Things were starting to look up...

Then it all went down hill, starting last Thursday. Well, Monday really. I started with this pain in my back that felt mysteriously like my kidneys feel when they are acting up. But it had been years since I had an infection & previously I would go months before having them treated with no problems. I also had just started my period & thought maybe it was just bad cramps.

Come Wednesday they weren't any better, but not a ton worse either. Advil was still taking it away but I couldn't get up & walk around too much or my whole pelvic area would ache. I went to bed that night & woke up around 1am with convulsive shivers that wouldn't stop. I actually woke Jon up I was shaking the bed so badly. The first time they happened I was shaking for a good 45 minutes straight.

I had Jon get me the themometer & I had a temperture of 103 at some points. I laid in bed & tried to sleep, but it just wasn't working & my pain was getting worse. I finally ended up going out to the couch & I was able to sleep maybe 2 more hours or so on & off, I had a couple more shivering episodes & my fever was still 101 or more.

Come morning I decided that I couldn't wait for an appointment with my doctor & I needed to go to the ER. We got Isis up & dressed, all the while my pain was getting worse. By the time we got out the door to take Isis to my MIL's, I was bawling & every little tiny bump on the road was agony. Jon decided to drop me off at the ER & then take Isis to his Mom's.

I bawled my way into triage & had pretty well decided by that point I had a kidney stone, not just an infection. They saw me really quickly & actually I had already seen the doctor by the time Jon got back. Between putting an IV in & trying to draw blood, they had to stick me *9* times before they found good enough veins.

But, once they finally got the IV in, they gave me Morphine, Tramadol & some anti-nausea meds & I started to feel much better. They did a blood & urine culture on me as well. The ER doctor came in originally & told me I had very "dirty" (read: infected) urine, so they put me in for a CT Scan. He said if the CT Scan showed that I didn't have any stones they would send me home on some Antibiotics & pain meds.

Well, the CT Scan showed that I had a small (2-3mm) stone that was blocking my ureter. Fluid was unable to pass through the kidney, so as a result of that the kidney was very large & swollen. There was also an obvious infection backed up behind the stone.

The ER doctor came back & told me they would need to admit me at least over night & do surgery to insert a stent (tube) into my kidney that would open the ureter & let the stone pass & also let the infection drain.

Needless to say I was pretty scared. They took me "upstairs" & admitted me to a room. The anesthesiologist came to see me shortly after I got there & said they were going to take me right in. In the middle of talking to me, he got a call for an emergency C-section so he ran away (literally) & came back another hour or so later. (Oh & just a note here, apparently the C-section never happened. The woman said she needed to push & she delivered vaginally on the OR table. How lucky is that?).

They took me to the OR, gave me some vercit (the anesthesiologist said "this will be like a 6 pack of beer with no hangover, all the men will look good). He was right, good stuff. They moved me to the OR table & gave me some oxygen & that's the last thing I remember before I woke up in the recovery room.

That was the first time I've ever been fully put under (I've been sedated before) & I was scared I would be sick. The anesthesiologist assured me he would do everything he could to prevent it & I kid you not I could have ate a 7 course meal in the recovery room. I felt great.

I spent the next day or so in a hospital room, bored out of my mind while they pumped me full of IV antibiotics & asked me a gazillion times if I had any pain (I had very little). Come to find out the stone must have passed after they gave me the Morphine when I relaxed, but the stent was still put in because my infection was so bad the ureter was swollen shut.

They sent me home & gave me a prescription for oral antibiotics. That's when I got sick. I went through 2 different ones before I finally told them to give me a different CLASS of them.

I'm on a new one now & finally today am feeling about 95% better. I never, ever want to go through this again. I have a CT Scan today to make sure the infection is going away & the stone is gone. Then on 4/2 I will have the stent removed in the doctors office.

I told Jon if I ever have cancer, he should take me out back & shoot me. I never want to deal with so many doctors ever again.

Mock DWI, NH, etc


Michele from our county STOP DWI program got ahold of me again a couple weeks ago. She asked if I would be interested in presenting at any of their Mock DWI crashes this year. I emailed her back & told her it would be dependent on the dates & times. I wanted to atleast send her an email to let her know I wasn't completely 'un-interested'.

A couple days ago, she got back to me & said the first one was on May 1st & said she wouldn't be able to be there, but she gave my name to the SADD director at the school (who I believe to be a student, per her grammar/spelling & the fact she addressed me as 'Ms.Towne'). The SADD director emailed me & said they plan on having a presentor for before & a presentor for after the crash.

I hmm'd over it & decided I should just take the leap & do it. I emailed her back & said I would, but I wanted to present before the crash because the last one I watched was so emotional for me there was no way I could have presented after.

Now I need to figure out what the heck I'm going to say. The last one I did was on October 20th, 2005. Which would have been my Mother's birthday & I figured that was sign enough I needed to do it. But now I have a lot more information about the accident & I'm a lot more removed from it. I'm afraid I won't get my point across as well. I sobbed through half of my story the last time.

The part I'm having the hardest time with is how I address the fact, that the woman that hit them...was charged with 2 counts of Intoxicated Manslaughter & walked away with a felony DWI...no jail time & not even a suspended license. In some ways it brings to light the failure in the judicial system, but in others it says "See if you drink & drive & kill someone, well its not THAT bad".

The other woman that presented with me last time (& I assume she will again, she does just about every one of them), lost her son when he was 16 I think? His friend was driving drunk. His friend walked away & her son died. She spends about 5 total minutes on her really heartbreaking story & the other 15 minutes of her presentation talking about kids having morals & responsibility & logic.

Both Jon & I agreed that she might be getting blank stares from some of these 16 & 17 year olds. I decided last time to focus instead on the sheer shock value of losing two parents at once, at a young age. Going as far as to give some of my sisters perspective, since she was 14 at the time. There were tons of kids sobbing at the end of my part & I really think *that's* the way you reach a highschooler. Not with a "You should be more responsible then that" speech.

Maybe I'm wrong?

On a lighter note, I booked our vacation yesterday. I'm so flippin' excited about that. We are going to Lincoln, NH. I know how did we come about staying in NH? Well, we planned on going back to the place we spent our honeymoon. However, the timeshare we use (MIL's & FIL's) didn't have dates available into May yet.

I kept waiting & they just never were coming up. I was afraid that either A) I couldn't give enough notice or B) they were going to jack the price when they fianally gave them. We paid $1100 for the week when we stayed for our honeymoon. Soo! We decided to look in NH & go for something "new".

My Step Dad grew up in Littleton, NH & Lincoln is apparently only 25 minutes from there. Its also 2 hours from Boston & 2 hours from Portsmouth, which is a coast town that has some good shopping I guess?

Yay for vacations!

My Grown Up Weekend


My MIL & FIL took Isis for the whole weekend! They hadn't seen her in three weeks because they were in FL for vacation, so they were more then willing to.

Jon worked a midnight shift on Friday morning (12am-10am), so he was still asleep when I got home from work. MIL & FIL came to get Isis around 6pm & then I went in to wake him up. We both laid in bed for awhile & watched TV, which was wonderful in itself.

Then we decided we wanted to have dinner, so we went to Lobster House at like 8:30pm & it was so nice & quiet in there & we talked the whole time, it had been along time since we had uninteruptted conversation where we didn't feel rushed. We had gone out for Valentine's Day but since Isis was with a sitter we were paying for, it was harder not to worry about the time & when we got home.

After that we came home & went to bed with the intention of sleeping in the next morning. However, Jon was up before 6am & I was up before 7am. I guess that's what we get for working so often & getting used to not sleeping in!

We hung around the house until about noon, read our books & just generally relaxed. Then we went & had lunch at Eben's (yes, we were taking advantage of getting to eat out since we haven't done it much since Feb 1st). After lunch we went to the Sugar Island trail that is near our house.

We had never been on the trail before & we were hoping to snow shoe. Turns out its not a great snow shoeing trail, because either end of it is paved & plowed before it starts the actual trail. We ended up just walking the paved/gravel portion of it (about a mile & a half). We poked around both the dam & the power house (which was very cool, we need to go back & get pictures).

Then we came home, got our snow shoes on & walked the 1/2 mile loop that Jon cut on our property. I sure did get enough exercise that day!

That night, we decided to go out & see Sandi & Derek. We hung out & eventually watched Jeff Dunham on DVD with them (so funny, I love him :). We stayed until about 9pm & then came home. Neither of us had dinner, but both of us were so whooped that we didn't even want to think about cooking something (I didn't even have the energy to eat), so we went to bed.

Yesterday morning we relaxed until Noon or so, when MIL got back from church with Isis & then we went over to her house to get Isis.

I feel refreshed & for the first time in awhile I wasn't dreading coming to work this morning.

I suggest for anyone that CAN to take a weekend to yourself with your hubby, it sure does make you remember why you married them :)

Just Let her be Well!


Isis has now been officially sick since Thursday evening. Thursday night was the last night she has slept that she didn't wake up atleast twice. Mommy is exhausted, Daddy is exhausted. Jon stayed home with her on Friday & I stayed home with her yesterday.

She actually seemed to be better yesterday, she slept well for her nap, was chipper, ate well & was fever free. Albeit, she was slobbery. She did sleep better last night then any other night. She went down at 8, was up at 11 & then back down until 5am. Jon got up with her at 5am for good.

She was looking pretty ill again this morning though. I was so disapointed to see that. Miriam is with her today, because she was so happy yesterday I figured it was safe to have her come back. I have to wonder if her yucky-ness it caused by her being up at 5am & by the time I left at 7:30-ish she was ready for her nap already (she's normally up at 7am & back down for a nap by 10am).

Miriam put her down for a nap & if she's not better/more awake when she gets her up, then I'm going to go home again. I'm likely going to make her an appointment as well, if she doesn't seem to be better. Everytime I do that, she seems much better by the time we can get her to the doctor (of course, isn't that always the way).

I feel like someone has been sick constantly since Christmas. Jon & I had a stomach thing right after Christmas & then Isis had a chest cold. It was mid January before we were all well again. Now in Mid-Feburary we have all been sick again!

Its such an emotional drain when things are like this. I can't really explain why, but I get so depressed from dealing with Jon being sick & Isis being sick. I think mostly because I'm a worry wart (to the upteenth degree) & I spend my time worrying that I'm not doing something right for them or they are going to end up too sick.

Nerve Conduction Test & Needle Study


Back Story: Around the first of the year I started with weakness in my right hand. It was a feeling like when you gripped something hard for a long time or when you used it a lot & it was very tired. It was also accompanied by a twitch/muscle spasm in my thumb & fore finger.

I went to see my Endo on January 29th & she suggested that I go to see an Orthopedic doctor that could look at the nerves in my hand/elbow. They called me & scheduled a Nerve conduction test for yesterday.

So off I went to have the test, after doing some research & being pretty nervous about it. I'll give you a step by step account of how everything went.

1. I was told to strip from the waist up & put on a stylish hospital gown.

2. I was given a very, very warm hot pack & I was told to put my hands on it to warm them.

3. The doctor came in & he had me grip his hands, push back on him etc so he could get an idea of what my right hand was doing, vs what my left was doing.

4. I Laid down on the hospital bed & had these sticky little probes connected to me. They are like the little metal disks they put on for an EKG. I had them all over my hand & fingers on the right side.

5. They hooked up leads to the little metal disks, they were black, red & green. I kind of felt like a car when you are jumping it :)

6. They took this thing that looked like a taser (no kidding), put ultrasound jelly on it & set it in several places on my arm & shocked me with electricity. The strength of the electricity ranged anywhere from what it feels like to be zapped after you have scuffed around the carpet, to what it feels like to touch an electric fence (they had a dial & they turned up the voltage when need be).

Honestly, this didn't really hurt so much as feel very strange. I did start to feel some pain when he would have to zap me several times in a row in a certain spot.

7. After the Nerve conduction test was done (about 20 minutes or so) they did what's called a needle study. They pulled out this very long thin needle that was connected to a lead wire as well. Apparently, they were looking for the natural electric current the body gives off.

8. They stuck the needle into the muscle of my arm/hand in about 7 or 8 different places & moved it around.

9. While the needle was positioned in my muscle the doctor would have me flex the muscle to listen to changes in the sounds coming from the machine he was working on.

All in all, this part was not cool. I honestly, was going to tell him to stop & turns out he was on the last one anyway. I was starting to get woozey from all the needle sticking.

Apparently, the nerve conduction test came back within normal range. He said the needle study didn't come back "Stone Cold normal" but it wasn't definitive enough to diagnose a problem either. He feels that either I have very mild carpel tunnel AND ulnar Nueropathy or I'm going to have it at some point anyway.

He sent me to be fitted for a wrist brace & also wants me to buy an elbow pad from a sports store. Both will be worn only at night to keep my wrist/elbow in a relaxed position.

He did take some x-rays of my neck/jaw as well & I haven't heard anything back about those so I'm not sure if that means they are normal or what.

I go back in a month to see if everything he gave me for ideas has improved my situation. If not then we'll need do an MRI on my elbow to get a more definitve answer.

Might be Depressed...


I'm concerned that I'm showing signs of depression & I'm not sure what to do about them. I've considered getting myself some counseling but in this area its so hard to find & often times you wait forever for an appointment. There are very few independent therapists you can go & speak to.

I just feel like 90% of the time, I'm just below that happy mark. Like even when something is really good, or really exciting I just can't muster up the emotion to feel excited about it. Its like I want to get excited but I just can't get past bland.

On top of that, I've noticed that I'm staying home a ton more then I used to. At first I contributed it to having our own house. But to be honest we aren't anymore comfy in this house then were in our last rental, maybe even less so cause this one needed some TLC to get to be "homey". But, I 'll find myself hoping that I don't need to go anywhere unless Jon is going to come with me & then often even when I've decided to do something I change my mind later & just don't do it.

I'm wondering if its winter. Because the one thing that does make me feel better is knowing that summer is coming & soon there won't be snow everywhere. Also, the idea of going away with Jon. But I'm even worried I'll get myself all worked up for that & actually get excited & it will be a let down because its the not same as it was last year.

Jon took his Jeep Wrangler off the road & that's what we took last year. You could take the top off & the weather was beautiful, so we took the trip slow & just enjoyed the ride. We smoked, which seems like such a stupid, horrible thing to miss, but it was always 10 minutes of time I could count on seeing Jon & I miss the act smoking more then I crave the cigarrette. Why this bothers me...it just does.

I know, I know...I won't start smoking again.

Jon made a comment about not taking the Jeep may ruin this vacation for him. That really hurt too & made me realize I'm really banking on getting away & having a week for us to connect again without work/Isis/his parents/work/work/work, etc.

Argh, I know what he meant when he said it, its just in my nature to take it personally.

I hope this gets better soon.

Finally starting to see some progress!


I stepped on the scale this morning & I've now lost 5.5lbs since I weighed in last. I do know if that was just the luck of the draw or what since it seemed like all last week no matter how little I ate or how hard I exercised I didn't lose a damn thing.

I hope I can stay motivated with this, I'm such a procrastinator & I have such a hard time working things like exercise into my schedule while I work all day & then go home to take care of Isis all night. Not to mention its winter if I go home, sit down breathe for a second & get back up its already dark. I can't wait for warm weather.

Oh yeah, you're right I'm going to bitch about the heat by then. That's what I do :) There is but a brief period in spring where I'm happy.

I'm bound & determined this is going to be the time it works for me. I'm motivated for this like I was motivated to quit smoking & I'm still being successful at that 18 weeks later! I keep trying to tell myself that there is no way that diet/exercise can be as painful as giving up smoking was, but for some reason it seems harder. I have such bad habits engrained in my brain.

Getting Healthy


I've decided to make some much needed changes in my life. I went to the doctor recently & she told me that although my control of my Type I diabetes is great, my cholesterol is not. I think hearing that was what I needed to get my ass in gear & start taking part in some good diet & exercise practices.

I joined http://www.sparkpeople.com/ & have been tracking all of my calories, etc. Also, this site gives you some great ideas how strength training exercises which I am doing Monday, Wednesday, Friday & I'm doing Cardio (mostly snow shoeing at this point) Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday.

My first weigh in was a disapointment, as it appears I've gained 1lb instead of losing anything. But this time I'm not giving it all up right away, I've decided to do this for my health instead of soley to look good.

One of my goals that I have set up on spark people is to journal, so hopefully I can stick to this & be brave enough to let some people read it :)