mmegaera | further adventures into the ludicrous

Please excuse rambling. I’m normally a six-cylinder person, and I’m functioning on about 1 ½ drugged cylinders. So, I got a lot worse Monday night. Really bad diarrhea, complete loss of appetite, exhaustion, etc. So, expecting Kaiser Urgent Care to be a bloodbath on this particular holiday, which amazingly enough neither it nor St. Peter’s ER was, I called the nurse hotline expecting to get some “tide me over till my official appointments and surgery” directions. What I got, after describing my symptoms, was a “get thee to Urgent Care NOW. Sigh.

Dear godlings, it’s hard to type on my laptop in a hospital bed even with the head up because of those stupid wrist bands and IV. But I can only sleep so many hours in the day.

So, Kaiser ran a bunch of tests on me, put in an IV, and started force-loading saline (now on Wednesday evening, I’m up to bag 9 or 10). As the doctor said later, I came in as dry as a potato chip. A CT scan was strongly indicated, but Kaisers’ wasn’t running because of the holiday. So I was checked out of Kaiser Urgent Care and sent across the street to Providence St. Peter’s ER, whose CT scanner was on. They took one look at me and kept up the saline.

The ER doctor (who I’d told about the cancer at intake) said, well, you’ve got a perforated appendix. This is where everything tipped over so far into the Twilight Zone that all I could do was laugh. Possibly pretty hysterically, but better that than crying.

So I was taken to a regular room, where I still wasn’t showing any signs of the results of all the saline, so to speak. I’d had about four one-liter bags by them. Oh, and to add insult to injury I’d walked out of my apartment with my purse, my Kindle, and the clothes on my back, thinking I’d be there for a couple of hours. I even forgot my phone. So I had a discussion with the ER doctor, who finally agreed to let me check out, to cover the IV (with what basically looked like a toeless tube sock), and go home and get a few things. It was when I got back and checked in that I discovered that St. Peter’s ER is a concrete bunker and has no phone reception. I’d been trying to get hold of Loralee for some time by then.

I did discover that my hospital room has good reception, and, among other things I’d snatched up was my charger.

I finally got hold of Loralee about 10:30 pm. She was worried and I do apologize.

I was already feeling worse by then, although it was discomfort more than pain at that point. They ran the CT scan. They told me that it was likely they’d have to take my appendix out. But when I spoke with the surgeon this morning (whose fatherly mien didn’t *quite* hide his “I know best” attitude, but at that point I didn’t really care, he said not yet.

So. The CT scan shows a furious appendix that is perforated on the side as opposed to the normal perforation at the tip (of course – there is *nothing* physically normal about me, apparently). It also showed the mass in my uterus (size and type still being determined), and a few nodes on my lungs (yeah-- I’m speechless, too).

I’m still in the hospital, gradually feeling worse. Due to the rest of my health issues we’re attacking this with more antibiotics than I have blood at this point. I haven’t been able (literally – before I went to Urgent Care I heated up some frozen pasta, and it was literally inedible, and not because I haven’t loved it in the past). I’ll be here at least five days in Room 711 (which has been one spot of amusement in all this – apparently when Loralee showed up today and asked where room 711 was, some bright soul cracked, “good coffee!”

They let me start eating ice chips this afternoon (all I had most of yesterday, last night, and this morning was those icky moistening swabs – I didn’t know my mouth could *get* that dry. Ice chips are the food of the GODs. I don’t really know if the treatment I’m getting is because antibiotics are the new wave in treating appendicitis, of it’s the best of several bad options because cutting me open right now is seriously contraindicated no matter what. I’ve asked, and that fatherly doctor has kind of danced around it. I need Loralee to ask him some of the hard questions I don’t have the wherewithal to ask him myself.

I have no idea when I’m going to get the hysterectomy now, but it surely won’t be August 8th. Dr. Brennan (the appendix guy) has spoken with Dr. Benoit, but of course the whole thing is seriously cattywampus now, since Dr. Brennan operates in Olympia and Dr. Benoit operates in Bellevue, about an hour and a half apart.

Yes, the appendix very well could be related to the cancer, but no one knows for sure. At least I’ll be getting all of the scans and bloodwork (it’s amazing how hard it is to draw blood from someone dryer than a potato chip, though) done while I’m in the hospital.

I’m gradually feeling worse, they know it, and I have one of those on-demand pain med pumps. It’s got a narcotic drug in it, and well, let’s just say that’s interesting.

I have no idea where we go after the five days of getting my appendix settled down. I’m not 100% sure they do, either, but I trust them to do the best by me (St. Peter’s is one of the best hospitals in Washington), and at this point when someone asks me any question about how I *feel* about all this, I’m afraid my laughter (at least I’m not crying any more) is more than tinged with hysteria. I keep shaking my head.

Ludicrous does not begin to describe this. Seriously. This whole thing is so far on the other side of ludicrous that it’ll have to invent a whole new category. And then invent a category to put the category in.

More as I know it, but don’t expect regular updates. I will do my best, but I’m hurting and exhausted and on narcotic pain meds. So please don’t ask for frequent or regular updates. Right now, this is about all I have in me. Loralee is being a champion, but she’s got way more than she can handle on my behalf right now, too. So please don’t pester her, either. Thanks.

Current Mood: indescribable

Threaded | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

thnidu

Good Thoughts, Hopes, and Prayers,

From:

annathepiper

Oh dear gods. :| That's just... wow.

There isn't much I can do for you from here but I'll take the chance to go buy the books of yours I don't have yet, and signalboost that now would be a REAL good time for folks to check your titles out. (I won't go into deets about your condition on public social media though.)

Many hugs. I'll be hoping for you.

From:

archangelbeth

Sweet GODLINGS.

*hugs*

(Yes, ice chips are wonderful.)

*hugs so much*

Look after yourself!

From:

ndrosen

Yeep.

This must be very seriously distressing. I hope you're in good hands medically, and it least you're living now, and not a hundred or a thousand years ago.

Again, if I can help with anything, like expenses not covered by insurance, please let me know. I care.

From:

threeringedmoon

Thinking of you. Sounds like you are getting good care. And yes, from what I've read, antibiotics are commonly prescribed for appendicitis now.

From:

quietann

Yikes!

This is seriously bad news, and so complicated. I do hope you're able to control the pain and they can figure out what to do with you... Those surgeons must keep talking.