An Adventure, Part 3...

Sometime on Saturday afternoon I started hearing a faint noise that sounded sort of like a notification sound on a phone. My room was right across from the nurse's station, so during the day there was often activity and noise out there.  And there are all kinds of beeps and other noises going on, so I didn't think much about it the first few times I heard it. But finally, it dawned on me that maybe, just maybe it was my phone.  I wondered if it was somewhere behind me where I couldn't see it, buried under something.  I was hooked up to too many thing to get up and start looking for myself.

When the nurse came in, I mentioned it to her.  She started looking through all my close-by things (that, by that time, I had already looked through).  Then she started looking through my current covers - which is probably when I mentioned my theory again - that my phone had probably gotten caught up in the bed linens of the gurney.

For some reason, this time it clicked for her!  She walked over to what was a linen hamper - which was about two arms length away from me the whole time.  Here, I thought it was a garbage bag!  With abandon, the nurse went bravely into the hamper, pulling out sheets and blankets, shaking everything trying to find my phone.  It was a funny and endearing sight.  Seeing her pull my phone out of the bottom of the bag was met with a cheer, and I declared her "Wonderful!"

In spite of my inauspicious beginning on the med/surge floor, the nursing and tech staff won me over from that point on.  Most of them looked too young to be nurses and techs, and all were tender and kind in their very different ways.  This began to be apparent to me as I started feeling better.  They were probably very kind to me in my sick hours, but I was too out of it to fully notice.

My home for 2 1/2 days...   See that blue thing in the background on the left.  That was the laundry hamper where my phone spent part of Saturday.

Okay... having dramatized enough of this hospital visit, I will wrap it up below.  

~~~~~

When one has an attack of acute pancreatitis (especially, if there is no infection present), the protocol is to give intravenous fluids, analgesics and to give the digestive system rest (i.e. starve the patient).  Not that I was interested in eating, but after about 12 hours of nothing to drink, I was excited to be offered ice chips. A few hours later, when they brought me chicken broth and frozen gelato, I savored very sip and swallow.  

Okay, nevermind the chicken broth was pretty tasteless, the important thing was it stayed down.  And the cold gelato only made me hurt a little.  Though, I was unsure how to parse out the different discomforts since I was on morphine.  Even on morphine, the pancreatic pain was still there, but by this time it merely felt "sore" or tender, instead of angrily gripping my whole middle.  The next meal was more broth and gelato (and jello if I wanted it, which I didn't), and the next meal... more of the same.  And the next day...  more of the same. 

By Sunday night, my stomach was gnawing with hunger, but the idea of eating still held no appeal.  After asking a number of times how long this process took, and getting no clear answer, I came to accept there is no clear answer.  

When a patient can tolerate clear liquids, s/he is moved to semi-solids (puddings, and I don't remember what else I was told).  Then, finally, the patient is given solids, and when s/he can tolerate solids, s/he can be discharged and finish recovering at home.  

The liquid diet went on through Monday morning, until the hospitalist's nurse came into my room, and started a conversation with me about going home.  As confusing as this was, physically, I knew I was capable of managing at home, and I would get better more quickly there.  So...  without actually saying we were skipping the middle step, that is what we did.  I was allowed to order something simple off the menu and eat solid food for the first time in 2 1/2 days. It might be worth mentioning, one of the reasons they wanted me to go home quicker than they were planning, was because flu patients were quickly filling up the floor, and they didn't want me catching it.  I didn't need the motivation, but that kicked me into high gear to order lunch, get packed, and be ready to leave as soon as they could make it happen. 

Nothing else dramatic happened in the few hours it took to eat, pack, and for them get my discharge orders completed.  It was cold - I think below zero outside - but I was so happy to be in the frigid air, set free from my hospital room.

Instructions were for me to slowly introduce new solids - preferably just one food group a week.  That seemed incredibly slow, and maybe it was too cautious, but I did my best to abide by that for the first week - and really through most of this past week. Up until just a couple of days ago food has made my innards hurt (some times more than other times), but one ibuprofen and one tylenol practically made me feel normal on those early days.  And as of this weekend, I've felt pretty good.

I hope I never have this happen to me again, and I'm prepared to never really understand why it did happen.  I have some suspicions that something autoimmune has been going on since summertime, and the high-dose flu shot I got four days prior to the attack may factor in.  And depending on what is determined about my thyroid, that could factor in (or not).

I'm trying to live by Matthew 6:34.  "So do not worry about tomorrow; for tomorrow will care for itself.  Each day has enough trouble of its own." ~ Jesus (NASB)

Okay...  so, practically speaking, that means I'm going to refrain from writing here what I already know from an ultrasound done on Friday. Hopefully, I'll hear from a doctor early this week to learn next steps.  And maybe in another week or so, I'll be able to write with some knowledge about what's up with my thyroid.

Prayers are appreciated - of course, for best outcomes, but also for peace of heart and mind to prevail - both in the waiting and in the outcome.

I appreciate the thoughts and prayers and such kind comments on these posts.  I imagine most bloggers feel this way about their readers, but I definitely feel I have the best people imaginable following along here - willing to encourage and pray.  

Thank you so much.

It's funny how the town I've lived in for over 27 years, and a road I've driven at least a thousand times looks like a different world when viewed from a third-floor hospital room.

An Adventure, Part 2...

At the hospital, I was quickly deposited into an ER room.  Our local hospital has a very nice new ER, and coming in the ambulance entrance gave me a different view than last year when Greg went there for a kidney stone.

I assume I was given an IV right away, and fluids were started, but except for a very kind nurse who popped in fairly regularly, nothing at all happened for hours.  No pain relief.  No doctor.  I told Greg at one time I just wanted to go back home.  Which, of course, was ridiculous, but that was my state of mind as I waited and waited.   Around 2:30 a doctor popped into the room - apologizing that it took so long for him to get there.  I was just glad to see someone, and maybe get some answers finally - and pain relief.  After examining me, he said he suspected a kidney stone.  Really!  That wasn't on my radar at all - not that I had anything else on my radar, but this was not how I'd ever imagined a kidney stone feeling.  Mostly, I was relieved when he offered me some pain medicine, and said he was sending me for a CT scan.  

With a dose of morphine added to my IV, and the sharpness of the pain quickly smoothed off, I was much more relaxed as a tech rolled me down the hallways to the CT machine.  I still couldn't get a deep breath (I know because the machine told me a few times to take one), and it hurt to hoist myself onto and off the scan table, but the morphine made me not care so much.

Then it was back to my ER room to wait for nearly an hour and a half for the CT results. That was okay - I was feeling so much better.  All my previous agony was but a memory (for a little while).

It seems it was another couple of hours later when the doctor finally popped back into the room.  He had a sober look on his face, as he told me I had acute pancreatitis.  He expressed his surprise, as none of the typical causes of pancreatitis applied to me - no gallbladder, I don't drink alcohol, and my triglycerides were great last summer, and only slightly elevated right then - no doubt as a response to the pancreatitis.  "Idiopathic", he declared it.  This is the second time that word has been used for an unexplainable health issue over the last 6 months. I'm seriously beginning to dislike the word, but I'm also beginning to have a theory that these things could be connected, and how.  That is for another day, though...  maybe.

Then the doctor told me a nodule was found on my thyroid and it would have to be followed up on.  

I can't say I jumped to worry, exactly, but I took his sobered cue and became a bit overwhelmed at these two bits of information. He offered me a stronger pain medicine to follow the morphine.  "Dilaudid, would be better," I remember him saying.  I made a mental note for when I was next offered pain medicine.

Soon after he left the room the second time, they started making arrangements for me to be admitted to the hospital. I was told patients often spend up to a week in the hospital for acute pancreatitis, but the doctor told me his mother had spent a month hospitalized when she had it.  I seriously hoped that neither of those scenarios would be me, but knowing I was at least spending the rest of Saturday there, I gave Greg a list of things to pack up and bring to me on Saturday.  With nothing more for him to do, I sent my exhausted husband home around 6:00 am to get some sleep, with both of us imagining I'd soon be sleeping in a (slightly) more comfortable hospital bed upstairs.

Sometime during the next hour, I had a conversation with the nurse about taking Dilaudid the next time pain medicine was scheduled.  Morphine helped me not care so much about the pain, but if something could actually take the pain away and let me sleep, I was game.  A little while later, she came in with the shot.

I can't say I noticed any pain reduction before the nausea hit.  And right as the nausea started, someone came to collect me to take me to my room.  I was just starting to look for something to throw up into when she asked me if I wanted to take a wheel chair or the gurney I was on.  I told her I was sick and I didn't think I could possibly get off the gurney. Nevermind, the thought of anything with wheels nearly made me panic. I asked if I could have some anti-nausea medicine.  I don't remember what she said, but she was clearly on a mission and she started unhooking me from stuff, and getting my things ready to transport upstairs.  

I asked again, for some nausea medicine, and I might have been told they'd give me something upstairs.   When she started rolling the bed toward the door, I knew I was in trouble, and asked as firmly as I could muster, "Can I not be given nausea medicine down here?"  She went and got my nurse, and I was quickly given a shot, and I prayed that it would take effect quickly.

It seemed to help a little, and wanting to be cooperative, I probably too quickly said, "Okay, I think I can do this." and we were off.  With eyes, closed (which I don't know was a good idea), and me holding my head as we cruised down the halls, somehow I managed being backed into the elevator, riding the elevator 2 floors up, then being backed into my room, to only then begin retching.  Someone saw me and rushed to give me a skinny little sick sack, and I retched (mostly dry-heaved) until my gut was sore.  Or maybe it was my pancreas.  Everything hurt again.

I don't know why, but at some point in my adult life, I developed what I've come to refer to as a pathological fear of vomiting.  I'm sorry to talk about this. It's such a disgusting word.  It sounds as nasty as it is.  But somehow I made it off the gurney onto the edge of the hospital bed, and for the next approximately 4 hours, I sat there, feet on the floor, head in my hand, balancing the arm that held my head on the little hospital tray table, trying desperately not to be sick.  Every so often I found myself reaching for a fresh sick sack from the stack that had been left for me, and every half hour or so I retched my guts out. Not that I was aware of time. And I completely lost track of how many times I got sick.  The hours ticked by, and every so often a nurse or a tech would come in and check my vitals.  Or ask if I needed anything.  I feel like I asked for some more nausea medication, but none was forthcoming.  Those hours were a dark and cold blur, even after the sun rose.  It was around 11 am when I started to feel the nausea abate. The nurse (or tech - I wasn't in a frame of mind to recall who was who at that point yet) came in and finally with a bit clearer head I tried to have a conversation about whether or not I could have been given more anti-nausea medication in the night.  The nurse (or tech) told me I hadn't been there during the night - that I had only come up to the room around 7am.  Okay, yeah...  I understand.  Can we not get hung up on the details?  Having, by this time, been awake for more than 24 hours, and sick for close to half of that time, I was confused.  

Moments into what was feeling like a fruitless conversation, the hospitalist came into the room, and a little too cheerfully looked at me and pronounced that I didn't "look like a happy camper." 

Not a happy camper indeed!  For the past four hours I had been questioning the choice to come to this hospital - and I finally said it out loud. The hospitalist dropped his happy demeanor and tried to answer my question about the nausea medication.  I honestly, don't remember what the answer was.  I was exhausted, but at least I wasn't vomiting anymore.  I know I was still feeling motion sickness, though, as I remember asking the doctor (who seemed intent on moving around) if he could stand a bit more still.  It was nauseating trying to keep eye contact with him as he just sort of meandered around.  What a wreck I must have been. In that moment it seemed enough that I said something out loud that I had been running through my mind the previous four hours - and that I stated I didn't want anymore Dilauded.

Now, I'm not sure at what point I realized my phone was missing, but around this time, I began to express my concern about it, and suggested that it probably got swept up in the sheets and blankets that were on the gurney when I was transferred to the hospital room.  I was so sick when I got transferred, it was impossible for me to keep track of anything, other than were I placed my two feet, and sat my bum.  And those things didn't move much in the four hours after I planted them.

I was assured they would find my phone. I wanted to believe them, but imagining it was in the laundry room - somewhere in the bowels of the hospital, probably tumbling in the dryer by that time, I started adding the cost of a new phone to what I feared would end up being a very expensive taxi ride to the ER.

After the doctor left, I was given some morphine and something for nausea, and I finally laid back to sleep for a few hours on Saturday until Greg came with some things for me to freshen myself up with later in the afternoon.

I wasn't yet a "happy camper", but I wasn't sick to the point of (I don't think I need to keep saying the word).  Every small kindness shown me was greatly appreciated.  And things improved from that point on.

More in part 3...

An adventure...

At the beginning of this month I had such good intentions, and originally some decent motivation, to post a bit more often here!  I even have a draft of a post I started right after my last post on the 7th.  And then, just like that, the motivation switched off.

And then halfway through the month, my body must have decided that life was just a little too dull, and I was due for an unexpected adventure.

Before you get too excited or concerned, let me assure you I am at home, and I am okay.  But there is a story to be told, and whether or not you're interested in reading, I going to record it here.  I may regret it later...  but here goes.

It's hard to believe it's been twelve days ago already, but on the evening of Friday (1/16), a few hours after supper, I suddenly had sharp pains strike my mid section. I couldn't tell, exactly, where the pain was originating, but overall, I just knew I hurt like I'd not ever hurt before. 

I struggled to get comfortable for a couple of hours, but nothing helped.  Then nausea started.  As the pain grew worse and became so pervasive throughout my torso, I decided I needed to go to the hospital.  Everything online said if you suspect a heart attack to call an ambulance.  It didn't come on feeling like I imagined a heart attack might feel, but with pain radiating through my whole midsection, it was impossible to parse out what might have been the origination of the pain by this point.  I also couldn't straighten up to walk.  Around 11:00 or so, not at all sure it wasn't my heart, and frankly, not thinking I could walk into the hospital, I gave Greg permission to call for an ambulance.  It seemed to take forever, but a crew of men were finally coming in the front door.  I thought they'd be loading me up and getting me to the hospital quickly now.  Well, as nice as they were they didn't do much but stand there and ask what was going on.  At one point, one did come close enough to get down on my level and ask questions about what specifically was going on.  

I told him right before the pain started, I was riding our new recumbent bike - feeling really good.  I'd just done a couple of HIIT sessions (you know, to get my heart rate up, then rest, then do it again).  After the second time, I decided to get off the bike, get a glass of ice water, and take a drink.  

That's when the pain hit.  Fast and sharp.  And grew as I've described above.  

The young men who first showed up latched onto this information about the recumbent bike and quickly formed a hypothesis that this old lady was so out of condition she'd pulled a muscle in her middle.  Being an old lady who is no stranger to pulled muscles, I tried to tell them this wasn't muscle pain, but they seemed to figure I just didn't know.   It would have been more annoying, if they weren't so nice, and I wasn't so humiliated to have, I think it was 4 men standing in my living room just staring at me - everyone waiting for the ambulance to arrive.  What?  You all aren't with the ambulance?

I don't know if this is common everywhere, but in these parts, (and I sort of knew this, but had forgotten) if an ambulance is called, often, if not always, firemen also show up.  These were the firemen.  Nice as could be, but as far as I could tell, they didn't serve a real purpose.  I don't mean that unkindly.  Truly, if someone can explain why fireman are always dispatched when an ambulance is, I'm all ears.

Finally, the ambulance arrived - we had asked them to please not have the siren on as they came down the street and they obliged - at this point, my humiliation being taxed to, what I thought was surely my limits.  I was so thankful they didn't disturb the neighbors at such a late hour.  And I was thinking just maybe none of the neighbors would even have to know...

At least two more men came in, and the same questions started all over again.  They asked me if I wanted a ride to the hospital?  Confused, I began to doubt everything I thought I ever knew.  We could have driven to the hospital and back a couple of times already!  And they still had not checked my heart.  

I'm probably the one who's obtuse here, but in that state, I didn't understand the point of the question...  I mean, I do realize that EMTs may show up to scene where someone declines a ride to the hospital.  And I can see asking as in "getting consent", but we'd requested the ambulance.  And the question didn't come out sounding like they were asking for consent - though I'm sure asking consent was covered in the question, no matter how it was asked.  At this point, even though the firemen may have thought they were dealing with a pulled muscle, I knew that wasn't what was wrong with me, and I was becoming increasingly concerned it was my heart. 

I honestly don't remember what the conversation was to get them to put me in the ambulance where they hooked up a heart monitor, and they quickly determined it wasn't my heart.  That was good.  I was relieved.

They asked again if I wanted to go to the hospital.  Relieved it wasn't my heart, but seriously starting to feel regretful about all this attention, I began to doubt what I was physically experiencing.  I think I said, "I don't know, let me think."  Like it was a question I might pass or fail on, I sat there for a moment weighing my options.  I knew I needed to be seen by someone, and if turning them away just to somehow manage to get myself into our car, and walk doubled-over into the hospital (if I could manage that), and to sit in agony in the ER waiting room was my only other choice, it seemed ridiculous to not have them drive me there.  I don't know!  I feel like I'm missing something here!?

Okay... so it might be a good time to insert that I can be a bit of a stoic - emotionally, if not philosophically.  My father was a gregarious man who didn't mind sharing his emotions, but my mother held things in.  Never showed fear.  Knew (better than me) how to hold her tongue.  I only heard (never saw) her cry once in my life. It was terrifying. I thought my brother and I had broken her.  My emotional stoicism isn't the caliber of my mother's, but a sense of decorum seems to kick in when I know others are observing me when I am suffering. 

So...  I don't know if it was because I was trying keep the drama to a minimum, and honestly... just breathe (I couldn't get a deep breath at all) - that this is how the encounter went.  Or is this the way these encounters typically go?  It's left me questioning so much - and thinking I'll probably have to be unconscious before anyone ever calls an ambulance for me again. 

Rather than make this crazy long, Part 2 will be in the next post.  Because you know there's a Part 2, right?

An almost finish...

Rather than begin a new project, I thought a good start to the year might be to finish something.  I remembered that I have a set of Christmas stitches that were begun a long time ago, but never finished.

I knew right where they were - I think because I pulled the project out a year or so ago and thought, "I really should finish this", and then put it back in the box and went on to forget about it.  I think I've done that more than once in recent years, actually.  And I probably recorded it here somewhere.  

When I took it out yesterday, I was shocked at how little was needed to complete it.  Why did I let this languish so long?!?

This is a Creative Circle kit, and as the picture above shows, I had done all the crewel work on two of them, and most of the stitching on the one on the far left (in the 1980's is my first guess).  But I only finished one into a "bag" and have used it as an ornament on our Christmas trees for all these years.  Here is that one:

This kit has a 1979 date stamped on the preprinted panel (below).  I was two years out of highschool in 1979, and wasn't married yet.  I wish I could remember if I stitched these that long ago, or if I bought the kit in the '80's.

I know, dear reader, none of that matters to you, but I very much wish I could place the image I have of myself stitching these in the correct time frame in my memory.  I know I did some embroidery work as a teen and young adult, but while I remember specific projects I made many years ago, I don't have time frames locked in. 

Anyway...  everything was in the original bag, a cut-out photo of the finished projects, printed instructions with diagrams, and a clump of old wool yarn.  All I had to do was find a large-eyed needle and a stitching hoop to hold my work taut as I finished stitching the the little bear in the stocking.

I love the "fluffy" top on the stocking.  First I stitched the loops:

Then each loop got snipped and fluffed and trimmed.

And if you thought you'd see the finished projects, you would be incorrect.  I did get the last one stitched up late last night, but I'm going to take a little time to finish them into their final form.  Hopefully, soon I'll be back with those photos.

   

Hello 2026...

I don't normally go for walks outside after it gets much below 50, but today - while it was only 33℉, it was a calm day and I thought taking a walk outdoors would be a excellent start to the new year.  

I often enjoy walking in the local cemetery because it's fairly private, and quiet.  And if I don't feel up to a long walk, I can simply park my car anywhere and walk as long as I want on the many intersecting roads and not ever be very far from my vehicle.  That was a good plan for a day I didn't know how long I could tolerate the cold.

That said, I found myself wishing I'd chosen another option, simply because a cemetery seems a less than optimistic place to begin a new year.

On the other hand, I was surprised at how many people were visiting graves today.   As I walked, I avoided passing closely to those visitors, but I could see well enough to not see people out beside the graves.  People were evidently sitting in their vehicles - yet feeling the need to visit a lost loved one on this first day of the new year.  

It struck me as rather profound.  A day when some are working, but most are relaxing at home, and on a cold day like today, not too inclined to go out unless something is needed - as was evident by the many sparse parking lots I passed while driving through town.

I understand.  I don't know the stories behind the visitors to the graves, but I can imagine that going to the graveside of a loved one today was exactly the right thing to do for whomever it was.  

And for one who calls herself a Christian, who too often fails miserably to that calling, simply walking the paths there, I am soberly reminded whose I am.  

He will swallow up death forever.

The Sovereign Lord will wipe away 

the tears from all faces;

He will remove his people’s disgrace from all the earth...

Isaiah 25:8