Very quick catch up

Daughter in the hospital. Chronic ulcerative colitis. 3 blood transfusions and some antibiotics and now she's home.

Mother has first chemo appointment. Ok for a couple of days then WHAM! Sick as a dog. Mother in same hospital that daughter was just in. Given tons of antibiotics, tons of potassium, tons of fluids, one dose of Zoloft that made her hallucinate, and now she is home, too.

Make it stop.

Thank you.

Finally, the 2nd part of my fascinating health story...

When I wrote the first part of my fascinating health story I left you hanging with me in the ER of Huntington Beach hospital.....

Don't hate me because I'm beautiful....

The day after my ambulance ride I had my mom take me to the doctor. My mom took me to see the doctor and at first I was irked because when I don't get to see the doctor of my choice I always feel like I'm forced to see the doctor who has the most time on their hands, and of course they have time on their hands because they are probably a crappy doctor and no one wants to book an appointment with them. However..I was so sick at this point that I didn't care if my appointment was with Dr. Bombay. (for you youngsters..."Dr. Bombay" was Samantha's witch doctor on the original "Bewitched" series.)


I was very relieved to find that this doctor spoke English very well and he actually had a sense of humor. He asked me a million questions and ordered further blood tests and asked me to get my lab results from the emergency room and come back to see him in a couple of days if I didn't feel any better. My mom and I went to the hospital and easily got my lab reports. I really figured that it was going to be a monumental hassle as is anything to do with hospital paper work but this time my mom walked in there and 25 minutes later came out with my lab sheets.

My mom took me to her house so that she could take care of me. It was a huge relief to not have to go back home and attempt to take care of myself. When I am by myself and I'm sick I will not eat. I don't eat if I'm not hungry and I don't drink if I'm not thirsty and if I don't feel good that usually trumps everything so I don't eat or drink, which is how I wound up in the situation at Albertson's. My mom is the kind of nurse who will cook or purchase anything in the world that you might want to consume and usually just the idea that she went out of her way is enough to inspire me to eat something.

I thought that being back in my childhood home would make me feel better but unfortunately I had seen nothing yet. As soon as night fell my fever went up and up and up. I was taking 800 Motrin piggy backed with 2 extra strength Tylenol. That helped a little but there was some times when it didn't touch the fever. My mom called the doctor to see if we could up the milligrams of meds but he said no. Instead he wanted my mom to take all of the covers off of me, take my pjs off and wash me down with luke warm water and put a fan directly one me. If I had one ounce of strength I would have gotten up and ran out of the house. The absence of blankets was bad enough but when the fan got pointed on me that was torture. I did my best to deal with it and fortunately it worked like a charm.

We went back to see the doctor with my ER lab reports and the doctor couldn't believe his eyes. My heart rate was way too high and my sugar rate was way too high. He asked me if I had a history of diabetes a couple of different times. I guess he just couldn't believe me when I told him that I didn't have diabetes. I told him that other than the high fevers my biggest complaint was a serious pain in my back. So I left that appointment with a referral to have an ultra sound scan of my kidneys, a referral for a Holter Monitor and a lab slip for more blood work.

Luckily the Holter monitor didn't reveal any heart problems and my blood sugar report came back within the normal range. (Later I was told that the heart rate was probably due to the fact that I was scared from the episode in the grocery store and the sugar was probably high because they took my blood after hooking me up to my IV which was pumping sugar in to my veins.) (As I write this I still haven't heard anything about my kidney scan and it's been 4 months!)


My fever continued to rise and fall and I slept and slept and slept. When the fever rose so did the pain in my back. If I didn't have a gall bladder I would have sworn that I was having a gall bladder attack. At one point the fever was so high it made me throw up.


Test after test the doctor still couldn't find what was causing the fever. Fever is a sign of infection yet nothing appeared to be infected. The doctor asked me a million more questions none of which led him to any reason for my fevers. I told him that I had had mono as a teenager and wondered if I had it again. He looked at me and laughed and flat out told me, "You don't have mono." Ok, fine. I don't have mono. He gave me a prescription for Levaquin and some big whopping shot of some other antibiotic and told me to come back in a few days.


By the 5th time I had seen this doctor he was ready to test me for everything under the sun. I brought up the possibility of mono again. He asked me if I worked with children or teenagers and I told him that I didn't. I told him that back in 1999 my ex-husband had been diagnosed with hepatitis C after we had split up. I told him that I had been tested for that and for every STD known to man kind and all of the tests were negative at the time. So, he sent me to the lab again and had me tested for hepatitis and just for "shits and gigs" he also had me tested for the Epstein Barr virus. EB causes mono.


I was very happy to find that I didn't have any of the hepatitis's and I was not really surprised to find out that I had a whopping case of mono. Once you have it it remains in your system but 99% of the time it will be dormant. There is really no rhyme or reason why my mono reared it's ugly head but the doc told me that the "titers" on a mono test usually show up as .01 and mine were 5.0. He kept looking at the results and shaking his head. He couldn't believe someone of my age and demographic had mono. He wrote me a note for the month of February off of work and sent me home. No one loves a vacation more than me but the idea of being at home sick for a month didn't excite me. However it didn't take me long to realize that I was free to sleep for as much as I wanted and let me tell you....sleep I did. I slept 17 hours at a stretch. My mom made me eat and drink when ever I woke up and it was usually a fever that made me wake up.


IMOM came to visit me, which I thought was very brave of him. He brought me a bouquet of roses and 2 bottles of Perrier. I'm happy to report that even after seeing me with sick-bed head and wearing flannel pajamas that were two sizes too small...he still says he loves me.


When I went back to my own house Lorenzo still woke me up at 6:00 am and at 6:00 pm. That is when he eats and he had no sympathy for my plight. All of the kitties were happy to have me home and they were usually piled up on me as I slept.


During the last week of February I tried to get up and move around in order create energy so that I would be able to go back to work. It was really hard to drag myself off of the couch but I was happy about getting to go back to work. I like having a reason to get up in the morning and I had had enough of sitting around watching day time tv and playing with the cats.

When I went back to work it was no fun to get up in the morning but once I got started I usually felt pretty good.

It is now June 30th and I have had some peaks and valleys. The peaks are simply weeks when I am able to come home from work and do something before going to bed at 10:00 pm. The valleys are days like yesterday when I get home from work, feed the cats and go to bed at 6:00 pm and still don't want to get up when the Lorenzo T2000 wakes me up. I've seen my official primary care doc and she says that all of my blood work looks good. She ordered a scan of my liver and a mammogram. The mammogram results were "within normal range" and that is enough to make this cancer survivor want to dance. I need to call in to get my liver results and hopefully they will still have the results from my kidney scan from February.

I'm supposed to go to Europe in August. Hope I can stay awake.

Back to my fascinating health story....

When last we discussed my health I told the story of my inability to walk in a straight line. For the majority of the last 2 years this was my biggest health problem and once I found out that I didn't have a brain tumor I didn't really worry about it. Aside from running people off the sidewalk and the occasional "shuffle off to Buffalo" move to get me back on track it really wasn't that big of a problem. At least not for me. Now my mom or my sister might have a different take on the matter since they are usually the ones I'm running off the sidewalk or grabbing on to as I veer off of the beaten path.

But let's go back to about August of last year. My sister and I got back from our trip to Europe and I was sooooo tired. I had the worst case of jet lag EVER. I did what I could to catch up on my sleep but I just couldn't get over the heavy feeling of complete fatigue. I got sick with the flu in late August and it just kicked my butt. I missed a couple of days of work and did nothing but sleep. I went to the doctor and was told, "It's a virus. There is nothing we can do. Go home. Drink plenty of fluids." So I went home and went to bed.

Then September rolled around. I got the flu again. I thought this was strange. I usually get sick once a year and then I'm fine. But to get sick twice in two months was a bit much.

October. By this time I'm not going to lunch at work any more. When 12:00 comes around I am dragging myself out to my car and going to sleep. This makes the afternoons much more tolerable. If I don't take a nap by the time 2:00 rolls around my head is actually bobbing from trying to stay awake. And I got the flu. Again. I went back to the doctor and was told the same exact thing by a different doctor.

November. Now, not only am I sleeping in my car during lunch I am going home directly from work and going straight to bed. On a big day I'm able to stay awake until 7:00 and watch Jeopardy. And of course...I was flat on my ass in bed with the flu, again.

December. Everyone is out Christmas shopping, decorating, eating, drinking and being merry...and I'm sick in bed. I was so sick that I seriously considered skipping Christmas all together. I was afraid that the rest of the family would get what I had. I decided that I would totally regret not being around my family for Christmas and went out to my sister's house. No hugs, no kisses. I kept my distance from everyone. I spent most of the Christmas eve and Christmas day asleep on my sister's couch. I get the time between Christmas and New Years off from work, (Thank God.), so I got to sleep, sleep, sleep. I felt a little bit better just after Christmas but by New Year's eve I was down and out again with the flu. I saw yet another doctor and was told that I had a virus and there was nothing anyone could do.

January. The two weeks off of work really helped me out a lot. I was able to rest up and get some of my strength back. I was no longer sleeping in my car at lunch and I was able to stay awake at night until the crazy hour of 9:00. Just when I thought I had been able to rise above this relentless virus I GOT SICK AGAIN. I thought I was in bad shape from September to December...HA! This time around was about the sickest I've ever been. I had a whopping fever. I had chills. I didn't eat. When I slept I had nightmares. I coughed until I thought my lungs were going to come flying out of my chest. My head was killing me. But all of this paled in comparison to the ache in my back. If I didn't know better I would have thought that I was having a gall bladder attack. (I had my gall bladder removed in '05.)

On Superbowl Sunday I was at home. I had depleted my Gatorade and my Tylenol. I was burning up from the fever. I didn't know my temperature because I didn't own a thermometer. I knew that I needed to do something about my fever before my brains started to melt out of my ear so I called my sister and asked her if she would go to the store for me. Mind you, my sister lives like 50 miles away so this was a pretty ridiculous request. She told me that she had a house full of people but if I was totally desperate she would go get me fluids and medication. I realized that it would be silly for her to have to leave her party and make a 100 mile round trip so I told her that I would be fine. After I talked to her on the phone I felt a little better so I decided that I would just throw on a jacket and go to the grocery store myself. (Mind you..I haven't bathed in approx. 4 days. It wasn't pretty.)

So I got my down jacket and a scarf and bundled up. I went to Albertson's market and got Gatorade, Tylenol and a thermometer. As I was standing in line to pay I started to feel a little light headed. When it got to be my turn to pay I started to get my wallet out of my purse and suddenly I was blazing hot, the room started to spin, my heart started to beat in my throat and I knew I was going down for the count. The lady at the cash register asked if I needed some help and I couldn't even answer her. I stumbled a couple of steps away from the cash register and sat down on a bottled water display. By then I was sweating and the room was spinning like I was riding on a Tilt-O-Whirl. I couldn't even hold my head up. Several grocery store employees were trying to ask me questions but I couldn't even speak. They asked me if I was on any medications and I tried to tell them that I wasn't on drugs nor had I been drinking. (with it being Super Bowl Sunday I assumed that they assumed that I was probably drunk.)

Within 5 minutes of parking it on the bottled water display an ambulance and a fire engine arrived. (I've always wondered why the fire department accompanies ambulances. Nothing was on fire and we didn't require a ladder.) My hands were completely numb and drawn up towards my torso. The EMT asked me a bunch of yes/no questions. I could nod or shake my head so we were able to communicate. They needed to take my pulse so they tried to take my jacket off. Unfortunately my scarf was caught on the Velcro on the jacket so I managed to get strangled as they pulled on my jacket. It was sweet relief to get that down jacket off. They put me on a stretcher and loaded me in to the ambulance. Even as sick as I was I still could not believe that I was being put in to an ambulance. It was scary!

They put the "pulse ox" thingy on my finger and we headed out for the hospital. They asked me if there was anyone I wanted them to call for me. I managed to get my phone out of my pocket, which was not an easy task for someone with stiff and contorted fingers. I hit the redial button and they were able to talk to Tori. Looks like she was going to make the trip out to Huntington Beach after all. After they hung up from talking to Tori I asked them to call her back and tell her not to tell our mother about this. As nice as it would have been to have her there for comfort, I didn't want her to be driving on the freeway with all the Superbowl Sunday partiers, in a panic.

The EMT took my blood pressure and told me that I was having an anxiety attack. By this point I could form words and told him that I knew from anxiety attacks and this was NO anxiety attack. I told him that I had been sick off an on for the last 4 months and that I had a fever and was obviously dehydrated. He continued to tell me about anxiety attacks and that I would be ok and blah, blah, blah. I finally asked him if he'd ever heard of an anxiety attack happening to someone who was taking Lexapro on a daily basis and also....did he ever hear of an anxiety attack causing a fever...? He had to admit that the answer to both questions would be no and then thought about what else could be happening.

The entire ambulance ride didn't take 5 minutes. We got to Huntington Beach Hospital and they handed me off and rode off in to the sunset.....with my cell phone.

Once I got in to the emergency room they took my temperature and blood pressure. They monitored my heart and took a chest xray. Temp=high, blood pressure=low, heart rate elevated, chest films=clear. They gave me 2 extra strength Tylenol and hooked me up to an IV and told me to rest. The fever was giving me the chills but they wouldn't give me a blanket. They told me that the fever was doing it's job and if they warmed me up then I would be defeating the work of the fever. Well, Mazeltov!

Tori and my niece Rebekah made it to the hospital in record time. They got to come back and sit with me and listen to the lunatic in the bed next to me. She had been in a fist fight with her male neighbor. She wanted to talk to, cry to, whine to, complain to, ramble on incessantly to anyone who would listen. She snagged a police officer who listened to her as long as he could until he finally asked her what exactly did she want him to do for her. She wanted her neighbor arrested but the cop told her that if the neighbor was arrested then she would have to be arrested, too. She had her two little kids with her and she wouldn't allow the nurse to take them to the waiting room. Those kids were all over the place playing and fighting and wandering around. Just what people who are sick enough to be in an ER want; two kids whooping it up and a rambling idiot who doesn't know how to shut up.

After freezing to death in the ER for about 5 hours they told me that my blood work came back and everything was ok. I simply had a virus and there was nothing they could do about it. I just needed to go home and go to bed and follow up with my primary care physician as soon as possible.

I honestly thought that the hospital doctors would be able to find out exactly what was wrong with me so when they gave me the same virus speech that I had heard 5 times before I was a tad disappointed.

The next day I had to fess up and tell my mom what had happened because I needed a ride to the doctors office. I couldn't get an appointment with my primary care physician so I had to see someone else in the practice. I have failed to mention that through out this whole ordeal I haven't once seen my primary care doctor so I never even dreamed that I would get to see her this time either.

To be continued....

Fascinating story about my health, part 1

Ok…if I have any readers left I’d like to thank them for sticking around during my hiatus. This will be a catch up post and hopefully I will be able to resume blogging on a more regular basis.

I’m going to explain my health situation…get a score card…it gets complicated.

Issue #1

For over 2 years I have not had the ability to walk in a straight line. I brush in to hallway walls, I run people off of the sidewalk, I trip, I fall, I’m fun to watch. I thought it would go away but when I found myself well in to the 2nd year of this I finally decided to go to the doctor and see what was going on.

My primary care doc did a very rudimentary neurological exam and I passed with flying colors. The doc drew many viles of blood and she gave me a referral to have a brain scan to rule out a brain tumor. Friends and family were happy to discover that there is now medical proof that I actually have a brain and we were all happy to know that the scan showed no tumors. The blood work came back clear, too. It took a couple of months for my next referral to come to fruition. I was sent to an audiologist. I was very happy to finally get to see an audiologist because I have suffered from tinnitus, (ringing in the ears), for decades. I also thought I was losing my hearing because I tend to keep my television and radio turned up so loud that my neighbors can enjoy my programs with me.

The audiologist exam came back stating that there wasn’t a thing wrong with my hearing, so my next referral was for an Otolaryngologist (Per Wikipedia: Otolaryngology is the branch of medicine that specializes in the diagnosis and treatment of ear, nose, throat, and head and neck disorders.) This guy looked in my ears, up my nose, down my throat and in my eyes just like the last 2 doctors. But then he had me stand up flush with the wall and close my eyes and walk heel, toe, heel, toe away from the wall. I lifted my foot off the ground to take my first step and I almost fell over. He stopped me and had me step away from the wall and cross my arms and close my eyes. Again I almost fell over. The doc said that he needed for me to have an ENG evaluation and that meant another referral.

Weeks later I found myself in a Clinical Audiologists office wearing this thing on my face that looked like a scuba mask only much bigger. The mask had doors in front of the eye area so that they could block your vision one eye at a time. There was also a teeny, weeny camera inside the mask that looked straight in to my eye balls. I had to watch a darting and flashing red light with both eyes and then with either eye isolated. This was enough to make me feel like I needed a seat belt to stay on the exam table. The next test included sticking little tiny water filled balloons in to my ear canal. (I looked very attractive and I’m just sorry you all weren’t there to get to see me.) The balloons were attached to a machine that regulated either warm or cold water to flush through the balloons. It was a very noisy process but not as unpleasant as it sounds. This process also made me dizzy. When the test was completed I was told that I would probably hear back from my primary care doctor in the next couple of days. That was in January. By the end of February I had asked my primary care doc 3 times for the results to the ENG and I finally got them on February 20.

“Caloric testing shows a unilateral weakness on the right with a directional preponderance to the left. Non-caloric subtest are within normal limits except for the Dix-Hallpike maneuver. The Dix-Hallpike maneuver for BPPV is positive with the head hanging to the left and the right.”

Alrighty, then. As I have yet to hear back from my primary care doc I did my own internet research on BPPV and discovered that means that I have deposits way inside my ear that have floated off and wound up in places where they don’t belong. The most popular cure for this is a simple doctor applied head maneuvering that causes the deposits to get released from where they are trapped. When this doesn’t do the trick the deposits can also be removed surgically. I’m hoping for the head maneuvering. (And I hope that I will be able to get this taken care of sooner than later. Last Saturday evening I was at a very fun and highly attended barbeque and I stumbled and fell and skinned my knee. Not a glamorous moment for someone of my age.)

Ok, that's issue #1. Please stay tuned for issue #2 and #3. The last one includes an abulance ride!!!

Catching up (the brief version)

Sorry it's been a while since I've posted but I was afflicted with a killer sinus infection. Thought it was allergies from all of the wind we've been having here in so Cal. Then when it didn't go away I figured I had caught a cold. But then when my teeth started to hurt and my face felt like it had been filled up with sand I figured a sinus infection was on it's way. Sometimes I can just live through sinus infections if I have enough Flo-nase and kleenex. This wasn't the case this time and I got really sick. Fevers and aches and pains and the whole 9 yards. After being harrassed and harangued almost hourly by my sister I finally dragged my fanny to urgent care. (note to anyone who's listening: when picking an urgent care facility during insurance open enrollment time...pick one close to your home, not your work. Having your doc close to your work is convenient for appointments made when you are not in the throes of death but when you are siiiick the last thing you want to do is have to drive on highways and bi-ways to get yourself medical care.)

In addition to the huge antibiotic pills I was instructed to take twice a day for 10 days the doc gave me a Netti Pot. Pouring water in my nose is really not something I'd ever find myself doing but since I enjoy the occasional in take of oxygen...I tried it. I'm happy to report that it really wasn't as bad as I had anticipated. Since you are supposed to have your head tilted to the side the water doesnt' go down your throat and drown you...it just comes right out of the other nostril. After you have doused both nostrils you simply need to blow your nose for the next 10 hours and relief is upon you. (note to self: lock cats out of the bathroom the next time you attempt to use netti pot so that Lorenzo doesn't wind up with saline solution in his eyes.)

I was just starting to feel a tad better when I was stricken with a stomach bug. I've consumed enough Pepto-Bismal to choke a horse and have since switched to pure aloe vera juice. The aloe vera juice tastes like crushed up aspirin which is really disgusting but I've found that it goes down easier than Pepto and it seems to work better, too.

In all I've been under the weather for about 3 weeks and I've had enough of being sick and tired. I have many emails to which I need to respond and I have a lot more things to write about that happened before I got sick. So...while I'm taking care of business and writing new blog posts I'm going to leave you with one of my favorite catergories: "Where's My Red Pen?"

Who was stupid enough to order and PAY for a sign that said, "Re-Grand Opening" instead of "Grand Re-Opening"? This is currently hanging in the shopping center in Anaheim on Harbor Blvd. down the street from Disneyland. I love it when people from all over the world can witness the profound grammatical talents of we southern Californians.