Another ER adventure with KFK and Nerdygirl.

2007-11-17 3:41 p.m.

I suppose if you're going to faint at work it's good that 1) No one sees you do it, 2) You go butt first into your garbage can and not face first, and 3) You eventually get found by a coworker. Once again, Nerdygirl came to the rescue and was my ambulance and my moral support in the Emergency Room. We went to a different ER than the one I'm used to for my HMO. My nurse was quite nice, although she couldn't get an IV line going in my left hand and had to send in Robert, the profesioonal poker guy, to stick my other arm. Meanwhile, my left hand which refused to give up even a tiny pin prick of blood for a glocose test, decided to bleed all over my hospital bed. I felt really bad about it at first, then I realized people have probably done worse things in their hospital bed. They stole just about any bodily fluid I could come up with for them and stuck me on the usual monitors. I didn't get oxygen this time which is kind of a bummer. Oxygen is kind of nice. It gives me a happy relaxed feeling. Once again, my heart rate decided to jump up to around 130ish and my blood pressure was 150ish/90ish. They were terribly freaked out, so I didn't tell them about the time I hit 210/115.

Next I was x-rayed. Then to rule out white coat hypertension, they injected me with a huge vial of Ativan. You'd think that would have sent me into outer space, and had me singing show tunes or some Fergie, but it merely gave me a nice mellow and kept me from convincing myself I had an inoperable tumor on my heart or some other horrible malady while they rolled me around the hospital so they could CT scan my chest. This time they wanted to inject me with radioactive dye so my blood is now a sparkly irridescent pink (this probably isn't true, but that would be cool, wouldn't it?) The technician was hot. He was young, pale skin and straight dark hair, my typical NaNo hero. I was glad I was wearing cute Victoria Secret pink panties but I wish they weren't the semi transparent kind. It's really hard trying to keep your hospital gown from flashing your ass when you're jumping from your hospital bed to the CT scan platform. Once I was all situated and covered nicely he stared deeply into my dilated eyes. "This is going to sting a little," The technician said as he injected iodine into my IV line. It did hurt. It was kind of like a slow burning sensation. "Next you're going to feel warm all over." I batted my eyelashes at him as a warm feeling came over my entire body. I wasn't sure if it was the drugs, or it if was starting at him. "Now you're probably going to feel like you're peeing, but you're not, so don't worry about it." I totally felt like I was urinating and giggled which ruined my attempts at flirting. To the contrary, it's difficult to flirt when you're half naked and a little stoned. My chest looked good (insert boobie jokes here), I didn't have an embolism or any blood clots. I was then wheeled back to my room and they injected me with gigantic glass bottles of some drug to lower my heart rate.

Later on as I was sitting in the half empty pharmacy with Nerdygirl, we were discussing how at Kaiser I get test results e-mailed to me and how that's kind of cool. Then we dedicded it would be even cooler to have a famous voice call you on the phone and inform you of your test results. For instance can you imagine Mr. T calling you and saying "You wanna know why it hurt's when you pee, fool? You got a bladder infection. Take this medicine for two weeks and no jibber jabber!" We tried different voices and test results until we got home. Some favorites were Bobcat Goldthwaite informing you that you've got erectile dysfunction and Christopher Walken telling you you're pregnant. We laughed a lot. A whole lot.

They still don't know what the hell's wrong with me. It might be an arrythmia, which means my heart is jumping into a quick rythm for no reason. Their other theory was my thyroid was freaking out and telling my body is was a humming bird. It could be sarcoid related. Sarcoidosis seems to really dig people's endocrine systems. A lot.

While I was being examined, the doctor was flummoxed that I couldn't feel my heart beating out of my chest. I guess people will complain of palpitations when their heart is beating fast. I felt normal. I was fine, for a half naked radioactive stoned hummingbird. I'm back on Propnanol and I'm monitoring everything on my home BP machine and so far everything is back to normal. I hate being sick. At least I'm on vacation next week so I can take it easy and finally work on my NaNo Novel and download some photos.

Nice Waffles. Want some Donuts with that?

2007-11-15 11:59 p.m.

Argh. I'm still cruddy feeling or feeling cruddy, your choice. I've read how the Methotrexate can lower your white blood cells, but that drug has actually stableized my blood more than fucked with it. When I was super duper sick and they had no idea what was wrong with me or what to do with me, but send me home with little bags of ibuprofren and vicoyumyums, (which I'd try to drill tiny holes through so I could skewer them on toothpicks make Bad Girl's Martinis with them) my white blood cells were really low. That's why I'm attributing it to something new going on in my body and feeling so craptacular. Le sigh. Maybe it's depression. I've been trying to accept that as an option. Trying really hard but it's just not working. Even when I'm sick I'm not moping and crying. I do cry but it's a full body, ultra dramatic cry. I'll even apply mascara beforehand so I have those nice gothic racoon circles and lines. (Do teenage gothic racoons put white eyeliner around their eyes?) I cry, howl and mess my hair up real good. It feels much more like a professional performance piece, than it does depressive crying. I don't think I'm depressed anymore than any other woman who is sick, on medication, weak, fatigued, single and makes out with her cats and calls tech help centers to flirt with Indians for love. That's not depressed. That's drugged out and starved for affection. See the difference or do I need to inflict another analogy on your ass? Don't make me get out my copy of Pride and Prejudice (Oxford World's Classics) out.

I put my hair in a ponytail, put on a really cute light blue sweater that makes my green eyes looks army fatigue blreen and went to the grocery store to buy something healthy for dinner because I'm all out of Demonology food. I came home with four liters of Diet Coke, a box of assorted Entennman's donuts, Dreyers low calorie juice popsicles, Skinny Cow ice cream sandwiches, Homestyle Eggo Toaster Waffles (I was looking for the special K ones but they were out) and a packet of Life Saver gummi circles. Perhaps I do need professional help.

Speaking of Professionally Cute Waffles or whatever the hell we were blogging about, my Shamanic group this winter is building a take what you need, ask what you want and give what you'd like, altar. I'm thinking about offerring free tarot readings, since they're kind of like mini emergency love therapy - you give an ear to listen to, some gentle guidance and a whole cheerleader routine. So, theoretically, what would you put/take from such an altar? I'd love to hear your ideas.

Insanity Strikes KFKs Bedroom.

2007-11-05 12:00 a.m.

You know that feeling you get when a minivan full of drunk soccer moms drives over you and then accidentally backs over you to see if you were a cute golden retriever they hit only to discover you're just a busty slightly bloody blonde woman who holds absolutely no interests for them and drives off. You know that feeling? Well, that's how I feel.

I got my blood tests back from Kaiser and everything was normal except for my white cell counts which was low. Like 3.0 low. Can low white blood cells make you feel like crap? My theory is that somewhere in my body my sarcoidosis is hosting and all you can eat buffet and my white blood cells have all run to the buffet in order to tell my immune system it's not really a buffet, it's let's say for argument's sake, my pancreas, and they shouldn't be eating that, because the pancreas is important. For pancreas things. The problem is, I don't know exactly where the buffet is being held. With sarcoidosis it could be anywhere. That's the craptacular thing about an autoimmune disease.

So I've been spending a lot of time in bed. Bed is a good place. It had cats and blankets which frankly, are interchangeable. Just ask them. It has pillows which are nice for putting your head on and other bodily appendeges. And if you're in my bed you also have: books, paper, pens, an iPhone, drugs, a vibrator, a cordless phone, low fat muffins, a case of diet coke and a stuffed penguin named Milkshake. Honestly, aside from a laptop and a toilet is there anything else you could possibly need? The only reason I haven't moved my laptop and television set into the bedroom is because I would never leave it. Ever. And then I would turn into a crazy lady with no white blood cells. Any nobody wants that.

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