Yikes!

So there's obviously been a HUGE gap in time since my last post. Last school year, day 1 of our first year homeschooling kicked off with a bang! I was super excited, and the boys thought I was the meanest mom in the whole wide world. Super! That means I'm doing my job, right?


Day 2... I meet with my family doctor to discuss some concerns - mainly the constant fatigue I had been experiencing for several months. He ordered blood work, which found that my hemoglobin was "critically low."


...And so began the process of determining what was causing the low blood counts. I was sent to an OBGYN, who performed a laparoscopic hysterectomy in November. We expected my blood counts to rise over time, since I was no longer losing blood each month. Instead, my hemoglobin continued to fall.


Plan B - I was sent to an oncologist, who monitored my blood counts closely while administering a series of IV iron infusions. After several weeks of treatment, my blood count finally fell within "normal" range. Enter: random stomach pain. And when I say "pain," I don't mean that I had a mild stomachache. I mean that I was on my knees, doubled over in the floor, and in tears until the hour-long "attacks" finally stopped.


Hmm... now what? I was sent to a GI specialist who performed an upper endoscopy. We assumed the pain was being caused by ulcers, possibly caused by NSAID use after the hysterectomy. The endoscopy showed no abnormalities. A gallbladder function test also appeared normal, although symptoms were reproduced during testing. Another head-scratcher. To be on the safe side, I was sent to a general surgeon, who removed my gallbladder just days before I was scheduled to move (via the family van and a uhaul trailer) from Texas to Washington State. The laparoscopic operation went well and I was sent home the same day to recover.


After a few days, the severe stomach pain returned, this time with bouts of nausea. Into the surgeon's office I marched (well, it was actually more like a crawl), and he insisted it was just post-surgical pain, though he also admitted he was baffled at how I could still be having "gallbladder pain" when I no longer had a gallbladder (this, I decided, is why medical school takes many years to complete). He suggested I stay on top of the pain by taking my prescribed pain relievers on time with each dose.


On the way home from the surgeon's office, I nearly crawled through the windshield as waves of pain radiated through my body. I couldn't find any position where I felt comfortable, and almost got out of the car at a red light because I didn't know what else to do to ease the pain. We made it home - barely - and I went straight to the couch. But an hour later, give or take, I was being loaded into the back of an ambulance. I knew something was wrong, but never in my wildest dreams...


The last thing I remember clearly was being wheeled into the emergency room on a stretcher. After rattling off my vitals to a nurse, one of the paramedics put his hand on my shoulder and said "I'm gonna make sure they take good care of you." Then he left. I vaguely remember my mom walking into the room - she must have followed the ambulance to the hospital. I was given pain medication in the ambulance, but it didn't help at all. One of the ladies from our church is a nurse in the emergency department, and she just happened to be on staff that day. She came in to check on me and I begged her to start praying. Something told me that I was about to be needing those prayers...


From there on out, I really have no recollection of what happened. According to my family, 2-3 days passed without any relief from the pain and nausea. They were giving me all the medication they could, to no avail. Then a very bright "hospitalist" came to the conclusion that all of my symptoms were being caused by drug withdrawals (I stopped taking my 'regular' medications after my gallbladder surgery, so I would know that everything was healing properly before I started swallowing pills again). I drew the mental conclusion that I was a drug addict - that I had somehow brought all of this upon myself.


Fortunately, my cousin is also a nurse at the hospital where I had been admitted, and as time continued to pass with no improvement in my symptoms, she began to lay the pressure on my doctors to be more proactive in finding the true cause of my illness. And as if on cue, my body handed the medical staff a handwritten invitation to reevaluate my case.


My blood pressure bottomed out - they had to use a doppler to get a blood pressure reading, because it was so low that the machines couldn't read it at all. My heartrate climbed into the 150's. I began to spike a temperature. The skin around my eyes turned black. I couldn't breathe. And finally, the physician on duty knew something was very, very wrong, and I was sent to the OR to find out what we were dealing with.


As soon as they opened me up, they realized that my intestine had perforated, spilling days worth of toxic bile into my belly. Six feet of my intestine had become trapped by an internal hernia, which eventually caused a bowel obstruction. The months of pain attacks, which we assumed was a result of ulcers and gall bladder disfunction, were actually caused by temporary obstructions within the trapped part of my intestine. And because it had taken us so long to realize we had a 'real' problem, I was now in toxic shock.


After surgery, I was sent straight to SICU (Surgical Intensive Care Unit). They were unable to roll me from side to side - doing so would cause my blood pressure to drop - and I quickly developed a nasty bedsore (which later required surgery and negative-pressure "woundvac" therapy to heal). I was placed on a ventilator so my body wouldn't have to struggle to breathe - they wanted every ounce of energy my body had being used to heal itself.


My family spent a great deal of time in the waiting room outside the SICU. A physician called my mom back into the Unit, and pointed out to her that my left arm was swelling and turning black below the elbow. I had compartment syndrome, and if they didn't act quickly I may lose my arm. My mom authorized surgery again on my behalf, and an incision was made along my forearm which released the muscles in my arm. The incision was left open for several weeks while we waited for the swelling to minimize to a point where the skin could be closed again - we dodged a bullet, and I was sent back to the SICU.


During a routine exam as he made his rounds, the on-call physician pressed on my stomach. The incision was "oozing" what appeared to be the tube feedings that were being pumped into my intestine. Back to the OR we went. Once they opened me back up, they found that the part of my intestine they had repaired had died - turned black and completely fell apart. Again, the surgeons worked to repair my digestive system, and flush out the toxins that had filled my belly a second time. After surgery, the surgeon approached my family and could only shake his head and say "She's very sick." My family wanted to have me flown to a larger hospital in Dallas - my surgeon insisted I would not survive the flight.

When it was all said and done, I'd had a total of 7 operations including the removal of my spleen. I spent one day shy of 7 weeks in the hospital, laying flat on my back. Fortunately, after the paramedics left me in the ER, I don't remember very much. Unfortunately, what I DO remember is the hallucinations caused by the sedatives and high doses of pain medications they were giving me. And I can only say that those 7 weeks were a very dark time for me. Still now, two months after leaving the hospital, my mom and I discuss what happened and she tells me which of my "memories" are real and which were hallucinations. We exchange worries that I may become sick again (ridiculous as it sounds, every stomachache brings anxiety). We wonder what the long-term effects of my illness may be, especially in regards to having lost my spleen (higher risk of serious infections).


Without a doubt, we were blessed tenfold by the nursing staff that cared for me. Two weeks ago my mom and I went down to the hospital and visited each of the Units that I spent time in during my hospital stay. It was exciting to see all (but one) of my primary caregivers, and to have an opportunity to thank them for their efforts in keeping me alive. No one expected I would live. Twice I nearly died. But I'm here now because God wanted me to be here. It's sobering to think about how fast things happened in the beginning. I knew I was sick, but when I was being loaded into the ambulance it didn't even cross my mind that it may be the last time my children saw their mother. That I may not be around to see them graduate, get married, or start families of their own. These things happen to other people, but you never expect it could happen to you. What a reminder of how precious life is - how special each and every minute is! I'll sit and rock with my 2 year old now, and we color pictures while we watch Dora the Explorer (*grits my teeth*) together. What if that had been taken away from me - and from her? I'm so very thankful to God that he chose to let me have these moments now with my children.


That brings us current, minus a few details here and there. It was a stretch, but I decided to proceed with my plans to homeschool my oldest son this year. I don't have the energy to homeschool more than one child right now, so my youngest son is still in "regular" school. He's been having some behavioral issues that we're trying desperately to understand and get under control - once that happens, I would love to make the push to homeschool him as well. My daughter, well into her 2's now, is such a good baby. She self-entertains which is handy when I'm short on time, but also does a great job of entertaining the rest of the family! She's so funny, and doesn't even realize it. While she's too young for preschool still, she's very smart and a quick learner so I'm looking forward to seeing how she approaches formal education when the time is right.

It seems my Philosophy of Education is changing each day. Without fail, nothing goes as I've so carefully planned it, and I continue to find myself reevaluating my approach to homeschooling my children. We've severely relaxed our studies in both overall consumption and pace. Instead of doubling up on formal textbook subjects, I find myself looking for opportunities to turn our daily events into learning opportunities so we'll at least meet state requirements (thank you, Cub Scouts!). This won't last forever, because highly intellectual learning is still very much something I want for my children. But until I'm feeling better, it'll have to do. Going forward, my biggest hurdle will likely remain my resolution to perservere - the pressure is on (from my family) to give up my goals of homeschooling unless it is done according to their terms.