I know that most of this is old news to most of y'all...but I have not been in contact with EVERYONE who reads my blog so here goes.....
For about a month before Halloween, I was pretty sick. I was not holding food down (even the simplist of things) and my energy level was next to nothing. Somehow I still dredged through 50-60 hour work weeks. Finally one day I decided to go to the doctor to see what was wrong. I was pretty jaundised (sp?)and it was getting worse. When I went to the doctor (October 17th) he ran some bloodwork and was concerned that it could be TB or something like that. He did call a few days later and say that the TB profile came back negative but he wanted me to see a specialist on November 10.
I went ahead and made another appointment for October 30th with an internal medicine specialist. I went by the original doctor's office on Friday the 27th to get my bloodwork results to take to the doctor that Monday. This is where it gets interesting....
I looked at the blood results and was concerned. Some of my results were 8-11 times what the 'normal range' was. I called my sister in Birmingham and read her the results. She is a nurse. She in turn called my sister in Texarkana who is also a nurse and happened to be at work at the hospital that night. She showed the results to a surgeon there and he pretty well told her to call me and tell me to get to the ER right away. Mind you...the results he saw were 10 days old at this point. So....I went to the ER..and the nurses there were shocked at how jaundised I was. They rushed me back for some tests and lo and behold they found out that every duct of my liver was blocked by gall stones. So...that Monday I had to have a procedure done where my gall stones were removed and a stint was put in to support my liver. Two days later I had my gall bladder removed. All in all I spent a week in the hospital and I still have to wait 2 more weeks to have the stint removed.
I am probably off work until December 4th or so. On the good side, I will get to go home for Thanksgiving but on the bad side, I am going stir crazy. My dad is here helping me out because I am not really at full strength yet. I get tired pretty easily but not as easily as before the surgery. I am still pretty sore because the muscles are starting to ease themselves back to normal and I have probably lost 20 pounds or more. Ah well.
I consider myself lucky. Yes that first doctor was an idiot (both surgeons confirmed this) and I was actually within 48-72 hours of dying had I not gone to the ER. However, I survived and things are getting better. So we'll see where things go from here. I am tempted to write that first doctor and ask why he sat on the results for 10 days w/o telling me the results. Kind of sad.
Anyway, please feel free to write, call or contact me in some way. Y'all know I love to talk :) and am a people person so I am always up for good company and conversation.
My next doctor's appointment is on Thusrday this week and then I will find out exactly when the stint is going to be taken out. After that, I should be able to go back to work relatively quickly.
I hope y'all have had a less dramatic few weeks than I have :) Hope to hear from y'all soon!
~God Bless~
