Note: This post contains medical stuff. If descriptions of symptoms or illnesses freak you out, I won’t mind if you stop reading now. 🙂

For the last week or so, Peter has been pretty sick with some abdominal/digestive issues. It would seem to get better, then get worse again, then better…but through it all, he was really miserable. This morning he woke me up at about 4:00am by collapsing onto the bed and groaning in agony, so it was pretty obvious that something was badly wrong.

I got out of bed and went to stand over him, and I swear, for a few seconds, I thought he was dead. Like, really, actually dead. His eyes were wide open, his lips were parted, and he was frozen — not moving, blinking, or even breathing. It scared the living shit out of me. Then he gasped, and I heaved the biggest internal sigh of relief in history, but when I bent down to feel his head (since he’d been running a fever off and on), he was cold and clammy.

Yep, time for a trip to the ER — or, as I like to call it, my vacation home.

He hemmed and hawed, but I got him into the car, and we made it to the hospital without incident. It had apparently been a slow night, and we got right into Triage and then back into one of the few actual rooms in the department.The on-duty doctor examined him, and because of the location and intensity of Peter’s pain, warned him that it might be one of several things, including appendicitis and diverticulitis.

They got him on a saline drip and brought in some contrast dye mixed into Crystal Light lemonade. By the look on Peter’s face, the “new and improved” flavoring method was less than ideal. He did get his first ever Morphine dose, though, and that was kinda fun to watch. 😉

After a couple of hours, he’s taken back for a CT scan. An hour or two after that, a doctor finally comes in and tells him that he indeed has diverticulitis, but that it’s apparently “perforated,” leaking air (and possibly infection) outside the colon. He’s put on various IV drips (including hefty antibiotics) and told to “rest” his colon — which means no food OR drink for at least 24 hours. A hospital stay is required, since we can’t do IV drips at home, and the first estimate we’re given is for a 24-hour stay.

At this point I have to come home to walk the dog, since it’s about 9:30am, and we don’t want her to explode. I gather up a few things to bring back to Peter (comfy clothes, iPad, chargers, earbuds, toothbrush, etc.), drive those over to him in the ER, and head back home for some much-needed sleep. Of course, by the time I’ve caught up with everything at my desk and have taken care of the critters (and myself), it’s noon. Thankfully, Lola was as tired as I was and we slept until about 4:00pm.

Up again, walked the monster again, then gather up a couple other things I though of and make another trip to the hospital. After I left him this morning, they moved him up to a room, which was nice…you don’t want to spend any more time in an ER than you have to. It’s just a miserable, uncomfortable place, no matter how awesome the staff are. I sat with him for a while, which was nice (well, y’know, as nice as sitting with someone in a hospital can be).

Another on-duty doctor came in to check on him and explain things a bit more while I was there, and she said that he’s looking at a 2- or 3-day stay, at least, to make sure the infection and inflammation are under control and that he doesn’t require surgery. She said that in a worst-case scenario, they would have to remove the affected portion of his colon, but depending on how he does on the IV medications, he might be ok with at-home medications, regular colonoscopies, and a diet change.

He’s still pretty uncomfortable, even with the occasional Morphine, although that does help him relax and rest a bit. I’m worried, of course, and Lola is just unsure about the whole thing and wondering where her Papa is. We decided that if I had to, I could smuggle a guinea pig in, but I think they’d notice if I tried to sneak a dog past the nurses. 🙂

I’ll keep everyone updated here when I can, but I’m posting updates on my Twitter feed as well. Please keep sending Peter your healing thoughts and positive vibes! We both appreciate them so much. <3

I know a lot of folks have been following @pasmith‘s updates on me during the last week. I know I’m always curious about what’s going on with my online friends, so I’m going to share the whole story with you guys, since I know some of you want to know, but would never ask. 🙂

Sometime around New Year’s Day, my right calf became painful and swollen. I’ve been diagnosed with fibromyalgia, so I just figured it was one more thing swelling and hurting…no big deal. The issue resolved on its own after a few days, and I went about life as normal.

Tuesday night, as I was heading to bed, I suddenly experienced incredible pain in my chest and shortness of breath. It came on so suddenly and was so intense that I was genuinely scared for my life. I sat on the edge of the bed for a minute, panting and clutching my chest, waiting for it to pass. I was eventually able to get enough breath to finish getting ready for bed, but the chest pain persisted.

I have to say, I played it off as “nothing.” I have enough wrong with me, dammit! I didn’t need one more thing added to the list. Besides, Peter was still laid up with gout and I wasn’t about to drive myself anywhere, lightheaded as I was. I was in full ostrich mode.

I dealt with the chest pain over the next day and a half, and it began to taper off. The shortness of breath persisted, and it remained at a pretty constant level after the initial attack. Walking across the room meant I’d be gasping for air by the time I got there. Peter wanted me to make an appointment with my PCP, and I hedged. I didn’t call her until the next day, the 7th, and her office immediately told me to go to the ER.

I was so sure it was nothing that I took the grocery list and a shopping bag with me, intending to pick up a few things on my way home.

The first thing they did once I got back into the wards was to give me a CT scan. After the doctor reviewed it, she came to me with an expression on her face that said she was about to tell me someone died. I’m pretty sure she thought it was me.

She proceeded to tell me that I had blood clots in my lungs (pulmonary embolism), and that she was amazed that I looked as good as I did for what she saw on that scan. She said that I would need to be admitted to the hospital for a few days for treatment and observation. Talk about unexpected! They started me on an IV anticoagulant. They wanted to transfer me to the University hospital in Worcester, though, since they didn’t have anyone on staff who could perform an emergency procedure if I were to throw another clot.

I stayed in the ER at the University hospital for about 24 hours. They did an ultrasound of my legs, during which they found the origin of the clot (deep-vein thrombosis, or DVT…you’ve heard it talked about on TV, I’m sure). An echo of my heart showed that it hadn’t been affected, which was great news. They finally had a room open up upstairs on my second night there, and I was whisked away from the chaos and clutter of the ER.

Long story just a little shorter, I spent another 48 hours in the hospital room, and they came to draw blood and take my vitals every few hours. During that time, my shortness of breath and chest pain eased and my blood oxygen level returned to its normal range. I was taught how to give myself anticoagulant injections in my belly (which totally sucks ass) and I’m on a varying dose of another anticoag, this time a pill, until the nurses at the Anticoagulation Clinic are satisfied with my bloodwork, and then I can stop the injections. They say I may need to be on the pill for as long as a year, and during that time I’m going to have to be extra careful around things that could bruise or cut me.

In the meantime, I have to undergo some medication changes to get off some drugs that might cause clotting. I foresee some suckage because of that in the future, but I’ll take it. By all accounts, I’m lucky to be here. The type of PE that I had — a large “saddle” embolus, which is a clot that settles in the area where the pulmonary artery splits off to go to the left and right lungs — is usually fatal, often within minutes of the onset of symptoms.

The moral of the story, kids, is that you should practice what you preach: You would want your loved one to go to the ER if they experienced chest pain and shortness of breath, right? No matter how much you think or hope that “it’s nothing,” it might not be. Get medical help right away and be sure to describe any unusual symptoms you may have had in the previous days or weeks.

In an ideal world, I would have called my doctor when my leg was swollen. They could have discovered the clot then and given me anticoags or “clot-busters” to prevent it from causing any serious damage. In a non-ideal but certainly smarter world, I would have called 911 when I had the chest pain and shortness of breath.

It is much, much better to be safe than sorry.