Sorry I have not been around but I have been through the ringer the last few days. I spent from Tuesday until last night in the hospital and believe me it was NOT FUN at all!! I guess when is being in the hospital fun? But I thought my hell would never end and I would forever feel as bad and in as much pain as I was. Thank God I am feeling better now!
So here is what happened... (sorry this may be a little long)
Tuesday was a normal day except that we had our usual fall flying ant problem. Usually once a year around this time after it got cold and then warms up we have a day where SWARMS of flying ants surround the front of our house. This year it happened on the side of our house. Of course the side where the hose doesn't really get to. Hubby tried to do the best he could but we spent HOURS just sitting by the vents and vacuuming HUNDREDS and HUNDREDS of flying ants. EWW it creeps me out even typing this now. You know how I feel about bugs!
After doing that for a while I could not take it and I was getting hungry. So I went shopping which I will have to tell you later about my free shopping trip to CVS. I was going to do it for show and tell this week but I was not around. Anyway, I was having a Big Mac attack. I had not had one in a long time so I went to McD.0nalds and got a big mac and came home. Hubby and I turned on Her0es that we taped the night before and I started eating. Halfway through eating it was like one second I was fine and the next I thought I was going to die. I felt like I was going to throw up and there was a pain in my stomach that was hard to explain and one I had never experienced before. I gave the rest of my food to hubby who ate it and was just fine so I do not think it was the food but TRUST me after that experience I do not think I can EVER eat a Big Mac again!
Anyway, I spent the next hour or so sitting in the bathroom and pacing the house as things got bad. I called my sis to find out what a gallbladder attack felt like and she said I should go to the hospital. I hung up and immediately threw up. I felt better for like 10 minutes so I thought it was just what I ate. I called her back and said I would be fine it was just food that did not agree with me. I think 20 minutes or so later I was calling her as I was on the way to the hospital. The pain in my stomach came back with a vengence along with a fire in my chest and extreme nausea. I went into emergency and believe me I am sure they wanted to get me out as soon as possible because I was just moaning and screaming how bad it hurt forever. I could not cry because it made the nausea worse so all I could do is moan and scream. They tried a bunch of pain meds that did not work and I continued to throw up even though I had nothing but bile (sorry for TMI) in my stomach. They did a cat scan and came back and said everything was fine. I was stunned! I cried no that is not possible to which they said "this is good news. Just go home, it is probably just some virus." I was like THIS IS NOT GOOD NEWS!!! I need whatever is wrong with me to be FIXED!!
They discharged me and I was DEVASTATED!! I could not IMAGINE going home feeling the pain I felt. I could not breathe. It hurt so bad to breathe. My chest was on fire, my stomach felt like I was being stabbed and I could not hold anything down. They did not think it was the flu or anything because I did not have a fever, my blood pressure was AMAZINGLY fine and no body aches or anything. So I called my mom and she said that was ridiculous! that they sent me home. She said YOU need to go to another hospital, which is exactly what I wanted to do! My DH really DID NOT! He was understandably mad and frustrated because I was in so much pain and their was nothing he could do and obviously nothing the hospital was going to do. He did not want to go sit in another emergency room for them to say the same thing. I just kept saying we had went to a hospital that I would not normally go to because it is a little hole in the wall. We went because it was close and we did not have gas and we had no time to stop for gas. I said doctors are wrong all the time . I can NOT imagine going home and feeling this way. I have to try some where else. He reluctantly agreed. I figured I now needed my mom to come up there because he was being unusually grumpy about the situation and that is NOT what I needed. (he did turn around shortly after and I get why he did not want to do that again so I do not blame him).
So off I was to the next hospital and my mom was meeting us up there. They took me in right away because they wanted to do an EKG because I was telling them of the burning in my chest. They never did get a clear EKG. They kept telling me to lay still which was SO HARD to do but I eventually did and they still were unable to get a clear reading so they just left...for a long time! Meanwhile, I am basically screaming out in pain the whole time. My mom kept going to find out what was going on (which is good because that is not one of hubby's strong points. He does anything to avoid conflict so he does not want to bug people. He did eventually do it sometimes.) My sis showed up too. I was so thankful they were there but I felt SO BAD that everyone was sitting there ALL NIGHT and they still went to work even though I think my sis did not leave until 5:00am and my mom 6 or 7. So thank you so much to them!
So the hospital wanted to try another CAT scan but this time with me drinking the crap they want you to drink for that. i looked at them like they were NUTS because I could NOT hold anything down in my stomach. The ER nurse, who was a ROYAL BITCH by the way, said to try. I took a couple drinks and up it came. So now they said they are going to shove a tube up my nose and down my throat and then they will but the drink down that way and it will stay in my stomach. I did not believe them. They shoved that thing up my nose and it felt like someone took a knife and shoved it up my nose. That was ABSOLUTELY HORIFFIC! I thought drinking that stuff was horrible. I would drink that stuff everyday for dessert to avoid that thing in my nose and down my throat for the rest of my life! They put one of the 2 glasses down and said they had to wait a half hour and then do the 2nd. 10 minutes went by and up all of it came! I am not sure why they think it would not make me throw up. i was constantly throwing up and now you add a tube irritating your throat and gag reflex. That does not mix well. Well they were not to happy about that!
Pain meds and meds to make me relax were not working too well. They tried to tell me that it was because I take Perc0cet sometimes for my back. I had recently gotten a RX for 15 from my doc who will occasionally give them to me for my back. Usually just once before she makes me come in to see her. I had gotten one at the end of last week and taken 6 of them over 4 days and not the day of this event. They told me that was why the pain meds were not working. They eventually started giving me Diladid (however you spell it) and that worked! They had been trying morphine that did not work at all!
After I threw up the stuff the nurse was all huffy puffy about it, like I did it on purpose and said "I have to talk to the doc so you will have to wait!" What felt like forever later she came back and said, "they are probably going to admit you but you are going to have to keep the tube in your nose." to which I said, "no, I can NOT. Go talk to the doctor again because I CAn"T keep this in my nose". She came back and yanked it out. THANK GOD!! After a while they cam back and took me for a cat scan and injected die in my IV. The cat scan came back fine. Again they say "good news!" Again I say, "NO!". After a couple doses of meds I was able to relax a LITTLE and get an hour or 2 of sleep. It was not restful because I wold wake up because it was so uncomfortable but I would not want to move at all because I was afraid to break the spell of feeling ok for that second. they came back after a couple hours and said they were waiting to see where my HMO would let me get admitted. They said they were probably going to have to send me downtown. I did not want to do that and could not really understand because this hospital was in my network and I should not have problems.
Finally, a nice nurse came on duty and they figured out I could get admitted at that hospital. They said they could only keep me for observation and my insurance co. would only let me stay for 23hrs if there was nothing going on but I would have a meeting with a surgeon later in the morning. They said they could not give me anything more for pain until I met with the surgeon. i thought I would die! Later that morning I met with the surgeon who was SO NICE and genuinely concerned. The nurses on the floor were all great! They scheduled me for a scan of my gallbladder and bowel. I am not sure how I made it through that test. It was like 2hrs long. i had to keep stopping it because I had to throw up and I could not have anything for pain until this test was over. the surgeon came down while I was in the middle of the test and he said I will have something waiting for you as soon as you are done...just get through this test. The hard part was the last 30 minutes was when I could not have them stop it because they were stimulating my gallbladder and I felt like my stomach and chest were ON FIRE!!! The tech was great and just kept telling me "you can do it"...I kept saying no I can't. The last 15 minutes I was doing an announcement of how long I had to go every 30 seconds. i am sure I drove them all crazy but they never showed it! The tech also called for someone to pick me up 5 minutes before I was done so i would not have to wait and called my nurse to have her have pain meds waiting for me. When i got back to my bed I threw up, got some meds and felt the best relief for like an hour. It was so great.
Of course that test came back fine and so they scheduled me for an endoscopy for the next morning. I threw up about 5 more times and then my hubby helped me wash up including washing my hair in the sink. which felt like HEAVEN. It was weird after that though because, as soon as I washed my hair I had NO MORE nausea at all! Maybe my hair was making me sick...LOL. One thing down, now I just needed to get rid of this burning,stabbing in my stomach and chest. I did not get much sleep because it seemed like everytime I got relief from the pain meds it was then that everyone needed to come in the room and do and check a million things. Hospitals are definitely NOT the place to be if you need rest!! I kicked my hubby out at midnight because he was snoring in the chair and then I got a roommate who snored worse. UGH!! Slowly, my pain started subsiding more and more. I had my endoscopy and that came back...FINE...UGH! It is so frustrating when everything comes back fine and you feel like you are going to die. The surgeon talked about doing exploratory surgery but I had started feeling better and I do not want to go under the knife for the hell of it.
Now I just wanted to get out of there! However the attending doctor, who I did not like, NEVER came to talk to me after my tests. NEVER came to explain what was going on now left and no one could get a hold of her to discharge me. I started making a stink telling them that I did not think my insurance co would like them keeping me here if they were not going to be doing anything more for me. They tried for hours. Finally they called her husband who got worried because the family could not get a hold of her either. You know why?...Their house is so big that no one knew she was home and her cell phone died and she could not hear anyone looking for her. Such problems! I finally got released last night at like 7:00 pm. I was talking to my nurse and she had been asking me a lot about what I was feeling and she said she had the exact same thing like 3 weeks ago. she said she never calls in and she was out of work for 4 days and checked in taking tons of tests that all came back fine. She said she had the nausea nd the same exact pain with the same conclusion. They told me they THINK it was some sort of virus. I know this is the same thing that the 1st hospital told me but I still think I made the right decision to go to another hospital. I am glad I was admitted because I could not been IMAGINE how I would have made it at home in that much pain. I know there are worse things and many people go through much worse but this pain felt worse then my kidney stone. It made the kidney stone I had a year and half ago seem like a picnic on the beach in Hawaii compared to what I was going through.
So, I am home now and feeling better. I am still not eating much and I have been just laying around. I am actually afraid because I have NO idea what caused it so I have NO idea how to avoid it. I do not want to EVER feel that again! I just wish I knew how to prevent it. I have been trying to figure out anything I did differently, which I know probably has NOTHING to do with it, but psychologically my mind wants to try to figure out a reason. Whatever it was I hope it never crosses my path again!!!
Thank you to my sis, my mom and DH for being there. I wish I could have better answers.
I will be catching up with all of you over the next few days. I hope you are all better then I have been.
