Resurrection, part 1

During the last four weeks, I have been through a lot of pain. I have been genuinely afraid that I was going to die. I've had my relationships tested to see what they were made of. And I have come alive again. It's good to be alive.



Sorry about the drama. It's just been truly crazy..... :)



September 22nd we took Nan out to dinner. I had a junky sort of chopped steak smothered with mushrooms and cheese. Then I went home and had a gallbladder attack (the painful passing of a gallstone). I have had them before, but this one lasted for 13 hours. All night until Lee got up for school in the morning. This was one of those times when I thought I was going to die. A sensible person would have gone to the emergency room, then, but no, 13 hours of bone crushing mind melding pain is not quite enough to send me to a doctor. (I don't care for doctors.)

I did a lot of praying that night. I felt like the pain was never going to end. I asked God not to let me die because I didn't want to leave my kids, but I was still too stubborn to go...

So the next day I was weak and tired and still felt bad in my tummy, even though I knew the stone had passed. I just wasn't all the way better. For the next two weeks, I tried to eat better to keep from being in pain, but every time I ate I had to lay down for awhile. I didn't share the pain with anybody, although I did let them know I was being careful about what I ate. Any kind of not being in control is embarassing to me. I lost 10 pounds in two weeks. That's not a bad thing in itself, but I wasn't in control of it.

Monday the 6th, I ate nothing but a plain chicken breast and plain pasta noodles, plus drank some gatorade. I could feel the pain escalating. I told Lee I needed to go to the hospital. He knew what I had been dealing with, so he was pretty freaked out.

One reason I didn't want to go to the doctor was because of Julius - he is breastfeeding exclusively, with even very few solids, and refuses to take a bottle. I was so scared to leave him. But I knew it wouldn't be any good to him if I didn't live. SO we dropped the kids at Nans, where I was soundly scolded for not going in earlier, then went to the emergency room.

At first at the emergency room, I declined pain medication so I could keep feeding Julius for awhile. While various nurses and practitioners ran in and out pre-diagnosing me (they went right for the gallbladder, no surprise there). About two hours after getting there, we finally talked to a doctor who was going to send me for an ultrasound. We explained to him about breastfeeding and his reaction was "well, he's had a good run." Mama Tiger woke up then of course and I realized I was going to have to do some advocating if I wanted nursing to survive this adventure. He suggested Lee bring the baby to the hospital for now. So Lee ran home and brought Julius to me for one last feeding. Then they took me for an ultrasound.

The ultrasound guy whistled at my pictures. That's never a good sign.

Lee ran the baby home then, and all I remember after that is the pain. I was literally bawling with pain after that. I didn't care about anything, not even nursing. I just wanted the pain gone. I asked the tech to tell the nurse to bring me pain medication RIGHT AWAY.

Instead I sat in the emergency bed crying for half an hour, finally yelling out at the nurses station for someone to come. My nurse came bouncing in then, smiling at me. "Ready for some pain medication?" he asked.

Grrrr.

Lee was back at this point, and Rachel was introduced to morphine. That was the low point of the whole adventure. After morphine, things slowly started to get better.

To be continued...