A New Journey In My Life
Wow, I can't believe my blog is still here! I have been following a blog about the daughter of a very good friend who has RSD and is in a Ketamine coma with hopes of curing it. I pray that it works.
Speaking of chronic illnesses, I was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis just over a year ago. It has been a difficult journey. Most of last year was spent in and out of the hospital for "non-MS" surgeries and illnesses. It started with all kinds of testing with the wonderful doctors I worked with at the MS Center (yes, I was actually working in MS Research prior to my diagnosis). Once they got me to the point of diagnosis, Dr. Riskind suggested I go to Beth Israel Hospital in Boston to a neurologist with whom he used to work. She diagnosed me with Primary Progressive MS. Sadly, there is no treatment for this type of MS. She had me do a 9 day course of steroids to see if it helped, but it didn't. During the steroids, I started getting this lower abdominal pain. I thought it was just from the steroids. I also developed a cough, so I went to the ED and a very estute doctor was more concerned about my belly pain. It ended up being diverticulitis. So began the new year. I think I was in for about a week for that one. My liver enzymes were extremely elevated too, but came down during my stay. About a month or so later, mom was here with me and about mid afternoon, I asked her to take me back to the ER because my pain was back. This time my enzymes were sky high again, and the surgeon said I needed to have the infected bowel removed. This was a 2 week stay with the worst pain I have ever had! So I came home to recover. Luckily I had retired on disability because I can't imagine having to miss so much work, so I guess it worked out for the best. So around June I think, I woke up with a sore throat, which got worse as the day progressed. By evening my temp was 102.5 and I was sooo sick. I guess when you have MS, any time you get sick it really knocks you out. My mom wanted me to go to the ER again, but I told her I was too sick. The next morning I managed to get myself downstairs to the couch, and when my mom came over, she picked up the phone and called 911. I have a raging fever and could hardly walk. Back to the hospital again and again admitted with a strep throat and elevated liver enzymes. Finally the doctor did an MRI and found my common bile duct was completely blocked, so they needed to do a simple proceedure called an ERCP. This is usually a day surgery type of proceedure where they put a little camera into your stomach and he put a stent into the duct, once he got it unblocked. Somehow, I managed to aspirate when he was taking out the tube, and I ended up in the intensive care unit on a respirator, with pneumonia! Not fun! I finally get released about a week later, back to my wonderful home to recuperate. I had one more ERCP about a month later to remove the stent, and thank God, it went perfectly. I have been out of the hospital since.
Wow, that was a long paragraph!! It's now 10:30 pm and I need to get to bed. I'll write more soon!
Speaking of chronic illnesses, I was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis just over a year ago. It has been a difficult journey. Most of last year was spent in and out of the hospital for "non-MS" surgeries and illnesses. It started with all kinds of testing with the wonderful doctors I worked with at the MS Center (yes, I was actually working in MS Research prior to my diagnosis). Once they got me to the point of diagnosis, Dr. Riskind suggested I go to Beth Israel Hospital in Boston to a neurologist with whom he used to work. She diagnosed me with Primary Progressive MS. Sadly, there is no treatment for this type of MS. She had me do a 9 day course of steroids to see if it helped, but it didn't. During the steroids, I started getting this lower abdominal pain. I thought it was just from the steroids. I also developed a cough, so I went to the ED and a very estute doctor was more concerned about my belly pain. It ended up being diverticulitis. So began the new year. I think I was in for about a week for that one. My liver enzymes were extremely elevated too, but came down during my stay. About a month or so later, mom was here with me and about mid afternoon, I asked her to take me back to the ER because my pain was back. This time my enzymes were sky high again, and the surgeon said I needed to have the infected bowel removed. This was a 2 week stay with the worst pain I have ever had! So I came home to recover. Luckily I had retired on disability because I can't imagine having to miss so much work, so I guess it worked out for the best. So around June I think, I woke up with a sore throat, which got worse as the day progressed. By evening my temp was 102.5 and I was sooo sick. I guess when you have MS, any time you get sick it really knocks you out. My mom wanted me to go to the ER again, but I told her I was too sick. The next morning I managed to get myself downstairs to the couch, and when my mom came over, she picked up the phone and called 911. I have a raging fever and could hardly walk. Back to the hospital again and again admitted with a strep throat and elevated liver enzymes. Finally the doctor did an MRI and found my common bile duct was completely blocked, so they needed to do a simple proceedure called an ERCP. This is usually a day surgery type of proceedure where they put a little camera into your stomach and he put a stent into the duct, once he got it unblocked. Somehow, I managed to aspirate when he was taking out the tube, and I ended up in the intensive care unit on a respirator, with pneumonia! Not fun! I finally get released about a week later, back to my wonderful home to recuperate. I had one more ERCP about a month later to remove the stent, and thank God, it went perfectly. I have been out of the hospital since.
Wow, that was a long paragraph!! It's now 10:30 pm and I need to get to bed. I'll write more soon!
posted by Kathy at
7:08 PM
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