Mood:
downNow Playing: Day 640-The Final Road To Survival
One can never predict day to day nor hour to hour living with Gastroparesis. Since Gastroparesis causes severe nerve damage it can affect anything. Including your blood pressure and blood sugar levels. Today I got a grim reminder just how severe Gastroparesis truly is and how much worse the condition can progress leaving one vulnerable for anything.
Luckily starting today I now have help from a few great friends updating my blog just long enough until my brain recovers. This comes after the unthinkable happening this afternoon. I should had joined Pumpkin and just lounged around all day.
Instead it was time to do my Drano aka Hell-In-A-Jug treatment. I got up and started putting away my couchbed blankets and pillows. Everything 'seemed' A-OK until I felt myself getting dizzy then the last thing I remembered was losing my balance hitting the right side of my face and head on a wooden side table then seeing white. It felt like I broke my teeth then I heard a glass shattering noise in my head. What I realize now after almost blacking out was my blood pressure and blood sugar were low and with the table being within my reach I held onto something that wasn't stable. At the same time poor Oreo was jumping mid air onto the couch next to the table. I made a collision between a hard 50 pound fur pup's skull and a wooden table. I saw stars and went down. Within I felt was a few seconds I looked around the room and felt blood coming out of my nose. I reached back for the couch as Oreo sat next to me. I remember hearing my friend in the kitchen but I was still dazed and confused so it took me five minutes to just say their name. Once they came into the living room my friend panicked asking what the heck happened then ran to get some tissues for my nose. It was a funny story 'I thought' at the time but I was the only one laughing.
Later on as the day progressed I felt burning in my face and head. I also couldn't keep my balance. I couldn't breathe out of the right side of my nose either. The headache was horrible but dumb me kept moving around pretending like everything was OK. I did fine until around 6pm. Almost four hours after the fall my friend thought it was a good idea I get checked out. I refused to go to the hospital seeing I am so tired of emergency rooms and even with insurance its just too darn expensive. I agreed to be seen by the Urgent Care center down the street by my house. My friend was concerned because the right side of my face was becoming more swollen. I was also getting very tired which is unusual for me seeing it was only 6:30pm. Once we arrived at Urgent Care there were only two people ahead of us so we got back into a room within 15 minutes. The doctor was very concerned although he didn't want to push on my nose, face or head. He had me do some tests on my balance as well questions to see neurologically where I was at since hitting the table and Oreo's skull. Instead of just finding out if I had a broken nose I was told I needed to go to the nearest emergency room because he said, "There is something clearly going on neurologically with your brain."
My friend began to panic but I remained calm because all I wanted to do was go home, get some ice and lay down. Instead I was told the opposite which was not to use ice or lay down. So from a quick Urgent Care visit we headed up to the hospital. The doctor at the Urgent Care center had already placed a call with the hospital and faxed over the report and exam. We only waited around ten minutes then was quickly sent back to a room. The nurse came in and took my vitals then the doctor-Neurologist came back to see me. After tests and going over everything the reason I was so tired, confused, dizzy, burning and having ear pressure with a horrible headache was because I have a concussion. YIKES! I must had hit the wooden table on the corner so its no wonder my nose is swollen and feels like bone protruding. I also hit that side of my head on a 50 pound fur kids skull as he was jumping mid air then hit my right ear with both his skull and table. I am lucky she said it wasn't worse because some people with low blood pressure and low blood sugar problems black out then go into a coma. DOUBLE YIKES! Instead I realized I was blacking out because I got dizzy super fast so I reached for an unsteady table and Oreo in the wrong place at the wrong time. Oreo is fine, my friend did check on him after we got my nose bleeding under control. With my concussion it will take 2 weeks before I can resume a bit of normal activity. 4-6 weeks for the bruised part of my brain to fully recover. The nose swelling will go down in time and then I need to see my ENT specialist so they can take a look to make sure its only a fracture and not a break.
After a few hours the doctor came back in to go over the treatment plan. She made sure that I understood things will get worse before they start getting better and not to be alarmed if I continue feeling dizzy, off balance and over all just not feeling well. Its normal she said to be very tired and its ok to sleep because it will help my brain to recover. The doctor explained that the first 24 hours are the most serious and when complications can occur so she went over with my friend the symptoms and signs to look for and when to head back to the hospital. They wanted to start a good pain management treatment however my Idiopathic Gastroparesis doesn't leave much room for medication that can cause further GI problems so instead the doctor ordered anti inflammatory drugs. Before being released they made sure my blood pressure and blood sugar levels were in a safer range than we could head home.
My head, ear, nose and face were throbbing! Completely different than a migraine or normal headache. If anything today, I quickly learned that I need to be careful and more aware of my sugar and blood pressure readings. I failed to take my blood sugar and blood pressure once I woke up this afternoon. A poor decision on my behalf but if I was to learn the hard way I sure did today!
I hope this month isn't a warning of a bad year to come. Amen.
