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Saturday, May 31st, 2008

Subject: This is insane Time: 5:02 pm. Mood: uncomfortable.

Northern Michigan is just one huge dendrological bukkake scene. Sorta unnerving.

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Subject: Match it for Pratchett! Time: 12:39 pm.

DISCLAIMER: this is not my idea, I got it from fastfwd's post here. For those of you that may not know, Terry Pratchett was diagnosed with early onset Alzheimer's in December of 2007. He has recently donated half a million pounds (that's $1 million to us non-limeys) to Alzheimer's Research Trust after learning that the money for Alzheimer's research is only 3% that of cancer research. Well, fastfwd came up with the idea to see if we can get enough people together to match it. It's only a few bucks, and he's got a lot of fans, so if we can get most of us to donate a couple bucks/pounds/yen/whatever, we'll be able to match his donation easily. So quit reading this, go donate a few bucks, and tell 'em it's in hono(u)r of Terry Pratchett.

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Subject: I suppose I should post this for posterity.... Time: 10:12 pm.

...or something like it. So, on Tuesday (11/27) at 10pm, the vomiting started. I've had food poisoning before, I've had a stomach bug before, and they both suck. This was, unfortunately, neither of those things. Every half-hour, I was up and running to the bathroom. After a few hours, "running" isn't really the word. "Walking a familiar path rapidly" would cover it much better. It was getting to the point that I was gulping water as quickly as I could just so I could have something to throw up, or I'd get the dry heaves. I hate the dry heaves. I actually found myself begging with my own stomach at some points, trying to convince it that I was done, man, that I had nothing else to give, that I was done. My stomach, as it turns out, is a jerk. Around 6:30am on Wednesday (11/28), Jess told me to check my blood sugar. I couldn't immediately because a) hello, vomiting profusely, and b) my testing kit was in the car. So she goes out to get it, and the battery is almost dead. Like...one test left in it. I swear, it was like in one of those really bad movies, where all you need is a small flame, and the trusty hero looks in his trusty pocket, and finds a trusty matchbook with only one single solitary match left. So she manages to get a finger stick going, and my blood sugar read 500+. For the uninitiated, normal is 75-125. I tell her that sounds a touch high, and could we try another test? She finds my backup meter, and is asking me how to work it, as if I can think beyond my ripped esophagus at this point. She figures out how to get the other one working, and it tests the same. So, the next step is to have me test my ketones. Basically, you pee on a stick and wait a bit (30-60s) to see what color it turns up; the darker it is, the worse your ketones. Mine went to deep purple immediately. This was, as Jess correctly guessed, a sure sign of diabetic ketoacidosis, or DKA. So the next words I heard were "get some clothes on, we're going to the hospital". I don't know how to explain it, but there was no WAY I could do a car trip to the hospital in that state. My body just wouldn't have made it. So I tell her, "Fuck that, call 911". Even in distress, I am eloquent as ever. 10-15 minutes later, I have a bunch of strangers in my home, poking, prodding, and strapping me down. Yes, yes, I know, it sounds like fun, but I assure you, it wasn't. See, now that I'm not drinking to keep myself vomiting (sounds weird when you type it out), my mouth was dry. Now, I don't mean "Hmmm...I could use a drink" dry, I mean, take the worst hangover you've ever had, and multiply it by 10. I swear to god, I'm not exaggerating here - I wish I were. All the vomiting had drained my body of any kind of moisture, even to the point of having no saliva. And, anyone who's had a hangover knows the headache that comes along with it. Yeah, multiply that too. It was insane, and this is coming from someone who has lived with headaches and migraines all his life. So we're driving down the road, and I'm begging for a drink. Anything, just a sip of water, just something to have in my mouth to alleviate the dryness. Nothing. The best they can do for me is hook up a saline drip. Mind you, they also have to ask me question after question after question: "What's your name? What's your birthdate? Where do you live? How old are you? What's your name?" and so on. Apparently, they do this to a) make sure that you're coherent and able to speak, and b) that you've got your story straight, and you're not trying to....I don't know, lie or something. The only problem was, I couldn't talk. My mouth was so dry, I could barely form words, and when I could, they were little more than a croak. Fun stuff. So I get to the hospital, IV in arm, saline going in. More doctors, more nurses, more questions, more begging for something to drink. The only thing there wasn't more of was liquids for me. They would NOT give me anything to drink. I think they wanted to get me stable before they gave me anything. It was that, or maybe it was the time I said "An emesis basin would be a *really* good idea right about now," and they barely managed to get me one in time. I finally convinced them to give me some ice chips, which helped. They helped infinitely more when Jess doused them and the inside of the cup with water from the tap. Over and over and over again. Yes, I know doctors are smart, and YES I know I'm not smarter than them or anything but screw THAT - I needed fluids. Didn't help much except for the time it was actually in my mouth; once I swallowed, my mouth was dry again. After a bit of time, I got moved up to the ICU (never been there, go me!) where I had a room to myself. More questions, more questions, more....damned....questions. I continue complaining about the state of my head, and they decide that I'm stable enough to do some pain management. They whip out the morphine to inject into the IV. I love my nurse. I wait about 30 minutes with no change. I love her significantly less now. I mention that it's just not working, and if they had any Imitrex, it might help. I'm a migraine sufferer and I know what works on my head pains. They decide to try Compazine first, a drug that has never, ever worked for me. At this point, the lovin' is gone, but they're doctors and nurses, and they have all the sharp things and good drugs, so I say very little. After that doesn't work, they move on to dilaudid. Sweet jesus, if you've ever had morphine or any kind of strong opiate before, this stuff is what morphine takes when it has a headache. For the next...12 hours? I think? I was in and out of consciousness, and when I was awake, I wasn't really...there. I couldn't use my legs properly, couldn't lift my head without dizziness, couldn't do much more than roll over. Which was good, because that's how I had to pee: rolled over, into a portable urinal. They wanted to tell the difference between what went in and what went out. There's a Douglas Adams joke in there about it being vitally important to get a receipt whenever you use the lavatory, but I'm not clever enough to make it. Anyway, once the drug wore off, I had another IV in my left arm, and several blood draws from the right. Honestly, the rest of Wednesday went by like a blur. Jess was there part of the time, but she had appointments to go to that couldn't be rescheduled (OB, VA, and others needed for the birth of our *next* child). Sid was being looked after by his grandmother Julie, who was an immense help in this time. Sometime during the afternoon, I got moved out of the ICU, and into a recovery room, which is a good sign, so I'm told. I ask if I can stop peeing in a plastic jug, as the novelty has sorta worn off. They say that no, I can't, because they want to see how much of the 15 liters they've put into my via IV is being retained. It only hits me later that they just told me I've had 4 gallons of saline shoved up my arms, and that's not even counting the potassium and magnesium they've been giving me to balance out my electrolytes. Holy. Christ. 4 gallons! It turns out I ended up "retaining" roughly 2 gallons. I mean, I needed it as a result of the profuse vomiting and DKA, but still. Damn. That night, I watched an episode of Survivor, and coincidence or causative factor, my migraine came back. Nothing they gave me worked, so eventually, I just went to sleep. I told the nurses to wake me up every 30-60 minutes to test my blood sugar, which made for shitty sleep, but allowed me to leave the next day, as I was told that if I could keep my numbers good, I could leave. The only issues with my blood sugars was earlier in the day when they gave me lunch, but still hadn't told me to reattach my insulin pump. Left hand, meet right hand, talk, get back to me. The upside from all of this is it's been a hell of a reality check. I know how bad it can be now, and I don't even think this was as bad as it gets. I could have lapsed into a coma if the vomiting had gone on a little bit longer. I've discovered that I am a huge fan of dilaudid. No, really. It's good stuff. And I got to meet my new endo and got a lead on a good GP/internal medicine doc. And...I smell fruity. No jokes, dammit - it's a side effect of DKA. It's weird. I'll update this if I remember any other details that I've forgotten. Oh, and here's a few images of my arms (I'm puffy still from all the fluids):

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Subject: The worst thing you'll ever read... Time: 2:53 am. Mood: exhausted.

...and it just happened to me. Like, 30 minutes ago. I don't know how to do an LJ cut, so you're all getting subjected to it. So as some of you may know, I've been given a prescription for valium for anxiety attacks. And, as some of you may know, valium can be taken recreationally. So, it being Friday, and me not having anything to do, I decided to take one at 11pm. I know, that's not why they've given to me, but screw it, I don't ever do that, really, and just felt like it. So, around 12am (I think), I started getting drowsy while watching TV, so I zoned out. Around 1:30am, I wake up with a weird ear sensation. You know that feeling when you have an earache, but you know if you pop your ears, it'll feel better? That feeling you get right before it pops is what I was feeling. Quite peculiar. So I'm sorta pulling on my earlobe, moving my ear around, trying to get get the sensation to go away. After about 10 minutes, I decide to get up and see how my dad's computer rebuild is going. As I get to the table where he's working, my ear starts hurting. It's similar to the pain that happens when you have an ear infection flare up. So I'm still fiddling with my ear, trying to get it to pop or drain, just to release the pressure, when it hits. Pain like nothing I've felt before hits me in my ear. Touching it does nothing. NOT touching it does nothing. It comes and goes, and it seems independent of whether or not I'm standing, sitting, or moving. It's a weird sort of....fluttering or something, which can happen easily if something's touching the eardrum intermittently. Figure I just have an earwax buildup that's come loose or something. So I'm gripping this chair by where my dad's working on his PC, with my right ear downward, with me sorta hopping up and down, trying to dislodge whatever's there. It feels like water or something, like when you've been swimming, and it gets way up in your ear. The only problem is that the pain is getting worse and worse, and less dependent on ANYTHING that I'm doing. I simply cannot make the pain abate with any degree of success. Naturally, my dad's getting increasingly worried about me, as my pain level is growing exponentially. Pretty soon, I'm lying on the couch, curled into a painful fetal position, with a handful of the couch that I don't think will ever regain its natural shape again. He's telling me that we have to go to the hospital, as there's something that's obviously very wrong with me. I tell him to go get Jess, in a very pathetic "I want my mommy" sort of way. She's passed out, but apparently hit full wakefulness in what I hear is record time. So both my wife and my father have a flashlight (we don't own an otoscope) and are looking in my ear, trying to see just what the hell is going on with me. Dad says he can't see much, but thinks it looks like there's some sort of thread in there. Sounds weird to me, as there's no way I just crammed a spool of thread in my ear and forgot it. Jess tells me that it's possible that it's some sort of sequin-like thing from a shirt of hers, which I disagree with, as that particular shirt is nowhere in sight. Meanwhile, I'm actually yelling, screaming, and writhing on the couch, because - as I mentioned - I'm in the worst pain of my life. Dad's trying to hold me still, as Jess is still investigating my ear. At this point, all three of us have come to a sickening realization - there's something alive in my ear. That fluttering sensation I was talking about before? It was apparently actual fluttering. So Jess decides to get a pair of tweezers and some alcohol. We figure the alcohol can kill whatever is in there, and the tweezers can remove it. She gets me to lie on my side which is no small feat, as at this point, I should be recruited by the Olympic Writhing Team - I'd be their captain. Remember when I said this was the worst pain of my life? Yeah, well once the alcohol filled up my ear, step THAT shit up a notch. I think they actually had to hold me down. And to add insult to injury, it didn't kill whatever it was immediately. It took about 5 minutes for that thing to die, all the while, it's more or less thrashing around in my ear. Right up against my eardrum. After that passed, it was still sore, but it just felt like I had about 3 cotton balls stuffed in my ear. Jess is fiddling (very carefully and considerately, I must say) in my ear with the tweezers, and manages to move something in there. I gasp, so she stops, but resumes whenever I say I'm ready. She has me lie down again (as I had sat up) and asks "Ready?" I say that I am, and she reaches in there, grabs whatever it is, and pulls. There's actually a "pop" as it's pulled out of my ear. I know this both because I can hear it (obviously) and because my father says he could hear it. It was a roach. An inch-long motherfucking roach. In my ear. Sweet jesus. It turns out that the movement of my jaw and the pulling on the earlobe only served to open the ear canal and allowed it to burrow further. Yes, the fact that I had something BURROWING in my fucking EAR is making me shudder even as I type it. After irrigating my ear with some more alcohol (which was painful as well), they put the roach in alcohol, so I can show it to the doctor on Monday. You know...when I was a kid, the two fears I had were needles and roaches. So I end up a diabetic and get a roach stuck in my ear. I must have REALLY pissed someone off in a previous life or something. Good god, I'm going to sleep now.

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Subject: Damn it Time: 5:20 pm. Mood: worried.

Today, Jess took one of our cats to the vet for the third time in about 2 weeks. Poor thing's not been eating, and keeps vomiting all over the place. Which is a neat trick when you don't eat. The first few times, we thought she had a UTI, and the doc gave her antibiotics and a pain killer. Well, last night, I found 2 largish puddles of a pink liquid. Jess gathered it up in a syringe, and it turns out that yeah, it was blood. Let me repeat that: my cat is puking blood. I'm not happy about this. They run some tests on her, and it turns out that her kidneys aren't working as well as they should, partially because she's dehydrated. Which is weird because, even though it's hotter than hell here in Florida, they've ALWAYS got water. The doc said her platelet count is low as well, which is what's really worrying Jess. Kidney problems can be resolved just because she's a young cat, and hydration could fix the issue, but a low platelet count points to one thing right now: feline leukemia. We had her screened for that when we got her, but as the doc said (and we already knew), screening can't catch EVERY strain. If you don't know, there isn't a damned thing you can do with a cat that has feline leukemia, other than make her comfortable. They could live a few more years or a few more months, and it is, in Jess' words, "a horrible way for a cat to go." I don't want my cat to die. Out of all four of them, she's the one that's NOT overweight, and shouldn't be having this issue. We should have more information tomorrow.

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Subject: Two posts, one day? What the hell? Time: 8:53 pm. Mood: happy.

Yeah, I know, I never update. Must be the Zoloft. Yeah...for those of you who didn't know, I'm on Zoloft now. Have been for about a month. Gotta be honest, I haven't felt this good in 10 years. Maybe longer. It's hard to describe to people who don't need it, because you people feel this way normally. If you've ever had MDMA, it functions by dumping all the serotonin in your brain at once, inducing a euphoric state. Well, Zoloft is considered a Selective Serotonin Re-uptake Inhibitor (SSRI) - much like Prozac and Paxil and such. It does just what its name implies - it keeps the serotonin in my brain for longer than it normally would. This induces a feeling that is VERY similar to a low dose of MDMA (or so I'm told, *cough*). In other words, it keeps me in a good mood. It's so great. =) Doc also gave me a prescription of Xanax for the times when stress gets too great and I feel an anxiety attack coming on. They're not often, but they really suck when they happen. Well, I took one at work about 2 weeks ago. Knocked me out. Almost completely. As in, I was passed out at my desk. So, while it did the job of neutralizing the anxiety attack, it did so too effectively. So, I called the doctor's office, and told them. They were completely unsurprised, as drugs that affect the brain are really a kind of experiment on what works for you. There's no hard and fast rule, really. So they said they'd switch me to Valium, lowest dose they have. Well, yesterday, I had cause to take one. Things at work were just freaking intense, which is great, because it gives me focus, but not so great, as it was just a touch TOO intense. So, as per the doc's orders, I took a Valium. 15 minutes later, in the middle of a conversation, I sorta stopped being able to think. My co-worker knew what was up and just started laughing at me. So after a few minutes, the feeling's just getting more and more intense, and in the middle of it, I realized I was thirsty. So I get up and start walking to the break room, and can't stop giggling because the simple act of walking is such a Herculean effort. Once I get to the break room, I get some water, and two other co-workers ask me if I'm ok. My response, if I remember correctly was (giggling all the while), "I'm high as a kite. How are you?" That got me some strange looks. =) Luckily the effects reach peak efficacy after an hour, then start to recede. Did a little investigating after that, because it was just nuts. Turns out the lowest dose they give for Valium is 2.5mg. I had 10mg pills. Well. That explains some things. Anyway...that's my life in a nutshell right about now. Sidney's crawling all over the place and is about to start cruising. We're so screwed. =) Check out the pics and videos here.

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Subject: w00t! Time: 8:43 pm. Mood: rejuvenated.

Got my first kimora today. And for once, I got someone in an armbar rather than getting caught in one. Of course, he escaped, but it's a first step, right? I, unfortunately, got picked up and slammed because as teach says, "all you newbies are retarded. If you're being picked up, LET GO. Don't try to hold on!" So...yeah. The best lessons are the ones you feel for days afterwards. I learned a few lessons tonight. I must be a masochist, because getting my ass thoroughly handed to me every other day is actually fun. =)

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Subject: Fuck yeah Time: 7:14 pm. Mood: energetic.

Bloody nose? Check. Kick to the eye? Check. Drilled in the groin about 3 times? Check. Fell on my (fucked up) shoulders a few times? Check. Massive amounts of enjoyment? Abso-fucking-lutely CHECK.

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Time: 12:06 am.

Your LJ Crew of your Federation Ship LiveJournal Username What is the name of your ship? What is the class of your ship? AkiraAmbassadorConstellationConstitutionExcelsiorGalaxyHopeIntrepidMirandaNebulaNew OrleansSovereign How long is your mission? What's your favorite series? Star Trek: TOSStar Trek: The animated seriesStar Trek: TNGStar Trek: DS9Star Trek: VoyagerStar Trek: Enterprise First Officer erica057 Chief Security Officer andjay Chief Operations Officer andjay Chief Engineering Officer andjay Chief Medical Officer tww1fa Ship's Counselor elfieodette Chief Science Officer notadora Transporter Chief tww1fa Fun Quizzes by Sylvan at BlogQuiz.Net Pisces Horoscope at DailyHoroscopes.Biz Sweet jesus, we're all going to die.

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Time: 4:03 pm.

Dear Santa... Dear Santa, This year I've been busy! In March I turned wesa in for tearing the tag off a mattress (3 points). In November I ruled Canada as a kind and benevolent dictator (700 points). In October I gave brother_blaze a kidney (1000 points). Last month I gave crossbelt a life-saving blood transfusion (50 points). In January I set kandangel's puppy on fire (-66 points). Overall, I've been nice (1687 points). For Christmas I deserve a new bike! Sincerely, Spazholio Write your letter to Santa! Enter your LJ username: Hrmph. I don't even LIKE bikes....

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Subject: Fridge Magnets + Camera Phone = Poetry Porn Time: 1:43 pm. Mood: productive.

In other news, 2 posts in a day, what the fuck?

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Subject: Despair, Inc > everything Time: 11:19 am. Mood: cheerful.

They just released 4 more. Check 'em out here.

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Subject: It's a boy! Time: 9:45 am. Mood: happy.

Well, yesterday, Jess and I had our first ultrasound, and as you probably guessed from the title, it's a boy! Pics here! We've decided to name him Sidney Collen (Colin? We never discussed spelling...) Martin. Sidney is the name of my grandfather, a man who died a few years ago who was very special to me, and Collen is very close to Jess' maiden name. We'll be doing a baby registry in the near future at Babies'R'Us, which is hosted by Amazon, which means you can browse the registry online! Lucky you, now you have no excuse to not buy us stuff! =)

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