that when I finally pull it, the glans is red and irritated.
Before 2019 I had never had any problem of phimosis or frenulum. It may be a pure coincidence if this happened but... well, no, I don't really believe in this kind of coincidence, I guess there is a link with POIS. Maybe a chronic inflammation of the genital tract which resulted in the weakening of the frenulum? A consequence of a general tension and stress in my body? I've also read that scleroderma (connective tissue autoimmune disease) can cause dyspareunia (my kind of problem), and scleroderma develops through Th1 & Th17, ROS, VEGF upregulation, etc., i.e. mechanisms which have been discussed for POIS.
- Someone recently mentioned hiatus hernia, it's a common problem in my family and it may cause my important bloating & digestive issues, I don't know.
Also, an update about the strange problem I described on January 7 (feeling like I'm intoxicated with some chemicals of sexual pleasure): it finally disappeared, maybe 10 or 15 days ago. Before that, I tried to provoke an orgasm and
didn't had POIS symptoms (this isn't the experience of CharlesB, as he told me), though it didn't put an end to the problem, either.
Are you going to make an appointment with Dr. Amarenco?
Finally, after many exchanges with the different secretaries of Pr. Amarenco and his service, he notified me that he doesn't see POIS patients anymore, and sent me to one of his colleagues. I'll have an appointment in the beginning of February.
