Scary stuff (or for those who care at all)
On Jan. 4th, I took GGT's advice and went to the doctor! Yeah, I know, I am worse than a man about going to doctors!He plopped my ass in a hospital bed, here in BFE, on Jan. 5th, when he discovered I weighed a whopping 65 pounds, where I continued to slide downhill. I was life flighted to Casper on Jan. 6th. Much of the following is from Mommymunchkin, The Kid, and various medical professionals, since I don't remember much from the first part of Jan. I remember bits and pieces of the critical care floor. I do know I was there for 3 days, and was a complete mess. Then they moved me to the medical floor. While there, I had various tests and scopes and x-rays and scans...all to no avail! On the 20th, I all of a sudden gained 25 pounds, all fluid around my legs and belly. I looked like hell, and felt worse yet. (The Kid said I waddled/waded/sloshed when I tried to walk on the 23rd.
) I guess, I really don't remember them being there that day, I told Mom and Kid to go ahead and come home that night, since I was up and walking and doing ok. Mom got a call about 4:30 Monday afternoon telling her to get her ass back to Casper as they had put me in ICU and I was not expected to be alive in the morning. I spent 3 days in ICU, none of which I remember. They drained 25 liters of fluid off me! I also had pneumonia, probably from the fluid pushing up from below, since I had just had a pneumonia shot on the 20th, and my lungs sounded good and clear on the 23rd. I also had a bacterial blood infection, but not the normal one that sweeps thru hospitals, so part of the reason for ICU was to isolate me. It was during this time I had my psychotic break with reality. I had some crazy assed dreams, like some rogue church was using me for experiments and shit like that!
After they released me from there, I went back to critical care floor for either 5 or 6 days, not sure which. They had me pretty drugged up at the time, so my recollection is a bit dim! (Fentanyl is a wonder drug, along with morphine and vicodin, all mixed together at times!They had me on some kind of anti-psychotic drug, but I am not sure what it was.
On either Jan. 31st or Feb. 1, they moved me back to medical. They began re-running tests and scans and scopes and x-rays. (Yay for doctors who refuse to quit!) On Feb. 3rd, they finally had a diagnosis! Yes GGT...YOU WERE RIGHT! I have managed, over 31 years, to drink/drug myself into a pancreatic failure. It is treated by enzyme pills, and insulin if needed. The pancreas is a wonderful organ...it helps digest food so it can be absorbed into the system, and it produces insulin and keeps your blood glucose levels in line where they should be! I seem to respond well to the enzyme pills, and am now proud to say I am up to about 86 pounds!
In my case, I seem to produce enough insulin for daily life, right up until the late hour of about midnight, then my blood glucose soars out of sight. I am currently only taking "rescue" insulin before bed, altho that may change in the future. I am also at a higher risk of pancreatic cancer, which might explain the earlier scare, so have to go be retested every 6 to 8 months.
The same day, I suddenly developed a "heart murmur" that the doctor wanted checked out. They scoped that on the 4th, and came back with a clean heart bill of health!I tried to tell the doctor that in times of medical or physical stress, I have had this all my life, but she was worried, so now we all know my heart looks "normal".
I was released on Sat. morning, Feb. 5th!
The other good thing about all this is, even with 31 years of smoking, my lungs don't look or sound too bad. My blood/oxygen level runs between 90% and 98%! One doc showed Mom and Kid my chest x-rays, while I was in ICU. He was amazed I was a "current" smoker, since, altho there was some scarring, my lungs looked very much like someone's who had quit 10+ years ago!
Luckily for me, Wyoming has a program where, if you are hospitalized for a month continuously, Medicaid will kick in and either help with or pay the bill. Since I am sure I owe Wyoming Medical Center, including life-flight, doctors, drugs, scans, scopes, x-rays and various and sundry other crap like the $3 box of rough kleenes, right around $1,000,000. Yep folks, you read that right! I haven't even been opening the bills, since I opened the life-flight one and it was $18,811.36. That almost gave me a heart attack, so quit looking for the moment. If Medicaid doesn't kick in for me, I will have to file medical bankruptcy, but not until they are done with all the follow-up visits and such. I should also have an MRI scheduled in the next couple of weeks, to check on my back! Hell's bells, might as well get it all done at once. One of the docs told me Sat. morning, well, we can schedule it for Mon. morning if you just want to stay over til then. Unfortunately, the weather sucked and my ride was already on the way!
What did I learn thru all this. Very simply...appreciate your friends and neighbors, you never know when you might need them. One lady here in the apartment building, who lives on SS, gave Mom a check for incidentals and gas in the amount of $200. One of the business owners gave Mom $200 cash for "whatever" and told her her bill at the store was "paid in full"...she owed over $100! Her boss let her have any day off she wanted/needed to be with me, with the agreement of the board of directors that Mom can make up any missed time as she can, so she doesn't lose any needed funds. Someone, I have no idea who, paid my rent for the next 3 months!
What else did I learn. Nurses are fabulous! Sure, you get a bad one once in a while, but I never did, in 31 days! Nurses are cursed at, yelled at for being 30 seconds late with meds, and generally treated like slaves...get me this, get me that, so this, do that. I tried to be my normal, easy-going, polite self, and say please and thank you. I must have done something right because, before I left, all of them had come to see me, hug me, and tell me they wished more patients were like me.
Sooo, no more Rule 12 violations for Munchkin, no more cigarettes for Munchkin...awww hell, they took away all my vices in a 1 month span of time!
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Originally Posted by Steely Glint
The bill for my dad was equally disastrous 
