Gallbladder

About two weeks ago I had to get a Hida Scan done to see if my gallbladder was working properly. I have been having pain since before Thanksgiving. Last weeks I got the results back.

I have Chronic Gallbladder Disease.

Basically it just means by gallbladder isn't working anymore. Instead of pumping like it's supposed to, it's not and I keep on having spasms which is what the pain I am feeling is. I have to get it taken out.

I was really upset when I first found out. The fact that I have to get yet another operation is just devastating. I must have cried everyday that week. I've been feeling better about having the surgery, mostly because I am in so much pain. I want to no longer have this non-stop shooting pains in my stomach and be able to eat without my stomach cramping up.

I saw the doctor who will be doing my surgery last night and it's all set to be done on January 7th. I really really wanted to get it done the week after Christmas, but of course he is away that week. So I have to deal with this pain for another 2 weeks. I just hope I don't have another full blown attach like I did. Otherwise I should be fine.

Gotta go right now

This is embarrassing for me to talk about….

I think I have an overactive bladder.

Seriously!! I guess I’m secretly and 85 year old woman. lol

I’ve always been a big water drinker. It’s a habit that I got into when I was younger. When I had surgery on my knee the first time I was home for a long time. Instead of eating and eating, I decided to start drinking more. I would literally fill up a huge glass, hold it in one hand and crutch back to my couch (I have serious talents with crutches) and go to town. I’m weird. Anyway since I drink so much water I always assumed that was the reason I went to the bathroom so much.

But now I’m not so sure. I’ve cut back on the water intake to see if I would have to go less, nope, still going just as often as before. It can’t be normal to have to go to the bathroom this much. Sometimes I’m going every two hours. Even worse? When I go and like 20 minutes later I feel like I have to go again!!!!!

I wouldn’t mind this so much but people notice when you go so much. At work I try to do other things first (like check my mailbox or fill my water bottle) so people don’t realize that I’m going into the bathroom, every single time. Also it can be limiting. When I go out I usually have to make sure that at some point there will to be a bathroom nearby. Road trips I always have to stop. Sleeping is the worst though. I ALWAYS get up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom. Some nights it’s like 4 times I’ll go. This has a serious effect on how well I sleep and how I feel the next morning. Still tired.

All my friends know this about me and we all make fun of it, but inside I’m embarrassed. Honestly I’m mortified I’m even writing about this right now.

I think I need to go see a doctor and maybe go on some kind of medication. You know those commercials: “gotta go gotta go gotta go right now…” that’s how I feel sometimes. I’m resolved that once the summer starts, I get off early on Fridays so I can see a doctor without taking time off, I will hopefully get to the bottom of this problem.

Ouch!

My procedure on my foot was a little more intense than I was expecting it to be. Started on Thursday when the hospital called to tell me I wasn’t allowed to eat or drink anything after midnight. You don’t normally have to do that unless you are getting surgery. Well guess what. I basically had surgery on Friday. I was not very happy.

I thought this would be a quick thing, in and out of the hospital in an hour. Nope I had to check in at 10 am and I didn’t get home until almost 5 pm. Since I wasn’t prepared to go under or anything like that I was a mess. I was crying hysterically while they gave me an IV. Which is really embarrassing. The nurse told me I should never have kids. lol. Thanks a lot lady!

I don’t do well with IVs. I think they are very painful. To prepare I always get this cream on my hands to help ease the pain. Since I didn’t know I was getting an IV I wasn’t able to do that this time. Which made the tears come down even harder. After the IV I calmed down a little but I was still pretty upset. I just didn’t want to be there.

Also I was starving. All I could think about was food. Delicious food. I wanted it to be done so I can go home and eat!

Finally they wheeled me down to the operating room. I meet my anesthesiologist and he look just like Bill Bob Thornton! He even talked like him, which was kinda weird. He gave me some meds and I was basically asleep before I was in the room.

When I woke up my foot was KILLING me. Oh man did it hurt. They gave me something to help the pain and lots of ice was packed on my foot. I also woke up feeling really sick. When I was able to get out of recovery and back up to the holding room they gave me a roll and some ginger ale. It tasted delicious but because I was nauseous I ended up throwing up. TMI sorry. I couldn’t keep any food down! So now I was hungry and sick all at once. Not a good combo.

Since I was sick they wouldn’t let me leave right away. I had to feel better. An hour later I was cleared to go home. Luckily I didn’t need crutches or anything I just had to wear a little boot on my foot. It hurt really bad to walk though.

I got home and felt a lot better. Being home always seems to do that. The rest of the weekend was spent with me on the couch, icing my foot and taking some medicine. I was in pain but it wasn’t too terrible.

I went in to work yesterday which was a bad idea. It took like 30 minutes to walk 6 blocks. I was in a lot of pain and I felt sick again. I tried to stay as long as I could but after I puked in the bathroom (TMI again) I decided I needed to go home. Which is why I didn’t post yesterday.

I feel a lot better today but I think I might actually be sick. Which sucks and is really bad timing. I did make it into work so that was good. I’m walking better and better every day and hopefully when I see the doctor on Thursday I won’t have to wear this boot anymore!

The doctor said I shouldn’t expect to see any real results for a while with my foot. But I will let you know how my progress is going and if this whole thing was worth it!

Am I turning into an old lady?

This past weekend: Eye doctor

Monday: Dentist

Friday: Hospital for my PRP Injections

Saturday: Getting fit for orthodics

Does anyone else think this list sounds like something an 80 year old woman would be doing this week and NOT a 24 year old???

I’m getting really sick of having to go to the doctor so much! Here’s hoping that I will be done with all this crap soon!

Will you hold my hand?

I need to go to the eye doctor. I HATE the eye doctor. I’ve been to my share of doctors and I can deal with pretty much everything. Shots? They hurt but I can usually deal with it. Going to the dentist? Fine. I actually enjoy getting my teeth cleaned. But there is one thing that scares the crap out of me.

Getting my eyes dilated.

Seriously. I hate getting those eye drops from the doctor. When I was little I would actually scream and cry hysterically while they tried in vain to do it. I was not a good patient. It’s just awful and I’m so scared about going.

I really need to go to see an eye doctor though. When I was two I got eyeglasses because I was crossed eyed. That’s right. Crossed eye. My right eye was all the way toward my nose. My vision itself was fine, but because it was like that I had a tendency to see double. They gave my eyeglasses to keep my eyes straight.

By the time I was 12 my eyes had actually fixed themselves. I no longer needed to wear glasses! It was awesome! Best of all that meant no more eye doctor! The only thing was I just had to go back every few years to make sure everything was still working.

It’s about that time to go back. Normally I would put it off because I hate those drops so much, but I need to. I fear that I might be going cross-eyed again. This past week my eyes have been killing me, so much so that I have a constant headache. I think the problem may be the fact that I am sitting in front of a computer 9 hours a day, 5 days a week.

I think my eyes are getting too strained and if they weaken too much my eye will start to go inward again. This occasionally happens. When I really tired I will feel them cross, but usually a good nights sleep will solve the problem. Now that I’m always in front of the computer reading small print all the time, I think my eyes are just constantly tired. No amount of sleep is making them feel any better.

Worst-case scenario is that I will need reading glasses when I am at work. No big deal. I’m not worried that I will need glasses again; I’m worried about those damn eye drops!

How pathetic am I?

My question for you is: Is there a doctor that you always fear going to? Why or why not?

To operate or not to operate?

One of my favorite bloggers Karen asked me yesterday about why I don’t want to get surgery. I was going to talk about that on the last post, but I felt that it was really long to begin with and I didn’t want to bore you any more about medical stuff. Anyway I did want to answer the question because I agree with you on how annoying it is when people don’t do something that can help them out.

I have nothing against getting surgery done if I know it’s the right thing to do. I’m not one of those people who needs to have surgery and won’t do it because it’s SURGERY. For instance my one friend needs to have her tonsils removed. She literally has a sore throat on a daily basis and every time she goes to the doctor they tell her she has to get them removed. For some reason though, she REFUSES.

It seriously angers me that she won’t do it. It’s not that big of an operation and you wouldn’t be in chronic pain anymore! I just don’t get it. She’s also one of those people that won’t take an Advil if she has a headache because too much medication is bad for you. Me? If the hint of a headache comes on I pop 3 of those babies.

The reason why I didn’t want to get surgery on my foot is because that particular surgery has little to no success rate. I’ve read up on a lot of the surgery and have seen bad outcomes. Most of the time, the pain is still there and the recovery itself is painful and unnecessary.

For me there is no way I will get that surgery. What it is basically, they go into your foot cut open your heel, and shave off the bone spur in there. Ew. Even though bone spurs can cause plantar fasciitis, getting rid of them doesn’t actually stop the problem or the pain. I just don’t see the point of getting a surgery like that done, if it doesn’t help the problem at hand.

Another reason why I don’t want surgery is because I’m 24 years old and I’ve had 10 surgeries. That’s a lot. Most people don’t even have to have half the amount of those in their lifetime. I’ve had 5 knee surgeries on my left knee alone. Three in one year when I was 13! Plus another one looming on the horizon but hopefully not for a while.

I hate that I have to get all these surgeries. There’s always a pity party that comes along with it, and I never feel “normal” because I can’t do certain activities anymore. I hate when people feel sorry for me because I don’t want them to be. Just treat me like you would anyone else. I’m fine. Yes, it’s very frustrating that I can’t do some stuff anymore but I deal with it and move on.

I just need to take another break from that operating table and if this injection will help me stay away? That’s just awesome.

Light at the end of the tunnel

For a while now I’ve had a problem with my foot. More specifically I have plantar fasciitis and nothing that I do is helping me. I’ve taken Advil regularly, iced it almost nightly, had very painful cortisone injections, and went to physical therapy which ended up being a complete waste of my time and money. A few months ago I basically gave up and stopped seeing the doctor. I figured that eventually it would just go away.

Well I was wrong. Very wrong. The pain has increased exponentially and I am in pain 24/7. Even when I am sitting I am in pain. Trust me it’s not fun. Then last week I was in a lot of pain. My foot was so swollen that it was almost twice the size as my other foot. I got really scared because that wasn’t normal and then I really freaked myself out because I started thinking I had a blood clot.

Obviously I didn’t, but after crying all night I decided it was time to see another doctor. My mom recommended a doctor that comes to the nursing home she works out. Luckily he took my insurance and did appointments on Saturdays. However, I was very apprehensive about seeing him though. I am just feed up with doctors to begin with and he will be my third doctor for my foot. I just lost all hope in finding a solution to my problem.

When I got to the office I didn’t feel much better. The exam room had a lava lamp! Not only that but there was a radio in there playing Dave Mathews. At first I was confused, I thought I was going to see a doctor, not smoke up in a dorm room. I couldn’t wait to see the doctor himself. He was a tool. He was one of those doctors that are just so full of themselves and thinks they are god’s gift.

For example, he was talking about getting orthotics in my shoes, and when I told him I wasn’t crazy about them because they were usually uncomfortable he suggest that I call any one of his “thousands of patients” and they will tell me that HIS orthotics are the BEST. Ummm okay.

Even though he was such an ass. I actually really liked him. He came up with something that no other doctor has mentioned to me yet. It’s called a PRP injection. What it is basically is they take a sample of my blood, spin out all the plasma and proteins, and injects it into my heel. What’s supposed to happen is the protein will heal the tissue. That way instead of stopping the pain temporarily like most of the shots I’ve had, this takes it away forever. It’s a minimal procedure done in the office and afterwards I would be able to walk fine and go back to most of my daily activities.

Finally a doctor with an answer that wasn’t surgery! The only thing I’m worried about is that it is a relatively new procedure. He himself has only done it a few times. He told me that every one of his was a success. Of course because he’s the best. lol. I did do some research today and it’s actually really interesting. A couple of Steelers players had it done before the super bowl and they saw great results.

I will most likely have the procedure done as long as my insurance covers it. I will keep you posted on that!Oh funny story. While he was explaining the PRP injections he was telling me about how they would inject my foot with anesthesia and then inject the PRP. As he was telling me about it, tears sprang from my eyes and slowly started running down my cheeks! I was so embarrassed. He probably thought I was crazy! I think I just freaked myself out about the needles and stuff. I don’t do well with them and I remembered how painful they can really be.

Either way I gave him a preview of how I will be the day of the actual injections.

A movie weekend

This past weekend equaled to me lying on my couch the whole time waiting to feel just a little bit better. I was sick for over a week. I kept waiting for it to pass on it’s own but the little bug decided to not leave. Saturday morning I was forced to go to one of those walk-in clinics, fork over 50 bucks (that was my co-pay!), and wait over an hour to see a freaking nurse, not even a doctor, just so I could get some anti-biotics.

It turned out to be a nasty sinus infection and by Sunday night I was finally starting to feel better. For the first time in over a week I actually slept soundly last night! Thank god for good medication.

Even though I’m almost a hundred percent I still have a really nasty sore throat. Everything feels fine, no more congestion, headache, achy body, just a sore throat that won’t quite. Now the nurse lady told me it was red from everything “dripping down” but I feel like it should be gone by now. However I have no idea what else it could be. I’m just going to cross my fingers that it goes away by the time I’m done with my medicine.

Despite being bedridden for most of the weekend, I actually had a pretty nice weekend. Friday, even though I felt like crap, I finally got around seeing “He’s just not that into you.” While I did like the movie, I felt like it was really long. I don’t know if that was because I was cranky from not feeling well or what, but I seriously felt like I was there for over 3 hours.

The rest of the weekend consisted on catching up with my shows and watching some great movies. I suggest you watch “The Secret Life of Bees” It was soo good! You should read the book first but even if you don’t, watch this movie. A definite tear-jerker.

How was your weekend? And do you have any idea why the hell my throat still hurts??

My stomach is rumbling

A while back I told you all that I was having problems with my foot. The doctor told me that I needed to go to physical therapy. PT was not a good time for me. I detailed a lot of my frustrations before. Well during the next few weeks there were a lot more frustrations added to that list. Anyway last Friday was my check-up back with my doctor to see how things were going. Even though my foot is a little better, I’m still nowhere near where he would like me to be.

I then proceeded to tell him about my frustrations, particularly about the fact that even though I was going there for my foot, 90 percent of my exercises focused on my leg and knee. The guy told me that I needed to build up my leg muscles to improve my foot. Yeah it made sense (sorta) at the time, but in reality my leg is actually really strong. Thanks to 5 knee surgeries and years of PT for my knee my muscles in there are really good. However because I am the patient of course the PT guy was right and I was wrong.

Well, when I told my doctor about PT he was not very pleased. In fact, he seemed downright pissed. He actually told me that as soon as he had a chance he was going to call them up and ask why in the world didn’t they do more exercises focusing on my foot. Seriously, I felt like a little girl tattle-telling.

But I don’t feel that bad. This guy basically wasted my time and I’m now out 200 dollars for the stupid co-pays. And it feels like I’m back at square one. The doctor prescribed me this medication that is basically steroids to take just for this week. I’ve taken it before and it actually helped my foot out a lot. He is hoping that this will give my recovery the final kick it needs to get better.

So far it’s been going well, minus the fact that I am STARVING. Seriously I can’t stop thinking about food. That combined with the fact that I am getting my period this week is making me a major bitch to be around. I actually got really mad at my mom last night for just making soup for dinner because that wouldn’t fill me up enough.

Never mind the fact that she went out of her way to cook for me, I still flipped on her for making so little. I am a horrible person. Especially since today I e-mailed my mother at work a list of foods to buy me when she goes shopping. Horrible horrible person.

Pain in the A**

When it comes to family genes, I have gotten the worst from both sides of my family. In particular when it comes to my joints. I’ve mentioned before that I’ve had multiple surgeries on my knee and my shoulder and a few other things. Well for the past year, I’ve had a heel spur. Which isn’t so bad, until it started to affect my ligaments. I now have full-blown plantar fasciitis. I’m in a lot of pain and the worst part is that the doctor can’t really do that much about it.

I’ve gotten shots to help reduce the pain. The shot was extremely painful and the relief was only temporary. I’ve done at home exercises, gotten splints and taped up my foot, and taken any type of anti-inflammatory medication known to mankind. Nothing is working. If anything, it’s getting worse.

Normally, I would just deal with it until it got better eventually. But these are my feet and I walk a lot every day. I can’t just ignore it. Also because of the pain, I am walking funny and it is causing my knee to be in pain. Basically, it’s a mess.

This past Saturday I went in for a check up and the doctor told me that we had to really step this up. One he gave me a six-day pack of steroids to take to reduce my inflammation. Steroids. I defiantly freaked out a little bit when he said that. He also told me that I had to find a way to go to physical therapy. This was unbelievably hard for me to do. Because of my work schedule and commuting I don’t get home until 8:30 at night. Most places close way before then and since I leave so early a lot of places are closed.

I thankfully found a place that is open until 8 pm each day and has Saturday office hours. Even though I will have to leave work 2 hours early to make the appointment, it will only have to be one day a week because I will go on Saturdays also. I have my first appointment this Saturday. The only thing? I don’t know if they take my insurance. They told me that they accept most, but will have to put it through the system to see. So fingers crossed that this lady accepts my insurance.

I started the six-day pack on Saturday. It defiantly made me feel a little funny the first day, but it’s been fine. Well, besides being unbelievably hungry 24-7. On the upside? My pain is almost non-existent right now. Too bad this is only temporary but I’ll take what I can get.

I’m just so over having all these medical problems. I just wish I could be normal person and not have to worry about things like this. It’s saddens me that in the past 5 years I’ve never had a pain free day. I’m only 24; I shouldn’t have to be worried about this yet.

Sorry about the woe is me post, but I haven’t slept in the past few days and I needed to get this out so I can hopefully have a sound sleep tonight.

Don’t forget to floss

Yesterday I had a dentist appointment at 8:15 at night. At first I thought this was a great idea because I wouldn’t have to take off of work at all. However going to the dentist at 8:15 at night SUCKS. It is the last thing you want to do after working all day. I felt like the appointment was never going to end. First she took x-rays of my teeth, then she had to develop them, then she cleaned, then the polish and then I had to wait for the head dentist guy to look at my teeth. I just wanted to get in and then leave. Instead it felt like each task took a half hour. Plus I was hungry because I hadn’t had dinner yet. The worst part? I found out that I have the beginnings of a cavity.

This is my first cavity EVER.

I was the only person that I knew that had never had one before. No I can no longer say that. At least it’s small. The doctor wanted to wait until my next cleaning to check the status but I want this thing taken care of now. Who wants to wait 2 years to get a cavity fixed???? Seriously. That’s what he told me; that I have a very small cavity and a low decay rate so I don’t need to worry about this for at least 2 years. No thanks. I would rather not have to worry about it at all. Who would want to wait until it got to a point where you’re in pain and you need major stuff done?? I had to fight him to get it done sooner rather then later. So in about a month I will be getting my first filling. Booo. At least he told me that since it’s small I probably won’t need any shots!!