Never been this ill in my life
Yesterday I had great plans - and they crashed about my head like shards of glass.
With everyone in the house being a bit beyond stressed out between hubby's new job (which he started the week after my surgery), my daughter getting set to apply to four year colleges as she is gettign her AA end of Winter Quarter this year, and my general lousy health - well, we have sucked at money management. Gee - I wonder why? Anyway, when my SUV failed emissions, we didn't have the money to get it to the shop to be able to get it tabs - registered for those of you not in the Pacific Northwest. That puts us down to one car.
Yesterday was my 10 scan after my RAI at the VA hospital. So, the plan was supposed to be this... (feel free to laugh at how much I planned into one day)
Hubby would drive all of us into his work in his car - three adults and my Great Dane in his commuter car for a 90 minute drive. Yeah - like that was not stressful!
Then my daughter took over driving and we drove an hour to the VA hospital - and were only 15 minutes late for my apt! I did not want my daughter, who is of child bareing age and my Servcie Dog in Training who is only 7 months old anywhere near the Nuclear Medicine where you can hear the radiation counters ticking in the background. So I left them about 40 yards away in the x-ray waiting room.
Then it was me on a platform in a big machine for an hour gettign scanned - not stressful, but horrific for my broken back. Oh, I forgot to mention that there is no room in hubby's car for my walker, and my dog is not old enough yet to be used to brace me so I just sort of had to hope that I didn't fall as I walked.
Once the scan was over, it was back to x-ray, get daughter and dog, then head down to the pharmacy back on the first floor after taaking some serious pain killers - which always makes balance iffy. We stand in line for about 10 minutes while I am doing my best not to puke as probably 50 people have to want to stop and talk to me about how beautiful my dog is and ask to pet her. Most people take "No, she is working" well enough and go away, most of them.
Being the VA, getting to the front of the line means getting sent to a different line. At least I got to sit down waiting for my turn and while the pharmist paged the Dr for clarification on the new meds. Then it was back to the waiting room to wait for my name to come up - and fend off about another 20 people who wanted to play with my workign dog.
It actually got to the point that my dog started to refuse to make eye contact with people and moved away from hands reaching for her - knowing she woudl be in trouble accepting being touched. I have never had so many people needing to be near my dog before in 15 years of having a Service Dog by my side. I know she is a beautiful Great Dane, but the bright red cape with the "Don't Touch or Distract" patches usually work better than they did yesterday.
My daughter says she is going to make me a shirt that says "If you ask me about my Service Dog you will cause a Medical Emergency" to see if it will get people to leave me alone...
Finally, my meds were ready and we got to get out of there. But by that time, between the pain meds, the panic from the PTSD triggered by talking to people, and the general weakness and neasua from my RAI treatment had me in bad shape. So of course we had about 100 yards to walk to the valet parking to have them bring around the car. As we were waiting, I took off Corso's working equipment so she could just go around and get love from the five or six people who were enamered by her. It kept thier attention on her and not me - and she loved it.
Now, after the great valet guy brought our car, the plan was to meet up with one of my friends here from DS who lives just 20 minutes from the hospital. My daughter, watching me struggling with not vomiting as I took more pain killers vetoed that - for which I feel so bad... there are just no words. But the fact that I was alseep in the car within ten minutes sort of proved I was not up to being social.
The next item on the list was Costco shopping. With only one car, which hubby has at work for 12 hours a day, counting commuting time, this was our opportunity to get groceries for the next two weeks. The problem is that I have a Costco card, not my daughter. She parked Corso and I in the shade with hopes they woudl not notice it wasn't her card. Well, not only did they notice, but come to find out that my membership expired two days ago. Well, reuping our membership is NOT in the budget this paycheck so the whole trip was a bust.
By the time my daughter got back out to the car, I must have looked like death warmed over as she stopped and got me a bit of Taco Bell to get some food on my stomach then took me home and put me to bed before driving back to pick up hubby from work.
Yeah - the day before yesterday I managed to wash one load of dishes in the dishwasher and one load of laundry and I attempted all of the above yesterday...
Today I am doing nothing but resting. It is also my first day on the long term new hormones, Levothytoxine NA (Synthroid) 0.2 MG. I am hoping that it helps me feel better.
I had a talk with hubby last night. Seven years ago when I crushed my spine and wound up bed ridden for three months I did not feel this helpless. Now part of that was probably the sheer volume of pain killers kept me too stoned to care. But In my life I have never felt this ill and this weak. He said I just need to be patient. Give myself time to heal.
I have this vision that just might come to pass. My horse is in shoes that need to come off, but I don't have a farrier right now. I can just see that this weekend I am going to pull up a lawn chair next to him and pull his shoes from sitting in the lawn chair. Yes - my horse is that good of a horse. Maybe if I do the first one my daughter and see how it is done and do the other one as he is only wearing front shoes.
I have too much to do to be this sick. Not everything can wait for me to feel better. For today, I have been awake for two hours, my daughter fed me breakfast, I have had to take my full morning dose of pain killers of muscle relaxants and codine just to be able to sit upright to type this, and am going to go back to sleep for a few hours.
With everyone in the house being a bit beyond stressed out between hubby's new job (which he started the week after my surgery), my daughter getting set to apply to four year colleges as she is gettign her AA end of Winter Quarter this year, and my general lousy health - well, we have sucked at money management. Gee - I wonder why? Anyway, when my SUV failed emissions, we didn't have the money to get it to the shop to be able to get it tabs - registered for those of you not in the Pacific Northwest. That puts us down to one car.
Yesterday was my 10 scan after my RAI at the VA hospital. So, the plan was supposed to be this... (feel free to laugh at how much I planned into one day)
Hubby would drive all of us into his work in his car - three adults and my Great Dane in his commuter car for a 90 minute drive. Yeah - like that was not stressful!
Then my daughter took over driving and we drove an hour to the VA hospital - and were only 15 minutes late for my apt! I did not want my daughter, who is of child bareing age and my Servcie Dog in Training who is only 7 months old anywhere near the Nuclear Medicine where you can hear the radiation counters ticking in the background. So I left them about 40 yards away in the x-ray waiting room.
Then it was me on a platform in a big machine for an hour gettign scanned - not stressful, but horrific for my broken back. Oh, I forgot to mention that there is no room in hubby's car for my walker, and my dog is not old enough yet to be used to brace me so I just sort of had to hope that I didn't fall as I walked.
Once the scan was over, it was back to x-ray, get daughter and dog, then head down to the pharmacy back on the first floor after taaking some serious pain killers - which always makes balance iffy. We stand in line for about 10 minutes while I am doing my best not to puke as probably 50 people have to want to stop and talk to me about how beautiful my dog is and ask to pet her. Most people take "No, she is working" well enough and go away, most of them.
Being the VA, getting to the front of the line means getting sent to a different line. At least I got to sit down waiting for my turn and while the pharmist paged the Dr for clarification on the new meds. Then it was back to the waiting room to wait for my name to come up - and fend off about another 20 people who wanted to play with my workign dog.
It actually got to the point that my dog started to refuse to make eye contact with people and moved away from hands reaching for her - knowing she woudl be in trouble accepting being touched. I have never had so many people needing to be near my dog before in 15 years of having a Service Dog by my side. I know she is a beautiful Great Dane, but the bright red cape with the "Don't Touch or Distract" patches usually work better than they did yesterday.
My daughter says she is going to make me a shirt that says "If you ask me about my Service Dog you will cause a Medical Emergency" to see if it will get people to leave me alone...
Finally, my meds were ready and we got to get out of there. But by that time, between the pain meds, the panic from the PTSD triggered by talking to people, and the general weakness and neasua from my RAI treatment had me in bad shape. So of course we had about 100 yards to walk to the valet parking to have them bring around the car. As we were waiting, I took off Corso's working equipment so she could just go around and get love from the five or six people who were enamered by her. It kept thier attention on her and not me - and she loved it.
Now, after the great valet guy brought our car, the plan was to meet up with one of my friends here from DS who lives just 20 minutes from the hospital. My daughter, watching me struggling with not vomiting as I took more pain killers vetoed that - for which I feel so bad... there are just no words. But the fact that I was alseep in the car within ten minutes sort of proved I was not up to being social.
The next item on the list was Costco shopping. With only one car, which hubby has at work for 12 hours a day, counting commuting time, this was our opportunity to get groceries for the next two weeks. The problem is that I have a Costco card, not my daughter. She parked Corso and I in the shade with hopes they woudl not notice it wasn't her card. Well, not only did they notice, but come to find out that my membership expired two days ago. Well, reuping our membership is NOT in the budget this paycheck so the whole trip was a bust.
By the time my daughter got back out to the car, I must have looked like death warmed over as she stopped and got me a bit of Taco Bell to get some food on my stomach then took me home and put me to bed before driving back to pick up hubby from work.
Yeah - the day before yesterday I managed to wash one load of dishes in the dishwasher and one load of laundry and I attempted all of the above yesterday...
Today I am doing nothing but resting. It is also my first day on the long term new hormones, Levothytoxine NA (Synthroid) 0.2 MG. I am hoping that it helps me feel better.
I had a talk with hubby last night. Seven years ago when I crushed my spine and wound up bed ridden for three months I did not feel this helpless. Now part of that was probably the sheer volume of pain killers kept me too stoned to care. But In my life I have never felt this ill and this weak. He said I just need to be patient. Give myself time to heal.
I have this vision that just might come to pass. My horse is in shoes that need to come off, but I don't have a farrier right now. I can just see that this weekend I am going to pull up a lawn chair next to him and pull his shoes from sitting in the lawn chair. Yes - my horse is that good of a horse. Maybe if I do the first one my daughter and see how it is done and do the other one as he is only wearing front shoes.
I have too much to do to be this sick. Not everything can wait for me to feel better. For today, I have been awake for two hours, my daughter fed me breakfast, I have had to take my full morning dose of pain killers of muscle relaxants and codine just to be able to sit upright to type this, and am going to go back to sleep for a few hours.
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