I have a couple of pills cases that I like but they are not big enough. The
problem? They are the biggest I can find. They have compartments for
breakfast, lunch, dinner and bedtime. However, due to the size of some of
my supplements, the breakast and bedtime ones are no longer big enough for
me. I have to take evening primrose, 2,000 mg each morning and night. If I
get the 500 mg gel caps they take up less room but the 1,000 mg ones are
considerably cheaper. I take flaxseed oil twice daily. I also take some
other huge gel caps such as D Limonene and CLA. I can't even fit these into
my container and have to remember to take them with each meal. I literally
take a handful of things each morning and night. The bulk of what I am
taking is supplements. And I can't seem to do without them. Each time I
cut back on what I am taking, whatever problem I was taking it for crops up
again. My Drs. do know I am taking all of these things and some are things
I am taking because they told me to.
I don't know if it's the gastroparesis or what but I do tend to be lacking
in some vitamins. And then I have some medical conditions besides diabetes
that seem to be helped with supplements. Like psoriasis and fibroymalgia.
So... What to do? I take so many things that I have to do them up two
weeks at a time. It takes me somewhere between an hour or two to do them
up, depending on whether or not I have to restock my arsenal and how many
interruptions I get. I have one large lidded bin for overstock and a drawer
unit that I use to store the open bottles. This includes my prescription
meds, of which I take 5. Actually the prescription meds take up very little
room in the cases.
My mom has a similar problem for herself and my dad. She has a system that
she thinks works for her but I would disagree. And I know it wouldn't work
for me. She uses little Nyquil containers. I have no clue where she got
these all. I dislike them because the tops are open and that leaves the
pills exposed to air. Plus they easily tip over. Angela is constantly
finding pills on the floor of their house. And they have a maid so no
telling how many she sucks up in the vacuum. She places these cups onto some
old snack trays that we had when we were kids but really never used them.
They are sort of like plastic plates but in a rectangular shape. They're
not very big. She uses one tray for each day. Then she puts little sticky
notes under each of the cups. She keeps these in what used to be my bedroom
but she uses it now for her computer. She has to keep them in there because
my dad has memory issues and he will just keep taking pills because he knows
no better.
So each day she will take his tray and her tray out to the table and put
them by where they eat. From what I have seen this does not work at all
because my dad will just take whatever he sees there. He also keeps spare
pills in his pocket for when he dines out, which is most of the time. Today
he forgot to take his lunch pills and then ran into trouble. I won't get
into the details of that, but it wasn't pretty. Or he will forget and take
his pills more than once. My mom doesn't seem to remember to keep on him
about this and apparently neither do Angela or I, most of the time. So I
don't think this system would work for them.
And I know it wouldn't work for us because I don't really have any spare
space where I can put all of those little containers. Because they are
open, they won't fit in the drawer where I keep my pill organizers. And
because I have cats and we have klutzy people in our home, there is no way I
would ever leave open topped containers of pills just sitting out.
So what to do? I have been looking online and can't seem to see anything
that is bigger than what I already have. At the time I bought them, they
were the biggest I could find. Let me see if I can find a link to the
product that I have. Here it is:
http://www.amazon.com/Weekly-Times-Practidose-Medication-Organizer/dp/B000XUI54U
I found it on the maker's website (Apothecary Products) and it is the
biggest they make.
I know I am not the only one having this problems In searching for
something larger, a few other people have had the same complaints.
So... What to do? I thought about using sandwich bags or even snack bags.
Those would be the right size and they are what I use when I have to go out
to eat. I put the pills in there. But... It would be really difficult for
me to fill all of those slippery bags every two weeks. That would be 42
bags at a time!
The other thing I have been thinking of would be to buy some other kind of
container for my dinner meds. I only take a few supplements then, plus my
Metformin. I could then divide the other meds and supps between the
breakfast/lunch and the dinner/bed slots.
Or I could get larger lidded containers for the breakfast and dinner but
that would be expensive and I would also have the problem of filling them.
I tend to fill them while sitting at the computer. My computer desk is very
small and because there are sooo many bottles of pills, many of them wind up
on top of the desk until I am done with them. Plus there would be some
confusing in trying to organize all of those loose containers and making
sure that I took the pills from the right one. Yeah, I could label with a
black marker but still...in the drawer I think they would get flung around
and I have no other place to keep them.
I would like to be able to get all of my pills together. For weeks on end,
I failed to put my Azo Yeast pills in there and then realized that they just
wouldn't fit. Actually I had run out of them and had to wait until payday
to be able to buy more. Same for the Oil of Oregano. I will never do that
again. I feel that our not taking that is why Angela and I got sick
recently. And I also got a yeast infection from not taking the Azo.
Grrrr...
Does anyone know of a similar type of container that would be much larger?
Or am I stuck using one of the other options?