Hello. The last couple of months have been filled with spending lots of time at home. School from home. Kids spending lots of time with Grandma while my husband and I work. It actually has been a nice time to slow down a bit. As much as I miss people and social interaction. Yet at the same time I have felt just as busy as ever. Trying to do school at home for our daughter has been an interesting change. It’s been forcing me to do school work with our pre-kinder kiddo. So that’s an upside. It has definitely been a challenge adding teacher to my already diverse resume. No longer just a nurse, mom, wife, housekeeper, and chef. Now I can say I have experience as a teacher, PE coach, principal, and referee. Haha.
With all that said it’s even more interesting while experiencing all this COVID stuff as an inpatient in the hosptial. Today is Friday. On Wednesday afternoon I started having abdominal pain. Left work early and drove myself to the emergency room. I was really hoping it would pass so I sat in my car for about an hour and half to try to wait it out. Which was not working. So after 3 hours of intense pain I went in. I found it interesting they weren’t screening for or testing people for COVID upon entering. Nor were they offering people masks.
Anyway, sat in the lobby a couple of hours before being taken back. That was fun. Being in intense pain and vomiting in front of everybody in the lobby was a new experience for me.
Met the ED Dr who I had seen last year once for this same type of abdominal pain. So it was nice to see a familiar face of someone who I remembered liking in the past. Got worked up with labs, urine, IV, pain meds and a CT scan. Thank goodness for pain medication!! So they found a UTI but that doesn’t really explain this intense abdominal pain. So they decided to admit me under observation since I didn’t feel comfortable leaving. The pain medicine was working but once it wore off the pain would come right back. This is by far the longest this type of pain has ever lasted. Something has to be wrong. The CT didn’t show anything. Which I wasn’t surprised about. I mean it’s good it didn’t show anything but it would also be nice to have a definitive reason for this pain. So they admitted me. I had a consult with a general surgeon. There’s nothing they see wrong that requires surgical intervention. And the gastroenterologist said the same thing...nothing they feel they need to do right now. Especially since the pain was gone by the time I saw them. The good news is that now I’ve been established with both of these specialists so I can call them if I need to.
I just got discharged a couple of hours ago and it felt amazing to get home and take a hot shower. Kids are at Grandma’a house swimming so I have a little quiet time to myself to gather and compose my thoughts and feelings. It’s these moments when I have this extreme pain I completely regret having my stomach removed. I start thinking all the reasons I shouldn’t have done it. It doesn’t take me long to snap out of it as I know deep down I did the right thing by removing it. But I think it’s worth mentioning for any of you who might struggle with similar circumstances.
So now I’m home feeling ready to conquer the world. Haha. I feel really good right now. But I am forcing myself to rest and eat. I only ate a very small dinner in 24 hours. And then so far today I’ve only eaten 2 very small meals. It’s amazing how fast weight can drop off me these days if I miss a few meals. So wish me luck I’m that department.
