Category: BlahBlahBabble

Best viewed large.

Yesterday I had my follow-up appointment with Dr. Hand-man, and for now the Carpal Tunnel & DaQuarvein’s Syndrome surgery on my right hand only is a “go” for December 20th. The pain has improved some, but I’ve now learned that once you have Carpal Tunnel, it never really goes completely away. It might improve, your symptoms might subside, but it will come back easily. With writing, typing, and knitting – it isn’t going to go away. The CTS on my left hand is still mild though, so for now we are leaving that hand alone. It is just the right hand going under the knife. Well, scheduled to go under the knife.

Dr. Hand-man has already instructed me that he wants me to knit as much as I want after my surgery because it is very soothing and good for you. He is obviously a smart doctor. He has also cleared me to knit before the surgery, because it won’t do me any harm. He was amused when I told him that if it starts to bother me, I knit with the needle propped up on my splint. Amazing what you can do when you’re determined.

After my appointment yesterday I came home, talked with Mike & Jason, took pictures of the lizard I caught for Jason, and just unwound. When Jason went upstairs, I realized I needed to do my Algebra homework right away, because if I waited, I was going to crash. Boy, was I right. Within minutes of wrapping it up, I told Mike I simply had to go rest “for a few minutes” because I felt queazy and exhausted. I vaguely remember him trying to wake me up two or three times. I slept from 6:30 – 9:45. I felt so bad – I had him tell my Mom I would call her back right after I finished my homework, and instead I ended up calling her at almost 10:00. I missed helping Jason study more for his Algebra test. I woke up in a fog, confused about what time it was and it took awhile for the haze to go away.

I stayed up until close to midnight, but I was fighting off sleep the whole time so I went back to bed and was plagued instead by weird dreams. I hate it when that happens.

I should be wide awake and spunky after getting 10 hours of sleep last night, but I’m not. I finally discovered why around 11:30 this morning.

I had the echo scheduled for 8am this morning. I showed up a few minutes early, only to be informed by the receptionist that the tech that does them had to go out of town and they had called the house yesterday to let me know the appointment was cancelled. Mike was working from home yesterday, so I have no idea why we missed the call, but whatever. It worked out ok because I had already planned to drop in on the Mom’s group brunch afterwards, so this way I was able to make the first half at least. I didn’t eat though, because I was going to see Dr. Belly at 11:00 am, and if he wanted to do any tests that required fasting, I wanted to be able to do them today. I can’t really miss my classes in the next two weeks, because we only have 3 class sessions left in each class. (Wow, I can’t believe the semester is almost over!)

When I got to Dr. Belly’s office, his nurse checked my blood pressure (128/74! Wheee!) and then she checked my temperature. 100.9! No wonder I felt like crap! My normal temp is around 97.4 (I charted it a few months ago for a mini-experiment, so I know it is normally low), so a temp of close to 101 is really high for me. I never run a fever. When I do, I feel like I have been knocked on my butt for days. So studying for my upcoming tests & finals should be fun!

Dr. Belly examined, well, my belly. He agreed that the pain definitely indicated a gallbladder issue, and ordered some more tests. I now have more tests next Friday – I’ll start the day off with a fasting ultrasound of my gallbladder, followed by a Hida scan (both for Dr. Belly), followed by drinking some absolutely vile looking contrast stuff (mmmmm… berry flavor!) and then after an hour and a half, a CT scan of my kidneys and left ovary (for Dr. Has-a-Clue). Fortunately, the doctors are willing to share information – so no one wants more blood work drawn after my 17 tests on Wednesday. Dr. Has-a-Clue will share them with both Dr. Belly and Dr. Hand-man (so nothing else before the surgery other than clearance from Dr. Has-a-Clue.) Then on December 13th it is back to Dr. Belly to get the results. Of course, if he says I need surgery it will trump the hand surgery on the 20th. Sharp, piercing pains in my abdomen when I eat most foods is not fun anymore.

Hmm, I wonder if they can coordinate and do them both at the same time? I mean – one operating room, one Dr. Sleepy to knock me out, one round of pain meds – that would save money and resources, right? I’ll have to ask if it comes up. Never hurts to ask.

I realized today just how much the stress is getting to me. I came close to crying at least 3 times at the Mom’s brunch as I talked to people, and ended up losing it during the prayer circle. Of course, I never do well in those situations – I get all choked up, my voice cracks, and before I know it the tears are running. Today was especially moving for me. Then I lost it again later on as I talked to my Mom.

I just don’t want to deal with any of it.

But then I take a deep breath and look around me once again at all the people who are going through so much more. I’m grateful for having good insurance. I’m grateful for having access to good doctors. I’m grateful for having such a supportive network of family and friends. I’m grateful.

But for tonight, I’m also tired. I think that after I do a little more homework (I have a Chemistry quiz on Monday, Algebra test on Tuesday, and Chemistry test on Wednesday), and eat something mellow for dinner, I’ll curl up on the couch and finish up my current knitting project. I got to wrap up a few Christmas gifts earlier today over at Katy’s house, learning what I needed to complete one gift and getting help with another, so that is one more thing off my plate. Maybe we’ll get the Christmas tree out and ready so it can go up in the next day or two. I love looking at the twinkling lights on the Christmas tree.

Be the change you want to see in the world.

Just to be clear, I’m not complaining about any of this – I know I have a TON to be thankful for in my life, and I truly am. I want to write about this though more as a way to keep a record of what is going on with my health, and as a reminder to others to take care of themselves.

The fun from the ER visit on November 20th continues. We still can’t get my blood pressure below 150/100. I’ve spent the past 10 years running at about 140/90 – 130/85, so while this is up, I’m not surprised. I just wish something would bring it down. I had a follow-up appointment with the Cardiologist/Internal Medicine doctor (Dr. Has-a-Clue) today because the last medicine she gave me was producing crappy side effects. From August – November 1, I took Micardis. This may be a great medicine for a lot of other people, but for me it causes a LOT of fluid retention. So much that my other doctor was ready to schedule carpal tunnel surgery on my left hand, and I actually don’t need it. Once we switched my medicine to Toprol on November 1, my hand problems decreased on the right and all but went away on the left. (The nerve tests revealed “mild to moderate” carpal tunnel, but not enough to cut my hand to repair.) After the ER visit, I saw Dr. Has-a-Clue the next day. She gave me Diovan, in the same family as Micardis. Guess what? Yep. Same reaction. Within 2 days, I felt like crap, my hands were numb when I woke up in the morning, my joints ached. Stopped the medicine on Monday and the symptoms were gone by today. So now we are starting me on a new drug tomorrow.

On top of this, it seems like I am having an issue with my gallbladder. I have had this pain in my right side since late October, but I was so tired of seeing doctors that I hadn’t given in and gone to one – I thought it was kidney stones again. When I went to the ER, I mentioned it to the doctor there. She asked where the pain was – right under my rib cage – and she said that isn’t kidney stones, but since I’ve had them before I am a candidate for gallstones too – and that is right where I would hurt if I had them.

Fabulous.

Dr. Has-a-Clue doesn’t treat gallbladder issues, but she is doing an echo on my heart this coming Friday and ordered an echo on my gallbladder too – that way, if I had stones she would send me to a surgeon. The pain has gotten more and more severe over the past week, and it could be a factor in my high blood pressure, so she had them do the echo today when I was there. Turns out they couldn’t see any stones. *sigh* However, the symptoms are right – pain increases an hour after I eat, pain gets better hours after I eat and gets worse when I eat again, high fat foods are worse than plain foods. She thought it might be an ulcer, especially since I took NSAIDs earlier this year for my hands, but the fact that I’m curled up in pain after I eat rather than feeling relief from the acid points the other way. She said it could be a small stone, or a stone that has travelled down the bile duct towards my pancreas. She gave me the name of a gastroenterologist, and I have an appointment there on Friday.

In order to make that appointment, I had to reschedule the CT scan of my kidneys and ovary that Dr. Has-a-Clue wants to do. The edema raised a red flag for her, so she wants to make sure I don’t have any kidney problems. The fact that I had an ovarian cyst back in 1990 (they removed my right ovary), the description of my cyst, and a lot of my other symptoms also seem to point to possible Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome, so she wants to make sure my left ovary is ok. The CT scan was going to be this Friday, but it has now been moved to next Friday. I can’t take this gallbladder pain much longer.

I did do all my lab work today. They drew blood for 17 tests. 17! I have no veins, so she had to search for one in my arm. Fortunately she found a deep one and was able to get all but one tube of blood from my arm – the last (huge) tube had to be drawn from my hand though. Ouch! I’m just glad she didn’t have to draw the rest from my hand. I’m glad that is over with now.

While at the appointment with Dr. Has-a-Clue, I got a return phone call from Dr. Zapper, the neurologist that did my EMG for carpal tunnel, called me back about the face numbness. I realized yesterday that I hadn’t called them and he might want to see me. I was right – he wanted to see me *right away* – the nurse sounded so urgent about it, I was almost nervous. Dr. Has-a-Clue asked me again about my symptoms (the same drill I got an hour later from Dr. Zapper), and said it sounds like Trigeminal neuralgia – and Dr. Zapper said the same thing. To be sure, I’ve got an MRI scheduled now for Sunday afternoon. I hate to do it in a weekend and take away from family time, but Mike needs to drive me since I get to take valium. We don’t want another incident like the last time I had an MRI, where I had a nice little panic attack over being in the machine.

Tomorrow is my follow-up visit with Dr. Hand-man about the carpal tunnel and I get the verdict on the hand surgery. I want to avoid it, and I am definitely not doing my left hand now that I’ve discovered the meds were causing most of the problem, but I’m afraid that going to school is going to keep me writing, and that irritates my right hand the most. He already warned me this summer that prolonged inflamation could end up causing permanent damage to the nerves that surgery couldn’t reverse down the road, and I have already put this off for 14 years. Back then, I was dealing with military hospitals and the process of going through the chain of doctors – by the time I got the clearance for surgery, I was pregnant with Jason so they couldn’t do surgery on me. Now I don’t have any excuse.

*whew*

Really, the blood pressure, the carpal tunnel and even the facial numbness aren’t bothering me that much right now. The gallbladder issue has reached the point of a very sensitive tummy and I feel a lot of nausea from it. I have to pick and choose what I eat because some foods cause a lot more pain than others. Meat seems to be out of the question right now – I was in tears the other night, it hurt so bad. So lots of bland, low-fat foods for me for right now until we get this figured out.

So if I seem quiet lately, now you know why. I don’t want to sound like I am doing nothing but complaining about my health, and I’ve been out of sorts for the past week or two. Just a bit spacey, for whatever reason. Plus I know people that are going through things that are so much worse right now, I’m thankful for all the good things in my life. I’m thankful for Dr. Has-a-Clue and Dr. Zapper. I’m thankful for my family and friends, because they have all been so supportive. Hopefully, there is a light at the end of the tunnel. I just can’t wait to reach it.

The Biology test wasn’t as horrid as I was afraid it was going to be. Mendel, genetics, all of that is somewhat interesting to me and I “get” it more than memorizing the names of the cell structures, so that is a good thing. Hopefully I pulled off another A so I can keep my average up.

I can’t believe how close we are getting to the end of the semester. I have a quiz in Chemistry next Monday, an Algebra test on Tuesday, a Chemistry test on Wednesday, and then the following week I have three finals. That’s it. We’re done on December 14th, just in time for me to celebrate my Mom’s birthday without worrying about having tests the next day. I can’t believe it is so close!

I have labs to finish up tonight, but I think I need a little TiVo and knitting time first. Yeah, need. Uh huh. That’s what I keep telling myself at least!