Dear Agony,
Just let go of me(her)
Suffer Slowly
Is this the way it's got to be?
Don't bury me
Faceless enemy
- Dear Agony, Breaking Benjamin
This is Liz's anthem. Let me define powerless to you. I thought at one point I knew what it was. I thought that watching my job fade, taking a pay cut or two, etc was what it felt like to be powerless. I had no idea. Powerless is watching your spouse roll on the floor screaming. Begging for mercy. Praying for relief. Pounding the floor, changing positions every 45 seconds. Watching, and not being able to do a dang thing.
She's been in pain for about two months now, manageable pain. Thursday the pain went thru the roof. Screaming, cursing, begging, pleading, crying. It was horrible. It went on for 18 hours. at about 5:30am on Friday we decided to go to the ER. We called my mom, she drove up and met us at the ER to pick Juliet up. We got admitted, where they started giving Liz morphine immediatly. Of course, since she is pregnant, the good narcotics are big no-no's. So, every two hours she was getting a shot of morphine. That was good and all, but it is definitly not sustainable. So shes out of pain for two hours, but what are we going to do at home? I can't give her a shot of morphine. Eventually they kept us overnight, for observation. We saw 8 different pain specialists in about 8 hours. I've had more intelligent farts than what they were willing to offer us. My favorite part is how each of them feels the need to grab Liz's leg and yank it around, poke her back, ask where it hurts. It's like "hey retard, this has been done about 17 times the last two months. The results haven't changed. Read that big red chart in your hand deuchebag." It took some begging, and a little complaining, but eventually we got a PA who actually listened, and helped us decide on a course of action. She got a different pain management specialist in, who actually listened. Listened, sympathized, and cared for Liz. We loved him. I almost hugged him when he said he would do anything he could to help us, write whatever prescriptions he could, etc. It was awesome. So raise your glass to Dr. Sean M. Conroy, I'll have a drink on you, pal!
Here's where we are now:
They tried MS Conton for 24 hours. That was a joke.
They are trying Methadone now. It's already a joke.
These are 12 hour pills, so about 4 hours in, Liz is rolling around in her gurney, and we always end up paging the nurse begging for something. So, they are keeping us tonight as well. They have her now on some other pain med, with an oral steroid, and an oral morphine. What's scary, and what sucks, is all these med's are FDA 'C'. That means they have either never been tested on humans, or in lab rat tests have shown adverse effects on fetus's, but the OB, the Pain guy, and the nurse all feel confident that since we are in the second trimester, it's safe to take them. Our little guy has developed everything, and the ultrasound a week ago looked great. Now he's just growing.
I mean, what do you do? Tell liz to bite a stick for four months? That's unrealistic. Finally we got the OB & Dr. Conroy together today, and thet decided that after they do the Epideral tomorrow AM, if there is no change, we will start seriously considering surgery. Which both of us are hoping for. There are risks, but we need to get this figured out for poor Liz.
Where do we go? Epideral tomorrow. Hopefully get discharged afterwards. Otherwise it could be more time in Hotel Troy. We just don't have any answers yet...
Sunday, February 28, 2010
Thursday, February 25, 2010
Dear Agony
I heard this song this morning and it made me think of my wife. So, I dedicate this song to her.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IbPuTwo1bxs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IbPuTwo1bxs
Friday, February 19, 2010
Stupidity
I am blown away lately by the decision making that has surrounded me. I see stupidity infiltrating every level of my surroundings. Sometimes I just want to ask them "oh, I'm sorry, I couldn't hear you because your head is so far up your ass, would you care to repeat yourself?"
It's like, do you care to think thru your decisions a bit more? No, well than let me know before you make your next stupid move so I can get my rear end out of the way before the poo-poo storm rains down on us all. I mean, haven't you learned from your mistakes before? No? Really? Care for me to re-live them for you? You Retard(s).
It's like, do you care to think thru your decisions a bit more? No, well than let me know before you make your next stupid move so I can get my rear end out of the way before the poo-poo storm rains down on us all. I mean, haven't you learned from your mistakes before? No? Really? Care for me to re-live them for you? You Retard(s).
Wednesday, February 10, 2010
Day #43
Day #43. Biblical time of testing is 40 days. I have a feeling this one isn't going by the book. We are off the script now.
Liz and the baby are in Lansing. Her parents and sisters were generous enough to volunteer to help this week. We have been immensly blessed so far by all the family members who have stepped up and offered to help us out with Liz and the baby. It's been really great to have such a huge outpouring of care.
Even though it's great to have people offer to help, it's getting really old not seeing my daughter or wife anymore. I miss having them around. Once you have been married for awhile, sometimes when you have the house to yourself for a night, you enjoy the break. You stay up a bit later, watch whatever YOU want on TV, drink a few beers, it's kind of fun. The second night you attempt another dose of the single life, which doesn't taste quite as good, and by the third night, it's like swallowing a bitter pill. I'm just lonely. I don't sleep without my daughter in the other room.
I hate when my wife hogs the bed, or rips the covers off of me, but right now, I would kill to have her do that again.
I am now on day #13 of singleness. It's really not cool anymore. I'm ready to stop walking around in my boxers already.
I'm working midnights right now, which means I go to work at 9pm, get home around 7 or 8 am, and crash until roughly 4pm. That means you are a giant worthless turd for the duration of the daylight hours. I feel like the time flys by, and I don't know if I am coming or going. At least if the family was here I could spend some QT with them. I need to stop complaining. At least I have a job, thank you Jesus.
I realize this doesn't read very smoothly, I apologize. Look at the time I am posting this. At this time of night/morning I can only generate cognitive sentences. My ability to generate paragraphs departed around 1am.
Thanks for keeping us in your prayers. We need them.
Liz and the baby are in Lansing. Her parents and sisters were generous enough to volunteer to help this week. We have been immensly blessed so far by all the family members who have stepped up and offered to help us out with Liz and the baby. It's been really great to have such a huge outpouring of care.
Even though it's great to have people offer to help, it's getting really old not seeing my daughter or wife anymore. I miss having them around. Once you have been married for awhile, sometimes when you have the house to yourself for a night, you enjoy the break. You stay up a bit later, watch whatever YOU want on TV, drink a few beers, it's kind of fun. The second night you attempt another dose of the single life, which doesn't taste quite as good, and by the third night, it's like swallowing a bitter pill. I'm just lonely. I don't sleep without my daughter in the other room.
I hate when my wife hogs the bed, or rips the covers off of me, but right now, I would kill to have her do that again.
I am now on day #13 of singleness. It's really not cool anymore. I'm ready to stop walking around in my boxers already.
I'm working midnights right now, which means I go to work at 9pm, get home around 7 or 8 am, and crash until roughly 4pm. That means you are a giant worthless turd for the duration of the daylight hours. I feel like the time flys by, and I don't know if I am coming or going. At least if the family was here I could spend some QT with them. I need to stop complaining. At least I have a job, thank you Jesus.
I realize this doesn't read very smoothly, I apologize. Look at the time I am posting this. At this time of night/morning I can only generate cognitive sentences. My ability to generate paragraphs departed around 1am.
Thanks for keeping us in your prayers. We need them.
Friday, February 5, 2010
Lesson's I (We) are learning - Day #37
It's now been 37 days since Liz first ruptured the disk in her back.
37 days since she has slept through the night.
37 days since she has walked to the bathroom, kitchen, bedroom, laundry room, etc. without bending over and nearly collapsing.
37 days since she was pain free.
37 days since things were last 'normal'.
Since this whole journey started we have seen 6 seperate doctors in two different cities 95 miles apart. We have seen:
The OB.
Family physician
Back Specialist
Pain Management Specialist
Osteopathic spinal manipulator
Physical Therapist
Spinal Neurosurgeon (Jack Shepherd)
Wait that's 7 doctors...
Liz has been poked, prodded, stretched and yanked in so many different ways, it seems almost comical when we go to a new doctor, because I just want to say, 'uh, excuse me, but this hasn't worked the last five times, let's try something new'.
The final diagnosis is that she has severly ruptured her L4/L5 disc in her back, causing her Sciatica Nerve to pinch which in turn atrophe's the muscles surrounding it causing spasm's of intense pain and general numbness down her right leg. Vicadin doesn't help cut the pain anymore. Tylenol is a joke, and we can't take anti-inflammatory's because of the risk to our baby in her belly. We can't do surgery either, because she is pregnant and spontaneous abortions are a serious risk for this type of surgery.
The Neurosurgeon's (Jack Shepherd) exact words to her on Monday morning were 'you are between a rock and a hard place. It's not going to be easy'. How is that for comfort? That's like saying, uh, your life is going to suck for awhile.
Our plan currently is to have a C-Section birth for baby numero dos, and 4 weeks later, Liz will go back under the knife for a Spinal Disk Fusion, where they will build a mechanical cage around her L4/L5 disc's so they can't rupture again. That is a 2-3 month recovery time. If you do the math out, it's looking like couch/bed rest for the duration of 2010. At least the fun parts of 2010.
Even in this situation, despite all the tears Liz and I have shed together, she has such a great attitude. She is still able to laugh, able to joke with me. I can't honestly say that if it was me, my attitude would be that good. Hell, my attitude sucks sometimes, and I can stand up whenever i want. Liz said to me the other day: "sometimes I hear someone complain, and i get so frustrated because they don't even understand, I would kill to have that problem. When this all goes away, and things go back to normal, I am going to remember how thankful I am for the little things"
Is that what you want to teach us God? Thankfulness? Submission to you? Reliance on you? Trust? Faith?
Can we stop learning lesson's the hard way please? It's our prayer that thru this extremely trying portion of life, we would be able to glorify God, and somehow use this experience to minister to someone down the line. We have no idea where God is taking this one, and we still can't see the light at the end of the tunnel. Sometimes I wonder if the tunnel is caving in, pray for us to Trust God.
37 days since she has slept through the night.
37 days since she has walked to the bathroom, kitchen, bedroom, laundry room, etc. without bending over and nearly collapsing.
37 days since she was pain free.
37 days since things were last 'normal'.
Since this whole journey started we have seen 6 seperate doctors in two different cities 95 miles apart. We have seen:
The OB.
Family physician
Back Specialist
Pain Management Specialist
Osteopathic spinal manipulator
Physical Therapist
Spinal Neurosurgeon (Jack Shepherd)
Wait that's 7 doctors...
Liz has been poked, prodded, stretched and yanked in so many different ways, it seems almost comical when we go to a new doctor, because I just want to say, 'uh, excuse me, but this hasn't worked the last five times, let's try something new'.
The final diagnosis is that she has severly ruptured her L4/L5 disc in her back, causing her Sciatica Nerve to pinch which in turn atrophe's the muscles surrounding it causing spasm's of intense pain and general numbness down her right leg. Vicadin doesn't help cut the pain anymore. Tylenol is a joke, and we can't take anti-inflammatory's because of the risk to our baby in her belly. We can't do surgery either, because she is pregnant and spontaneous abortions are a serious risk for this type of surgery.
The Neurosurgeon's (Jack Shepherd) exact words to her on Monday morning were 'you are between a rock and a hard place. It's not going to be easy'. How is that for comfort? That's like saying, uh, your life is going to suck for awhile.
Our plan currently is to have a C-Section birth for baby numero dos, and 4 weeks later, Liz will go back under the knife for a Spinal Disk Fusion, where they will build a mechanical cage around her L4/L5 disc's so they can't rupture again. That is a 2-3 month recovery time. If you do the math out, it's looking like couch/bed rest for the duration of 2010. At least the fun parts of 2010.
Even in this situation, despite all the tears Liz and I have shed together, she has such a great attitude. She is still able to laugh, able to joke with me. I can't honestly say that if it was me, my attitude would be that good. Hell, my attitude sucks sometimes, and I can stand up whenever i want. Liz said to me the other day: "sometimes I hear someone complain, and i get so frustrated because they don't even understand, I would kill to have that problem. When this all goes away, and things go back to normal, I am going to remember how thankful I am for the little things"
Is that what you want to teach us God? Thankfulness? Submission to you? Reliance on you? Trust? Faith?
Can we stop learning lesson's the hard way please? It's our prayer that thru this extremely trying portion of life, we would be able to glorify God, and somehow use this experience to minister to someone down the line. We have no idea where God is taking this one, and we still can't see the light at the end of the tunnel. Sometimes I wonder if the tunnel is caving in, pray for us to Trust God.
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