Comments | zombiehamster: Writer's Block: Dear LiveJournal

zombiehamster

Writer's Block: Dear LiveJournal

Mar 08, 2011 17:32

beardo, katamari 2011, awesome stuff, california funtimes, asshole brother, housewifey, anti-whining, disney, writer's block, pretty penny, wisconsin, health, toot toot poot poot, the ex

Comments 6

rocstarsky March 9 2011, 01:35:26 UTC

I think this is one writers block I will do!

upandatombomb March 9 2011, 01:40:24 UTC

What health problems did/do you have? And what happened with your surgery? :(

(Oh, and of course you can ignore this if you don't want to answer. That's fine.)

zombiehamster March 9 2011, 02:04:48 UTC

I started having severe headaches that didn't seem to be migraines and no pain medication could help. So in the absence of any other diagnosis the neurologist decided I had pseudotumor cerebri, which apparently tends to happen to fat white girls, and is characterized by too much spinal fluid building up between the brain and skull causing severe headaches and vision problems, which he thought he could see when he flashed his light in my eyes. I had three spinal taps and the first one came back high on pressure (because I was on my stomach instead of my side) but the other two came back normal. Despite this, and despite the fact that diuretics weren't helping either, he recommended having a shunt put into my spine that would drain the excess fluid into my abdominal cavity where it would be reabsorbed and eventually peed out. The neurosurgeon who inserted the shunt placed it in a very oddly high position for unknown reasons, and I woke from the anesthetic with screaming pain in my hip and leg (that I now know is sciatica) and the ( ... )

upandatombomb March 9 2011, 18:34:26 UTC

That's horrible! Wow... I'm sorry. I would have sued them to hell and back (and I'm not a "sue happy" person at all)! :(

zombiehamster March 9 2011, 21:47:48 UTC

Neither am I, but we vaguely looked into it. We found out that unless you want to go to an ambulance chaser, it's really hard to get a doctor to say anything at all about another doctor. My second neurosurgeon came right out and said that he wouldn't testify to anything, that he and the first guy worked at the same hospital, and that if he said anything that could be used against Dr Fuckup that he would break the unwritten code and be pretty much ruined at that hospital. So he was willing to treat me as best he could and say "it's possible that this happened" but he would not be pinned down. If I wanted to pay for a neurosurgeon out of pocket (that he could not, again, recommend as that would be backstabbing) I might have been able to pursue it, but between that and the huge difficulty in finding a reputable lawyer, it didn't seem worth it. I just wanted to move on with my life.

rocstarsky March 9 2011, 02:42:21 UTC

Hey, we moved to California the same year, and made our journals the same year/month LOL! I miss Disneyland so much more than I thought I would. I miss living a 10 minute drive from it, too.