Yet Another Day of Doctors

At this point, this has become a full-time second job. It feels like if I’m not at work, or dealing with FLMA/Sedgwick, it’s dealing with this nightmare Parc caused.

It’s not even March

It’s really sad that this is where I’m at with everything, but at least doctors are now taking action to get this resolved.

I saw Dr. Lovett yesterday, who is my chiropractor. I haven’t seen him in a very long time. Almost a year. I had to put everything we were doing on hold because of all the chronic illnesses, hospitalizations, surgeries, etc. From my previous post, the Charley Horses I’ve been experiencing in my left and right calves have progressively gotten worse. Yes, the vitamin D3 shot, and this electrolyte powder is helping, but Anies found an extremely bad knot in my lower lumbar on the left side.

So I went to him for an adjustment. Probably the most painful to date. My whole back was out of wack. My Cervical portion of my spine was way out of alignment. After some serious manipulation, we got everything straightened out. I’ll have to go back again Thursday at 3:30pm for another adjustment to make sure everything is holding. At least the Charley Horses have stopped for now, those were extremely painful.

Today, however, is somewhat of a big day. I saw Hepworth at 9:50am. He was running about 15 minutes behind, which is pretty good. He’s usually an hour behind. The waiting room was full of patients. Looked like he had a busy day ahead. I’m just grateful he was able to wedge me in. Kendall came in, we quickly went over the game plan, my symptoms, etc. Since we were going all the way back to the Sphenoid today, it’s one of the rare times I opted for the lidocaine spray. As she finished spraying it in, I just exhaled, and pulled in as much air as I could through my nose so that we could try to coat the whole way back to the sphenoid. I know this isn’t going to be pleasant by any means. She said, Dr. Hepworth would be in shortly, because we gotta let the lidocaine numb me for a bit.

Dr. Hepworth came in, in a very good mood. We did the usual shake hands / how are you (I rarely touch other people). But he deserves it since he’s been helping me the most aside from infectious disease. I briefly told him what’s going on as he was assembling the endoscope, and the culture collection suction device. I also said “I know I’m getting ahead of myself here, and I know we are headed towards surgery regardless, but for the Sphenoidotomy, can we just bilaterally open it up and get rid of the cyst found durning the scan?”

Hepworth replied “Absolutely”. I felt relieved. He then turned the chair and I wasn’t ready for the culture. It’s so goddamn uncomfortable. He started on the right side. Went all the way back to the sphenoid, basically a clear shot. Since everything has been removed that would’ve been in the way. As he started suctioning the right side of the sphenoid, the opening was pretty much inflamed shut. So he had to push somewhat to get the suction to draw from the sphenoid. As he withdrew, he examined the cyst they saw on the scan.

He gave me 30 seconds to compose myself, then he started on the left side. Same thing as the right, straight shot back. Again, the left sided opening of the sphenoid was also inflamed shut, so once again, he had to push the suction through to get another culture from the left side. He withdrew, and gave me yet another 30 seconds to compose myself, then went back to the right side to look at the cyst again.

That was it. The hard part is over. He sat across from me as his MA dictated our discussion. He said that he’s ordering a CT of my sphenoid, to be completed in 3 weeks. I mentioned to him that Kaufman is starting me on IV Meropenem/Daptomycin. He said that it’s a good plan. Basically stay on those until the CT. Should the CT still show no improvement or the cyst shrink, the next step here is going to be a bilateral sphenoidotomy. He will also remove the cyst on the right side which is close to the opening of the sphenoid. The main procedure would open both the left & right sides of the sphenoid to the point where they would be “open”. We both agreed that this is the last hiding spot of where the infection is.

I then brought up once again, the cysts in the left side of my face, and how it was tracking through my face. We have to get rid of this. I’m pretty sure that this is all fungal. Again, the vancomycin should’ve taken care of it, but it did nothing for it. So I’m going to make sure that this is all done next surgery. This is the LAST surgery. I can only hope.

He walked away saying that he’s glad we finally convinced infectious disease, it’s only taken 5 years to get them to pay attention. I waited for Kendall to give me the summary sheet, and I left. I’m just glad the culture was over with. I blew my nose a few times before I walked out. Definitely blew out blood and some nasty stuff. He said that to contact the office in 7 days for preliminary results. Since we are looking at everything, aerobic, anaerobic, and fungal. It will take at least 2 weeks to result.

Since I was in the area, before I left the parking lot, I called Walgreens in the hope that the Poconazole I ordered last week came in, since I took the last of what I had today. Thankfully it came in, and I asked them that I have to go that way anyway next, so if they could just get it ready for me. After I hung up, I called infectious disease if I could just come earlier to get accessed, get labs, and pickup my meds. I guess it was a slow day for them, and they said head on over, my original appointment was at 2pm. Might as well get it out of the way so that I can get back home, and back to work.

So I took off towards Walgreens, which is next door to Swedish hospital, snagged the posaconazole, then headed towards infectious disease, which is next door to Porter. About a 10 minute drive. Got into infectious disease, got my port accessed, got labs drawn, signed some paperwork, grabbed my meds, started the first dose of Meropenem, and headed home. Spent maybe 15 minutes there total.

As I drove home, the waves of exhaustion started to hit me. Waking up at 6am doesn’t help, but I needed to put in a fair day at work. When I got home, I started to configure all the alarms in my phone for the schedule of antibiotics. Since Meropenem is every 8 hours, I’m going to have to do a dose at work. No real way around that. The schedule itself will be exhausting, but at least it’s wake up, take it out of the fridge at 4:30am, start at 5pm. Hopefully the next 3 weeks, these antibiotics do the trick, but I already know that this is all leading to surgery. At least the recovery won’t be as bad.

I’ll post results of my labs tomorrow. I’m pretty sure my WBC has gone up, or still where it’s been. All I know, is that I just want this over with. If this does come down to surgery, I want it done by April. Not this oh let’s wait 5 months bullshit.