Diabetes, Bronchitis and Anemia
June 1, 2007
Post Op Day 32
My lungs are acting weird. When I breathe it feels like there’s a draft in my throat and my lungs kind of stutter. Then, last night at bed time I got a fever of 100.2. Ruht roh.
When they release you from the hospital after surgery, they go over the stuff that can happen in recovery and what to do about it. Since fever is one of the things that can indicate trouble, I was advised to take my temperature every day, which I’ve been diligent about. It’s never been over 98.9. I took some Tylenol and laid down. Half an hour later my temp had climbed up to 100.9! We were worried this might be pneumonia, and in any case, fever means infection somewhere.
So at 10 pm off we go to the local hospital emergency room. They did take the situation very seriously, did a very thorough job of evaluating me. They determined that I have some form of bronchitis. After the blood cultures, x-ray, EKG, CT scan they gave me an antibiotic IV, and sent us home at 2 am with a prescription for more. Today I have no fever and no headache but the lung stutter has turned into a cough.
Love,
Jinx
June 3, 2007
Post Op Day 34
This bronchitis is the pits. I have a fever of 101 right now. I’ve been having long spells of a dry cough, like spasms, so my abdominal muscles are killing me and my throat hurts. I’m having the weakest day ever since coming home from surgery. My legs have revolted and won’t take me where I want to go unless I use the quad cane or walker. I could no sooner walk a quarter of a mile than I could fly to the moon. The insomnia is back.
Good news includes fine blood glucose levels, well within the normal range, no insulin shots required. I also have an appointment with my primary care doc tomorrow. I want to know if my steroid-induced diabetes means that now that I’m off steroids, am I no longer diabetic? I was told to weigh myself every day since steroids make some people gain weight. I’ve gained only three pounds since I got home May 7th. Blood pressure has been great. My pulse rate is always high-ish though; 104 at the moment.
Love,
Jinx
June 4, 2007
Post Op Day 35
We went to my primary care doc, Dr. C., and just as we thought, since I am no longer on steroids I am no longer a diabetic!
And the reason I’ve been so weak these last few days? It’s from the anemia! And why do I have anemia? The surgery! The good news is it should be gone in about a month.
Dr. C. said my weakness is definitely exacerbated by how quickly I was weaned off the steroid by Dr. M, and he wanted to put me back on them to be weaned at a slower pace. Neither Brand nor I liked the sound of that (steroids make me wacky). We’ll probably revisit the issue when I go back to see him on Friday to check on the progress of this bronchitis. I have a fever of 101.2 at the moment.
My psychiatrist, Dr. J., has a new plan to address the insomnia and it sound like a good one. Both doctors told me to “take it really easy” for the next couple of weeks. Take naps if I need them, don’t do anything strenuous, just rest, rest, rest.
Thank you reading my recovery blog. Love, Jinx
June 7, 2007
Post Op Day 38
It’s been a tough couple of days. The bronchitis has my fever ranging from 100.2 to 102.2, so I’ve had a constant fever for six days now. My coughing spasms are also almost constant, which makes it very difficult to speak. And the headache’s back, too.
Brand has noticed that my bronchitis symptoms align perfectly with the list of side effects for my anti-psych drug, Zyprexa, dosage of which was just doubled on Monday as part of the anti-insomnia plan; the fever, the coughing, the rigid neck. So do I have “some form of bronchitis” or am I taking too much Zyprexa? Brand called Dr. J. and they agreed to cut back to our original dosage and address the insomnia another way. We’ll be seeing our primary care doc, Dr C., tomorrow as a follow-up on the bronchitis-or-not-bronchitis.
Okay, there’s always a bright side. ONE: I finally slept! It wasn’t eight hours straight but ultimately it added up to eight. Also, TWO: Brand did not return to work today as planned. I’m just way too feverish and sick for him to just leave me here all day alone. And THREE: I got a package from Amazon:
Books: “Art Forms in the Plant World", “Art Forms from the Ocean ", “Visions of Science: The Art And Science of Ernst Haeckel" (my hero).
CD’s: “The very best of Cream", “The best of the Doors", “The best of Jimi Hendrix", “Janis Joplin Greatest Hits", “The best of The Pretenders", “Missundaztood by Pink" (LOVE IT!) and “The White Stripes" WHO I LOOOVE and I played them all really loud.
Here are some pix of me in some of my crazy headgear. With the exception of the tie dye hat, which is from my friend Karen, all the rest are recent eBay purchases!
That’s all for now, Have a rockin’ day! Love, Jinx
June 9, 2007
Post Op Day 40
Finally a strong day! My symptoms are better today. No fever at all, coughing has subsided I’d say 80%, no more sore throat, hooray! But I do have that stupid headache and rigid neck.
We told Dr. C. about the misdiagnosis of the MRI in 2003 and he was pretty shocked. All he got was the radiologist’s report which said everything was normal. He doesn’t get to see the films, only the report. We showed them to him and he said soberly, "There it is. They just missed it.". I wish I could scan the MRI for this blog so you could see how obvious the tumor was.
Love, Jinx
June 11, 2007
Post Op Day 42
Another strong-ish day! No sore throat. Legs are getting stronger. And I slept a full 8 hours! Wooo! Today is Brand's first full day back to work and we're both totally fine with it. That is, me being alone for nine hours for the very first time.
June 16, 2007
Post Op Day 47
As we sneak up on the seven-week anniversary since the surgery, blog updates will be fewer and you can assume my recovery is going well. This past week has had its ups and downs health-wise. The bronchial thing had me coughing and coughing and coughing non-stop. For the insomnia I’ve been on Ambien CR which has worked very well for me. I feel quite rested and refreshed. Because of the bronchitis I haven’t been feeling strong enough to take long walks yet – maybe next week.
I still struggle with memory problems. I told Brand that I’ve really got to call this friend of ours and thank her for volunteering to sit with me. I was worried because I had tried to get through to her number but kept getting a weird busy signal. Brand had to tell me that I had indeed talked to her already (“No I didn’t!”) just a few days ago, (“For real?”). He reminded me that I’d given up on the busy signal and just dialed her cell number. Then I remembered, Oh yeah, that had happened but I have no memory of the conversation except that Brand reminded me that she asked how he was doing, which I found very sweet. I really appreciate it when people remember that he's going through this too. Anyway, my memory needs help. I need to find out if it's from meds or from the surgery or what. I play word games to try and strengthen my memory but I should probably do more. I’ll ask Dr J. about it on Monday.
Brand worked the whole week and things really started to feel like they’re getting back to normal around here, though Clementine the cat and I really got used to having him home all the time. We missed him.
Take care of each other,
Love,
Jinx
June 19, 2007
Post Op Day 50
A friend of mine just had a biopsy done on her thyroid. She was elated when the test results indicated it was just a cyst (they'll just have to keep an eye on it). She said, "I told them about what happened to you and asked if they have two sets of eyes looking at these test results. They basically said they do random checks". I'm so glad that my experience has raised awareness about this issue. Asking questions like my friend did could help improve existing standard policies. (In my case, the neurosurgeon himself called the radiologist who missed the tumor in the 2003 CT scan.)
So far the Ambien CR is working very well. It's so great not to have insomnia! I'm still feeling some effects of the bronchitis, mainly that stubborn cough. But yesterday I went to an appointment without the aid of a cane or walker for the first time! I could tell I was ready and strong enough.
Have a rockin' day everyone.
Love, Jinx
June 23, 2007
Post Op Day 54
It was a beautiful day yesterday and I was feeling well enough to take a short walk all by myself for the first time. Although it was just up and down a couple of blocks it felt glorious to get some exercise and sun and fresh air. On the down side, I've had to work through a couple of minor anxiety episodes. Fortunately, I have meds for that.
My friend Carol asked, "Somewhere in your blog you remarked that you'd lost your sense of smell about 15 years ago ... When I read that I thought that perhaps that was from your tumor, that maybe that was your first clear sign of its existence." When I mentioned this to Brand, he reminded me that the type of tumor I had is called an olfactory groove meningioma. Once he reminded me I remember the neurosurgeon had called it that when he briefed us but I had since completely forgotten it. From a meningioma site: “Olfactory groove meningiomas grow along the nerves that run between the brain and the nose. These nerves allow you to smell, and so often tumors growing here cause loss of smell...They can grow to a large size prior to being diagnosed due to changes in the sense of smell and mental status changes being difficult to catch.” So that’s why I couldn’t smell all those years! During surgery they had to cut my olfactory nerves so I couldn’t smell before and I can’t smell now.
Here’s the event that serves as a marker for how I gauge the length of time I’ve been olfactorily challenged. In 1991 I was traveling around Russia with a group of colleagues. As we were boarding a small plane several people who had boarded ahead of me were coming back off the plane with their hand over their mouth. Not realizing what was going on, I got on the plane and asked one of de-boarders why she was getting off. “Are you serious? Don’t you smell that?”. No, I didn’t. Apparently several passengers on the flight before us had gotten air sick and the full air sick bags were still on the plane. I didn’t smell a thing.
Take care of each other, Love, Jinx
Questions and comments can be mailed to jinxgarza@comcast.net .
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