So where was I? ...
I know it's been "about" a week since I last updated, but I feel it has been much longer. I know it has.
I know, I know, get on with the story, dammit.
So, I came home from the hospital on Friday (Oct. 2nd) from my newest cytoxin treatment, and I was fine. I had dinner, I was watching the ball game, I thought everything was going to go wrong later in the treatment month.
Hunzie kept waltzing from my dad to Joey to me. At one point, he went up to my dad and kept batting his face and "pointing" at me (usually just means he keeps looking at me). Then when my dad was paying attention, Hunzie slumped into my lap and stared back like "do something".
So, my dad made me take my temperature. Turns out when I did, it started to skyrocket up.
It went up every .5 or so; 99°, then 99.5°, then 100.1°, then 101.9°. Dad just told me to watch it every time I woke up, and if it hit 102 to just wake them up and we'd go straight to the ER.
At 5am Saturday (Oct. 3rd), my temperature spiked to 102.2° and I started to get dizzy, I couldn't see straight and every time I tried to get up it took 5 minutes to even convince myself to get up. I pushed to get to the phone to call my doctor, and when I got the call back I was told to get to the hospital immediately. Mum and I don't bother to grab stuff, we just rush to the ER and we were there in less than a half hour.
When we got there, we were met by my doctor and the ER doctor, and they started antibiotics right away.
Diagnosis? I got the starting stages of pneumonia. Had I called even an hour later I would have been ravaged by it.
Cause of pneumonia? The cytoxin treatment.
Reaction? WTF GOD DAMN LUPUS SOB GONE KICK MY ASS AGAIN.
At this point I'm talking like I got laryngitis, my voice is so squeaky and low. I still can't think straight. My mother is sitting with me with a book she somehow managed to grab, and I start babbling how I appreciate her being there and if she's scared of what's been happening. Her answer proves me to me one thing: "I am scared, but it's more scary for you because you're living with it. It's only scary to me because I have to see you go through it."
My mom isn't just some crazy Polish lady, y'know. My mom is a mom. And of course, being her kid I have to give her hell sometimes, but now I know where a lot of my "motherliness" comes from.
Because my doctor was worried about my condition, he told me I would be in the ICU for the duration of my pneumonia so I would have closer monitoring. If things got worse, I'd probably be put on dialysis, and that was the very last thing they wanted.
They put me in one of the rooms called a "negative pressure" room, and hooked me up to the usual ICU machines - heart monitor, blood pressure monitor, pulse monitor, etc. - and told me if I needed to use the toilet just let them know, blah blah. (Negative pressure rooms are for people who have to have kidney conditions or had surgery concerning the kidneys.)
It took about five times for me to figure out how to unhook myself from all the machinery and go to the bathroom, so I did the nurses a favor by telling them I'd do it myself if I needed to go.
Out of all the 6 patients in the ICU, I was the only one who could even walk. Everyone else was half-comatose, comatose, or too ill to even sit up. I was also the youngest patient - the next youngest was a 46-year-old guy who recently brought in and had some kind of surgery. Everyone else I saw was either geriatric or looked like ghosts.
So, my grand adventure in the ICU basically consisted of me napping, going the bathroom a lot, being pumped full of antibiotics - and facking BORED OUT OF MY MIND. My mother started on an afghan that we dubbed "the hospital quilt" on the nights she came. Nana kept me company most afternoons, and Dad was with me most mornings after he got out of work.
Thankfully, by the fourth day I was in the ICU, things started to greatly improve, so they took me out and put me down the hall in a regular room. I was happy because they gave me a room with my own shower. I felt well enough to go to the kitchen to grab some snacks, and I found a package of Lorna Doones.
Here's a hidden secret: Heidi LOVES Lorna Doones. Just imagine what I did when I found those.
I moved into the new room with relative ease. I thought I'd be going home after a couple more days and I'd be okay.
The next day, my doctor told me they were going to trial a new treatment for me, and if I showed no allergies I'd be staying another five days to start the treatment. Of course, I was a little upset I had to stay longer than I wanted, but if it meant getting better, then I was all for it.
The new treatment is called IVIG. Mrs. Finnin told me a little about it, so I knew what it was, but I just didn't know what IVIG did. In proper terms, a thousand donors gave antibodies to the hospital, they put it in a bottle and give it to patients like me who need it to make their immune systems confused and stop attacking the original problem and go for them instead. In easier terms, a thousand people gave me their antibodies, and these antibodies go play tag with my immune system and mess it up in a good way.
Needless to say, the IVIG treatment worked like a dream. I had no symptoms at all except it was a pain dragging around the pump system it was on. I named it Pacco - Personal Assistant to Crazy Coot (Old). Pacco was male and a jerk - that's how I wanted him to be.
After a long five days, I'm finally home and I am glad for it. No more crap hospital food. No more being woken up by Pacco saying "I'm full of air" and "I'm obstructing his airway". And definitely hooray for not being woken up at odd hours for vital signs and blood draws.
I would have a lot more to write, but a lot of it is just minor stuff, like my lunch accident with casserole and me literally acting like the Pokemon Slowpoke about it...calling Astra to wish her a Happy Birthday two days early...and manga reading. Boy, do I love One Piece and GTO: The Early Years.
Maybe I'll do an entry on the small stuff at a later time. Who knows.
I know, I know, get on with the story, dammit.
So, I came home from the hospital on Friday (Oct. 2nd) from my newest cytoxin treatment, and I was fine. I had dinner, I was watching the ball game, I thought everything was going to go wrong later in the treatment month.
Hunzie kept waltzing from my dad to Joey to me. At one point, he went up to my dad and kept batting his face and "pointing" at me (usually just means he keeps looking at me). Then when my dad was paying attention, Hunzie slumped into my lap and stared back like "do something".
So, my dad made me take my temperature. Turns out when I did, it started to skyrocket up.
It went up every .5 or so; 99°, then 99.5°, then 100.1°, then 101.9°. Dad just told me to watch it every time I woke up, and if it hit 102 to just wake them up and we'd go straight to the ER.
At 5am Saturday (Oct. 3rd), my temperature spiked to 102.2° and I started to get dizzy, I couldn't see straight and every time I tried to get up it took 5 minutes to even convince myself to get up. I pushed to get to the phone to call my doctor, and when I got the call back I was told to get to the hospital immediately. Mum and I don't bother to grab stuff, we just rush to the ER and we were there in less than a half hour.
When we got there, we were met by my doctor and the ER doctor, and they started antibiotics right away.
Diagnosis? I got the starting stages of pneumonia. Had I called even an hour later I would have been ravaged by it.
Cause of pneumonia? The cytoxin treatment.
Reaction? WTF GOD DAMN LUPUS SOB GONE KICK MY ASS AGAIN.
At this point I'm talking like I got laryngitis, my voice is so squeaky and low. I still can't think straight. My mother is sitting with me with a book she somehow managed to grab, and I start babbling how I appreciate her being there and if she's scared of what's been happening. Her answer proves me to me one thing: "I am scared, but it's more scary for you because you're living with it. It's only scary to me because I have to see you go through it."
My mom isn't just some crazy Polish lady, y'know. My mom is a mom. And of course, being her kid I have to give her hell sometimes, but now I know where a lot of my "motherliness" comes from.
Because my doctor was worried about my condition, he told me I would be in the ICU for the duration of my pneumonia so I would have closer monitoring. If things got worse, I'd probably be put on dialysis, and that was the very last thing they wanted.
They put me in one of the rooms called a "negative pressure" room, and hooked me up to the usual ICU machines - heart monitor, blood pressure monitor, pulse monitor, etc. - and told me if I needed to use the toilet just let them know, blah blah. (Negative pressure rooms are for people who have to have kidney conditions or had surgery concerning the kidneys.)
It took about five times for me to figure out how to unhook myself from all the machinery and go to the bathroom, so I did the nurses a favor by telling them I'd do it myself if I needed to go.
Out of all the 6 patients in the ICU, I was the only one who could even walk. Everyone else was half-comatose, comatose, or too ill to even sit up. I was also the youngest patient - the next youngest was a 46-year-old guy who recently brought in and had some kind of surgery. Everyone else I saw was either geriatric or looked like ghosts.
So, my grand adventure in the ICU basically consisted of me napping, going the bathroom a lot, being pumped full of antibiotics - and facking BORED OUT OF MY MIND. My mother started on an afghan that we dubbed "the hospital quilt" on the nights she came. Nana kept me company most afternoons, and Dad was with me most mornings after he got out of work.
Thankfully, by the fourth day I was in the ICU, things started to greatly improve, so they took me out and put me down the hall in a regular room. I was happy because they gave me a room with my own shower. I felt well enough to go to the kitchen to grab some snacks, and I found a package of Lorna Doones.
Here's a hidden secret: Heidi LOVES Lorna Doones. Just imagine what I did when I found those.
I moved into the new room with relative ease. I thought I'd be going home after a couple more days and I'd be okay.
The next day, my doctor told me they were going to trial a new treatment for me, and if I showed no allergies I'd be staying another five days to start the treatment. Of course, I was a little upset I had to stay longer than I wanted, but if it meant getting better, then I was all for it.
The new treatment is called IVIG. Mrs. Finnin told me a little about it, so I knew what it was, but I just didn't know what IVIG did. In proper terms, a thousand donors gave antibodies to the hospital, they put it in a bottle and give it to patients like me who need it to make their immune systems confused and stop attacking the original problem and go for them instead. In easier terms, a thousand people gave me their antibodies, and these antibodies go play tag with my immune system and mess it up in a good way.
Needless to say, the IVIG treatment worked like a dream. I had no symptoms at all except it was a pain dragging around the pump system it was on. I named it Pacco - Personal Assistant to Crazy Coot (Old). Pacco was male and a jerk - that's how I wanted him to be.
After a long five days, I'm finally home and I am glad for it. No more crap hospital food. No more being woken up by Pacco saying "I'm full of air" and "I'm obstructing his airway". And definitely hooray for not being woken up at odd hours for vital signs and blood draws.
I would have a lot more to write, but a lot of it is just minor stuff, like my lunch accident with casserole and me literally acting like the Pokemon Slowpoke about it...calling Astra to wish her a Happy Birthday two days early...and manga reading. Boy, do I love One Piece and GTO: The Early Years.
Maybe I'll do an entry on the small stuff at a later time. Who knows.