nekosensei

* Work has been a pain in the neck...literally. I had a horrible migraine triggered by my pissed off neck muscles on Monday. (My neck has been screwed up ever since I got a neck sprain in 2007). I spent most of the afternoon laying on the couch downstairs being hurty and sick to my stomach. Needless to say, I didn't manage to get out for my walk that evening. :P

Cosette is on Adequan for her arthritis issues and it's been working for her beautifully. She's much more playful and you can tell she's feeling better. I'm almost tempted to ask the vet and my doctor if I can start taking it for my neck. Or I could just say fuck it and shoot myself up with some of it and see what happens (it has to be taken subcutaneously). Hey...they say some athletes use it for doping so it has been used in humans before (not what I would use it for doping, but if it lets me read for long stretches of time like what I used to do, that would be awesome). And, apparently, Adequan acts a lot like Heparin so it would help with all of my clotting issues too. And no, I won't actually do this, but right now it's looking so so tempting right about now.

Or maybe I should suck it up and start taking glucosamine and chondroitin sulfate....

* It's going up to 92 degrees today. That is pretty damn hot.

* My second cat, Arwen, has a lump on her back. I guess I'm going to have to take her to the vet in August to have things checked out. That is going to be nicht gut because she acts like a hellcat when you take her out of her natural environment (aka our house). The vet and the techs have to handle her with welding gloves. She's not their worst patient-- their worst one managed to bite a tech through the welding gloves-- but she's pretty damn close.

Hmmm...now the question is, which vet in that practice am I going to subject her to?


* doomsey has been talking about pestering some friends and finding out whether they're free this evening. My reaction? Meh. We're going to a play tomorrow, and I don't feel like doing much of anything today. We've had a lot of weekends this summer where we've been booked solid, and for me, that tends to get draining after awhile. Yeah...I'm such an introvert. I think I'm going to do some reading and then see if maybe doomsey wants to watch the rest of Torchwood's "Children of Men." We have about three episodes left.


Links:
* Jewel goes into undercover into a Karaoke bar and starts singing her own songs. The results are epic. (Blame doomsey)

* Commercial done for a library using the same style as the Old Spice commercial. Hilarious! (Via happyfunpaul)

Wow...I'm right on time with this one...

( Click here )

I talked to the doctor today, and found out that my INR was indeed too high. It was 4.8. It's supposed to be no higher than 3.5. Whoopsie!

So...you know what this means.



I can has salad.

Also...in related news, I've sprung another leak. My legs are starting to look like doomsey has been beating me or something.

I'm glad I called my doctor today instead of waiting around for her to call me. Last time, she wanted me to change my dosage, but never called me. It turns out that my INR was much too high this week. It was over five. I'm supposed to be between two and three. So, this means that my blood is too thin. Doh!

The good news is that I get a break from my rat poison for two days. I also get to have a salad.

Mmmm...salad...

I think I'm going to order salad with thousand island dressing tomorrow...

I must be weird. I have an alarm on my cell phone that's called "Rat Poison." It reminds me to take my Coumadin so I don't accidentally skip doses, causing my INR to crash.

*picks hair off of her computer*
*picks more hair off of her shirt*
*makes faces at hair stuck to her hair brush*

Here are the less serious side effects of Coumadin because we're just not going to go into the more serious side effects...period:

- nausea, vomiting, stomach pain
- gas and bloating
- hair loss

Yeah...so...hopefully this won't get too embarrassing. If it does...well...maybe I can pull off the Sinéad O'Connor look.

[Edit: This probably also means that I'm not going to get my hair highlighted this year. I don't want the bleach drying my hair out and making the problem worse].

So...I think I'm having some major problems with anxiety. For some reason, I have this fear that more blood clots will form even though I'm on the anti-coagulants. Yes...I know that it's completely irrational and said phenomenon is rare. Still, I can't stop worrying. If it were a less serious health condition, I wouldn't feel so bad, but this could make me drop dead from a heart attack, stroke, or another pulmonary embolism. It also didn't help that my doctor seems to think that I might be one of those women who hyper-coagulate-- and are therefore more prone to clots-- because of how slowly I responded to the coumadin. We're not going to know for sure though until she does the tests once I'm off coumadin.

Anyhow, I went to the doctor yesterday and she prescribed me some anti-anxiety meds (Buspar and Xanax) to keep me from panicking. Everyone seems to think that my worrying all the time is not going to help me get better. She also mentioned having me talk to someone who has had a pulmonary embolism before.

Yesterday, I had some more tests done. I had another ultrasound of my leg and I also got my blood tested. I'm now up to 3.2 inr and I don't need to take the lovenox shots anymore. Friday morning, I get to have more fun tests. I'm going to have a CT scan of my abdomen and that means that I have to drink this really vile looking mixture the night before and the morning of. I'm not sure what it is, but I think it's Barium. Then, I have to go to my doctor's office and get another blood draw. I have to say that I really am a human pin cushion. My arms are all bruised from IVs and blood draws and it must look like I use intravenous drugs or something...

I’m still at the hospital. I’m writing this one handed since I have an IV by my hand and it hurts to type…

As doomsey already mentioned, things got really interesting on Monday night. I was talking on IRC with some friends and flipping through LJ when suddenly. I felt my heart start to race and I had a hard time catching my breath. I told doomsey at the time that I was feeling strange. Then, I lay down on the floor and tried to calm down, thinking that it was a bizarre panic attack. Before I knew it, I woke up and saw doomsey standing over me and talking on the phone with the paramedics. I had passed out. doomsey later told me that I had stopped breathing and I was starting to turn blue. Quite honestly, I think that, if this had happened while I was at home alone, I probably would have been a goner. I also think that doomsey saved my life. He saw that I was having a serious medical problem and reacted very quickly. Not only that, but I passed out face down on the carpet. We think that his turning me over (and later turning me on my side), may have also dislodged something that caused me to come around again.

The paramedics came in minutes. They checked my blood pressure and pulse and observed that both were pretty high. They also tried to get me to sit up, but I immediately started feeling dizzy again. They decided to put me in the ambulance and take me to the nearest ER. What probably stabilized me (aka kept me from dying) was the oxygen they put me on. Because of my condition, I wasn’t able to pump enough oxygen through my body. At one point, I almost passed out again in the ambulance. The paramedics told me to breathe slowly in through my nose and out my mouth, and I followed their instructions. I barely managed to stay conscious.

When we got to the hospital, doomsey got me admitted and answered all their questions about my medical history since I was really out of it. I was very uncomfortable because my heart was going 100 miles per hour and I had a hard time catching my breath. They found me a room and started to do tests. After they saw that my heart sounded like that of a frightened jackrabbit after walking a few feet to go to the bathroom, they decided to tell me not to walk and that they were going to do a CT scan. Then, the doctor came in, said that I had a pulmonary embolism that had broken apart and lodged in my lungs. I was surprised. I thought that either I was either having a bizarre panic attack or I was having an allergic reaction to one of my medications (I had been taking an anti-inflammatory prescribed by my doctor for a foot injury). After I heard his diagnosis, my thoughts were pretty much: “that sounds serious," “am I going to need emergency surgery? “ and “am I going to die?" Later, the ER doctor told me that it was a blood clot in my lungs and that it could have killed me. After I was out of the woods, doomsey told me that he did some research online and found out that one in three people with pulmonary embolism die. This did not make me feel good. I still think it’s a miracle that I managed to survive. [My sister called me after I got into the ICU. She said to me, “The ICU is for old people, loser. She later told me that she knew I was going to be okay when I told her to sit and spin. Yep…I was still being sarcastic with my sister].

Right after the ER doctor gave me a diagnosis, they put me on heparin, a blood thinner that is administered intravenously, and Xanax to get my heart rate down. Then, they wheeled me up to the ICU where they hooked me up to a bunch of machines to measure my blood pressure, heart rate, and respiration. I was also hooked up to oxygen and an IV with heparin and fluids. I was told to lie in bed and try not to move around a lot since the blood clots could travel and cause more problems (ie a heart attack or a stroke). This meant that I couldn’t get up to use the bathroom and had to use a bedpan. Yuck! Not fun!

And if that wasn’t enough, more drama followed. Within a few hours, my parents arrived at the hospital with my brother. My brother is mentally disabled, and I think that he had a hard time processing what was going on. He just couldn’t deal with seeing me so sick and hooked up to all kinds of machines. When the doctor came to talk to me, my dad sent my brother out of the room. We think that either he wad eavesdropping or he saw someone else in bad shape in another room. Just as he was finishing explaining things, we heard someone fall down outside. My brother had fainted. They ended up taking him down to the ER to get things checked out, and my mom had to go with him. I saw her when she left, and she was just overwhelmed. She was crying. In the ER, they determined that my brother was going to be okay. He did, however, have a nasty bump on his head.

I was supposed to check out of the ICU around the second day, but more shit hit the fan. They had me sitting up in the bed as if it were a chair (I was doing much better by that point.) This was my first time sitting up and I also so happened to be talking to my mom and worry-worting. Suddenly, I felt dizzy. My mom was in the process of finding someone when I fainted. By the time I had woken up, all kinds of people were in my room. I lay down and started feeling faint again. The doctor came running in and had the nurses give me more fluids. I immediately started to feel better. They held me an extra day and had a cardiologist order some more tests. They gave me an EKG and an ultrasound and determined that there was nothing wrong with my heart. The fainting spells were caused by stress, and I was certainly under a lot of it after almost, you know, dying the day before. The cardiologist explained that this is something that often happens to people between the ages of 15 and 35 and that it was not unusual for someone who is in the ICU.

The next day, I was given the green light to move to a room in the cardiovascular wing. I have a roommate and the rooms are kind of small. It's hard to navigate through the room with an IV. There’s also what dewfreak referred to as a “singer" (blondibritecake and dewfreak came to visit yesterday) across the hall from me. When I first got here, she was yelling “Hello?," “Help me," “Get me out of here!" and “Where did my little friend go?" It’s also kind of sad because she’s from a nursing home, has health problems, and is alone.

It looks like I am pretty much out of the woods. It’s just a matter of weaning me off of the IV blood thinners and onto oral ones. They want my blood count to be between 2 and 3 (INR?) before they can let me go home. They think this isn’t going to happen until Monday. Tonight, they’re going to take me off the IV and start giving me injections, so at least I don’t have to do that. I might also be allowed to take a walk tonight, but I’m not sure. The nurses here tend to be a bit more conservative about what I’m allowed to do than the doctors.

Oh…I also wanted to mention that I’m going to have to take blood thinners for four to six months to prevent another clot. The doctors seem to think that this clot was caused by a combination of factors: birth control and the foot injury on New Year’s Eve. Needless to say, I’m not going to be taking birth control anymore seeing as it damn near killed me.

So…that’s about it. The nurses aren’t letting me get up very often, and I’m tired of looking at four walls. I am very very bored…

Today definitely qualified as a bad day. Things were going well until I was just about ready to leave for work. I walked upstairs and noticed that cosettemonster was limping again. And, yet again, she was favoring the back paw that has a chipped bone in it. This morning she was walking around normally (she started getting better a few days after she first injured it), but now she looks like she's back at square one. She must have strained it again jumping up on something. I asked doomsey to check on her and give the cats some food before he went to anime night, and he noticed that she was hiding behind the couch. He said that he had to poke her to get her out so she could have some food. Hiding is not a good sign. It means that she's not feeling well. Tonight, when I got home, she came out from behind the sofa to greet me (because I'm her mommie). I gave her her pill (aren't I nice?) and then gave her a little bit of food since she's supposed to eat with the medication. I talked to emygination this evening, and she said that I should leave a message with the vet and see whether she wants us to wait a few days to see if she gets better or to bring her in again. I really worried that she's going to have to have surgery. I'm going to be a basket case if it's determined that that's what she needs.

The day goes downhill from there. I ended up leaving later than what I wanted for work because I wanted to make sure things were okay with cosettemonster before I left. As I said, I noticed she was having problems right before I was supposed to go. Next, I'm on the expressway and some idiot leaves a large plastic bag fall out of their car or truck. It drifted into my lane, but I couldn't avoid it since there were cars on either side of me. I thought it was going to end up stuck under my car and that my car would smell like burnt plastic for the next couple of weeks (that happened to me several years ago). What happened was that the stupid bag ended up wound around my side mirror so that I couldn't see out of the goddamn thing to change lanes. I tried to open up the window to remove it while I was on the expressway, but the damn bag started flapping in the window, and I was afraid it was going to start flapping in my face and obscure my vision if I opened the thing any more. That was even more dangerous so I closed the window and put up with the goddamn bag until I got off the expressway (I'll tell you...other cars were leaving me a lot of room!). Then, I stopped and took the damn bag off. I still have it in my car if you want a souvenir! Actually...scratch that...I think I'm going to light a fire and burn it.

And...

Since cosettemonster started getting barfy on Sunday on the Clavamox, the vet switched her to a new medication that is supposed to be easier on the stomach. She's supposed to take one and a half pills once a day. I had a hell of a time getting her to sit still to take one and a half pills as well as her pain medication. In fact, she spit one of the pills out and I had to hunt her down and make sure she took it. It took a couple of tries! I wonder if I can give her one pill in the morning and one pill at night to spread the torture things out a bit more so she doesn't get fed up and struggle as much.