Well, I'm back behind the Zion Curtain again waiting for Wednesday when I jet set off to Oz. My husband and I actually got packed for our 2 week adventure on Saturday. This is officially the earliest I've ever packed for a trip in my life. I realized for the millionth time why I am grateful I married this man when he thought of random details like taking photo copies of our passports just in case, checking into our abroad health insurance coverage, etc. These are things that just don't cross my mind.
We packed while listening to a lot of Midnight Oil. As J would say, "What's not to like about a tall white guy who can't dance?" He's referring to Peter Jaret who is the lead singer and if you've ever seen him in concert, he looks like he's having a grand mal on stage. I didn't realize this, but Peter actually broke up the band to pursue his political career. That is something I can respect considering that their songs are so politically motivated.
Edgar had a few mishaps on his flight over here. For one, I followed Delta's guidelines for flying an animal (even though we were flying Frontier). I taped an extra bag of food to his crate just in case, as it is advised. I packed about 6 cups thinking that it would also serve as a nice blend/introduction to whatever my mom is feeding her dogs these days while minimizing GI issues. When Edgar and I were reunited I noticed his bed was a bit wet. Then I noticed that his food bag only had 3/4 c. left. Then I noticed a note that read: I gave Edgar the rest of his food and some water. He is a very nice dog. Fernando, Denver Ramp. Holy cow! Edgar only eats 1c., 2x a day!! I even woke up at 2:30 AM to give him that cup before our flight knowing that he couldn't eat right before. This means that Edgar ate approximately 8 cups of food in less than 24 hours or so. Holy GI issues from hell.
To say that the dog was bloated was an understatement. Then the poor guy got into a scuffle with a Great Dane. The Dane belonged to one of our Sunday night dinner guests and she was beautiful! I just know that her owner is dying a thousand deaths, but truly these things happen. It was all over a tennis ball. At any rate, I missed Sunday night dinner and landed in the Pet ER about 7:00 PM. Over $180 later, Edgar has the top of his skull shaved and a nice crusty scab where he was gouged. He now was a sleepy, GI distressed, sedated, PTSD, Frankendog with a horrible case of the hot farts and involuntary bowel issues. It was quite the night.
This morning he seems to be back to normal and enduring his new nicknames of "Scarhead," "Frankendog," "Head-wound Bubba," and "Patch." I'm off to see "The Jerry" for my hair appointment to correct whatever he sees fit that the other scissor wielding bastards in Indy did to my mane. Then I'm off to see the puppies who seem to resemble more dog like form than other embriologic entity by now.
Monday, November 12, 2007
Friday, November 9, 2007
Horse and Buggy Parking Here
Well, the scan turned out to show no growth encroaching on anything of big importance (read: optic nerve is not crushed requiring barbaric surgery through your nose and sinus cavity to your brain). Two words only suffice here: Thank God.
In the meantime, my doc said she was just chalking up my recent episode to a migraine gone haywire. I now have enough narcotics in my medicine cabinet that could knock out a small army.
To celebrate the recent bout of I-promise-I'm-really-not-a-crazy-person-medical-event, I'm making a batch of butternut squash soup. Some would go out on the town and drink bad tequila until they thought they loved everyone in the bar, but I think my poor liver has had enough with all of the Tylenol over the past week. Yup, I do happiness with soup.
While I was out buying my provisions, I went into Trader Joes and saw something that you don't see everyday. A flock of Amish in Trader Joes. The women were in their bonnets, black dresses, knitted sweater shawls, etc. They were loading up on the Joe Joe cookies, tasty salsa, and ground meat. They then loaded it up into their PT Cruiser complete with a vanity license plate of Godz4U. It was quite the distracting sight.
In the meantime, my doc said she was just chalking up my recent episode to a migraine gone haywire. I now have enough narcotics in my medicine cabinet that could knock out a small army.
To celebrate the recent bout of I-promise-I'm-really-not-a-crazy-person-medical-event, I'm making a batch of butternut squash soup. Some would go out on the town and drink bad tequila until they thought they loved everyone in the bar, but I think my poor liver has had enough with all of the Tylenol over the past week. Yup, I do happiness with soup.
While I was out buying my provisions, I went into Trader Joes and saw something that you don't see everyday. A flock of Amish in Trader Joes. The women were in their bonnets, black dresses, knitted sweater shawls, etc. They were loading up on the Joe Joe cookies, tasty salsa, and ground meat. They then loaded it up into their PT Cruiser complete with a vanity license plate of Godz4U. It was quite the distracting sight.
Monday, November 5, 2007
Waiting for Guffman, My Version
About 7 years ago I broke up with He-Who-Shall-Not-Be-Named and decided that a good insurance policy for unnecessary painful rebound relationships would be to get off of birth control. No need to add any more hormones to the mix when I didn't need them. My doc thought this was a great plan since I had been on them since I was 15. Yup, it was time to see what my system would do. My system did nothing.
Most females (and males) would rejoice in this news and so I didn't seek any treatment for about 4 months. I suppose I wrote it off as a side benefit/self-regulation issue, etc. That is until I began to have tons of swelling at my ankles, gained 40 pounds, and had insomnia. At that time, I finally went back to the doc who put me through a bunch of progesterone withdrawal tests without any success. Essentially this meant that I had little to no estrogen in my system. My internal medicine doc referred me to a gynecologist.
The gynecologist ran me through more tests and ordered a CT scan of my head. Nothing showed and he referred me to an endocrinologist. By now it is 2002. The endocrinologist decided to test my hypothalamus (mission control for the pituitary) which rendered as non-functioning. He then ordered a MRI of my brain. The scan showed that a small mass less than a centimeter thick was causing the problem: I had a pituitary microadenoma.
I will admit I went completely around HIPAA and wrote a release for my own radiology report for them to fax to the hospital as I wasn't going to wait a week while he finished his vacation. I discovered I had the tumor on my own, which sucked by the way and I wouldn't advocate for anyone else to do what I did. Eventually, that doc wasn't really certain what to do so he referred me back to the gynecologist who suggested I went back on hormone replacement therapy of birth control. I fired them both and found an amazing endocrinologist, Dr. Grua.
Dr. Grua is a great guy who drew diagrams to help explain what the body did and how mine was malfunctioning. He said my thyroid was borderline low and tried me out on some Levoxil. Wouldn't you know, I dropped my weight, the edema went away, and my reproductive cycle became as functional and predictable as clockwork. What was even better is that my husband was one of my best friends through the whole deal and we weren't even dating yet.
Here we are 5 years later and everything has been going along quite snazzy in my life. I have a great life. I'm married, I have an amazing dog, 2 great houses (with mortgage payments to prove them), a nice car, great jobs, etc. Then, I began to wrestle with headaches last Monday. The kind of stabbing pain behind your eyes where the thought of your eyeballs popping out of your skull sounds more pleasant than keeping them in your head. I dosed myself with Advil up the wazoo until my husband pointed out that headaches should not last a week. Huh. Ok, he had a point. By Friday I managed to go to the doctor for his sake and for my own piece of mind to get through the weekend. After all, the pain was a bit worse and I hate the emergency room.
My internal med doc, who is also fantastic, thought she might start out by treating it as a migraine gone BAD. She gave me scripts for two narcotics and a migraine formulary. Over the weekend I noticed a few things: 1) My pain control sucked, 2) Reading made it worse, 3) Cold compresses helped, 4) Nausea had the chicken or the egg problem (pain or meds causing it?) By Sunday night I knew I had bought myself another co-pay for yet another office visit and a trip to radiology to get my head spun in the MRI.
I showed up today in the docs office and promptly barfed all over the room. This was preceded by her stating, "It seems that I always see you when you look so miserable." I answered her with retching. Nice. That was followed by me apologizing. The office staff was more than accommodating, but still I was horrified. You will remember that my last office visit I passed out and won a week of heart monitoring and a whole lot of drama. I drove myself and didn't have anyone to come pick me up, but they gave me an injection of anti nausea meds, put the trash can near the exam table and let me rest for an hour before waking me to let me know I had an emergent appointment for the head scan.
If you have never had a head scan: Don't. First they give you ear plugs, then they put you in a claustrophobic Hannibal Lecter mask, then they put you in a small tube with loud noises for over an hour. I managed to make it to the pharmacy for yet stronger pain meds, steroids, and another formulary for migraine headaches. I'm finally home.
My doc just called:
"Hello?"
"Oh, thank God you are home! This is Dr. So and So. I got home and just remembered that I never checked on you and realized you could still be sleeping in room 4! But you did make it home!"
"Yup. I even made it to the pharmacy."
"Good! Good! Oh, thank God! I actually thought about admitting you with your husband being out of town or else driving you home myself after I had picked up my kids and then I forgot all about you! I'm so sorry! Ok, well, I'm off tomorrow, but we'll have your results Wednesday. If you need anything, have my office page me! I'm certain you want to take some pain meds. You sound like you need to take some pain meds. Ok, well, hang in there!"
Now I wait. Its like deja vu all over again with this waiting stuff. I'll keep you posted on how things go.
Most females (and males) would rejoice in this news and so I didn't seek any treatment for about 4 months. I suppose I wrote it off as a side benefit/self-regulation issue, etc. That is until I began to have tons of swelling at my ankles, gained 40 pounds, and had insomnia. At that time, I finally went back to the doc who put me through a bunch of progesterone withdrawal tests without any success. Essentially this meant that I had little to no estrogen in my system. My internal medicine doc referred me to a gynecologist.
The gynecologist ran me through more tests and ordered a CT scan of my head. Nothing showed and he referred me to an endocrinologist. By now it is 2002. The endocrinologist decided to test my hypothalamus (mission control for the pituitary) which rendered as non-functioning. He then ordered a MRI of my brain. The scan showed that a small mass less than a centimeter thick was causing the problem: I had a pituitary microadenoma.
I will admit I went completely around HIPAA and wrote a release for my own radiology report for them to fax to the hospital as I wasn't going to wait a week while he finished his vacation. I discovered I had the tumor on my own, which sucked by the way and I wouldn't advocate for anyone else to do what I did. Eventually, that doc wasn't really certain what to do so he referred me back to the gynecologist who suggested I went back on hormone replacement therapy of birth control. I fired them both and found an amazing endocrinologist, Dr. Grua.
Dr. Grua is a great guy who drew diagrams to help explain what the body did and how mine was malfunctioning. He said my thyroid was borderline low and tried me out on some Levoxil. Wouldn't you know, I dropped my weight, the edema went away, and my reproductive cycle became as functional and predictable as clockwork. What was even better is that my husband was one of my best friends through the whole deal and we weren't even dating yet.
Here we are 5 years later and everything has been going along quite snazzy in my life. I have a great life. I'm married, I have an amazing dog, 2 great houses (with mortgage payments to prove them), a nice car, great jobs, etc. Then, I began to wrestle with headaches last Monday. The kind of stabbing pain behind your eyes where the thought of your eyeballs popping out of your skull sounds more pleasant than keeping them in your head. I dosed myself with Advil up the wazoo until my husband pointed out that headaches should not last a week. Huh. Ok, he had a point. By Friday I managed to go to the doctor for his sake and for my own piece of mind to get through the weekend. After all, the pain was a bit worse and I hate the emergency room.
My internal med doc, who is also fantastic, thought she might start out by treating it as a migraine gone BAD. She gave me scripts for two narcotics and a migraine formulary. Over the weekend I noticed a few things: 1) My pain control sucked, 2) Reading made it worse, 3) Cold compresses helped, 4) Nausea had the chicken or the egg problem (pain or meds causing it?) By Sunday night I knew I had bought myself another co-pay for yet another office visit and a trip to radiology to get my head spun in the MRI.
I showed up today in the docs office and promptly barfed all over the room. This was preceded by her stating, "It seems that I always see you when you look so miserable." I answered her with retching. Nice. That was followed by me apologizing. The office staff was more than accommodating, but still I was horrified. You will remember that my last office visit I passed out and won a week of heart monitoring and a whole lot of drama. I drove myself and didn't have anyone to come pick me up, but they gave me an injection of anti nausea meds, put the trash can near the exam table and let me rest for an hour before waking me to let me know I had an emergent appointment for the head scan.
If you have never had a head scan: Don't. First they give you ear plugs, then they put you in a claustrophobic Hannibal Lecter mask, then they put you in a small tube with loud noises for over an hour. I managed to make it to the pharmacy for yet stronger pain meds, steroids, and another formulary for migraine headaches. I'm finally home.
My doc just called:
"Hello?"
"Oh, thank God you are home! This is Dr. So and So. I got home and just remembered that I never checked on you and realized you could still be sleeping in room 4! But you did make it home!"
"Yup. I even made it to the pharmacy."
"Good! Good! Oh, thank God! I actually thought about admitting you with your husband being out of town or else driving you home myself after I had picked up my kids and then I forgot all about you! I'm so sorry! Ok, well, I'm off tomorrow, but we'll have your results Wednesday. If you need anything, have my office page me! I'm certain you want to take some pain meds. You sound like you need to take some pain meds. Ok, well, hang in there!"
Now I wait. Its like deja vu all over again with this waiting stuff. I'll keep you posted on how things go.
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