Worse

I’ve grown tired of writing stuff like this.  Just seems like its all I really post about is how I just am not getting better.  Roughly 3 months ago I stopped going my blood thinners.  Not by choice.  The hematologist didn’t feel they were no longer necessary so she didn’t renew my prescription.  Eh. I went with it.  Whatever.  You are the Dr. That gets paid a lot of money.  To be wrong.  To be fair, my medical history is extensive.  Probably scares most doctors.  But that shouldn’t detract them from actually listening.  

As expected, the clots came back.  Slowly. The past 2 weeks have just been weird. Heart rate doing weird things. Sweating constantly. My face hurting. And my leg. Oh boy. It started off as my foot falling asleep constantly. That slowly evolved to my calf hurting periodically as though as if I pulled a muscle (which we all know that’s not possible). 2 weeks ago when I was walking back to the Jeep, it felt like a charley horse in my upper thiegh. I stood in the parking lot just waiting for it to pass. I guess I made nothing of it at the time. Yeah. I’ve been doing a lot of nothing at home. Desk. Shower. Bed.  As the weeks followed I guess I continued to ignore the symptoms. The wake-up call was coming home from costco last week. As I carried a case of coke up the stairs, I got about 5 steps up and a familiar feeling came back. I can’t breathe. Followed with nausea. I stood at the 2nd floor trying to catch my breath, but just wanted to get home. 

As we got into the apartment, my right leg went from a 6 to a 12 real quick. Now it’s felt like I’ve pulled something. The back of my calf felt like someone was just crushing it. Where my leg meets my hip started to just burn. 

As we got into the weekend, severe exhaustion started to hit me. Pain. Shit mood.  Everything is starting to hurt again. We watched Dune. Only positive thing. Great movie. 

Saturday I did my infusion. But the wake-up call I got wasn’t so pleasant. It’s my face again. It felt swollen. Again. But painfully swollen. My lips were on fire. It felt like I fell down the stairs. Repeatedly. I fast pushed this time, went quick. But as the day went on, my mood was getting worse. I just felt like the walls were closing in. At this point my right leg was about 6x bigger than the left. You could easily tell it was swollen. 

The wife and I tried figuring out the swelling. As we talked it started to dawn on me that there might be a clot. You wouldn’t think it, but it’s a possibility. I remember there was a method to check for DVT’s in your legs, but I couldn’t remember the way.  After looking it up, I asked the wife to try it. Holy shit was that painful. It’s called Homan’s sign. You hyper extend the foot while the leg is raised, then squeeze the calf. Instant pain. Had Anies try the left, nothing. Back to the right, yep. With that I caved. Fine. Let’s go in. 

Where to go?  I fucking hate hospitals. We debated. Since my clot was taken care of at Swedish last time, let’s just go there. I popped a morphine and we left. 

As we got to Swedish, the walk to the hospital felt like an hour. My leg at this point feels like I’m getting these stabbing sensations. To my surprise we got in pretty quickly. As I was getting registered a doctor was already talking to me. The ultrasound he ordered found 3 DVT’s in my right leg. I wasn’t shocked. Made sense. 

When the Dr came in to discuss treatment, lovenox was what was discussed. I honestly wanted to get admitted. I didn’t feel good. I told him about losing my breath and seeing stars. He didn’t feel it was necessary, so they gave me a shot of lovenox and sent me home. 

I’m exhausted at this point. I just want to sleep. I feel like I’ve been running a constant marathon that I’ll never finish. As Wednesday came I had to teach class. When I woke up I wasn’t feeling good at all. It took me awhile to get ready for work. As the day went on, the random sweats started to happen. The flashes of light I’ve been seeming were pretty constant at this point. The sensations in my jaw were starting to get worse as well as just my face hurt. I took a morphine and just dealt with it as always. 

As class started my chest started to feel strange. Almost as if someone was sitting on it. After some time, my head started to just hurt. My left shoulder started to hurt, and at the same time my right foot kept going numb. When the shortness of breath and lightheaded feelings came I immediately sat down and just pushed to the finish. I was supposed to get an MRI at 8, but I decided that it’s a better idea to go back to the ER. 

The ER was pretty busy. More or less a mad house. I’m pretty miserable at this point. I kept feeling my heart speed up and slow down. Breathing was becoming challenging. Of course when you have that, anxiety starts to set in. I did my best remaining calm. At first they did an X-ray of my chest. Shortly after I got a room and went there. The PA I met was really nice. I explained to her what was going on. Surprisingly she listened. Seemed concerned. Ordered a CT. 

After awhile I was wheeled back to CT.  But they only did one of my head. Which was weird. I told the tech what was going on, and they called the Dr. They did a secondary scan which was a PE study. I had a feeling they were going to find something. About an hour after, the nurse came in with heparin. She didn’t need to tell me what was going on. I already knew. It’s bad of course. I have 2 PE’s in both lungs, along with sludge in between the two. 

Finally. A fucking answer. To the exhaustion. The weird shit. 

It was relieving yet terrifying at the same time. PE’s are known to be a silent killer. I’m glad I listened to myself and went in.  I was admitted and will probably be discharged Friday. 

I still feel weird though, at least I can breathe.