What a weekend...part 1

I don't even know how to really start this post because I'm still at a loss over what happened. So I will just get right into it.

Saturday afternoon I took a ride in an ambulance and ended up with this on my wrist and in the hospital for 3 days.

So, to start at square one....about 5pm ish on Saturday afternoon, Adrian and I were relaxing in bed (nothing too serious so calm down) when suddenly I got DIZZY.   Everyone has had some occasional dizziness, especially after a few too many drinks or getting a quick head rush standing up too fast.   This was nothing like anything I had every experienced before, it was SO much worse.  It felt like I was in the middle of a whirlwind and could do nothing to stop it.  It was absolutely terrifying, unsettling and nothing was helping- eyes open, eyes closed, laying down, sitting up.  After a couple minutes of trying to calm down and Adrian getting me a trash can and cold cloth I realized it wasn't getting any better and asked him to call 911.

Somewhere along the lines Adrian helped me to the bathroom because I thought it would somehow help to be on the cold floor and closer to the toilet....ummm heck no, but I had to try.  I was hardly able to make it there, even with his help and that is where the paramedics found me and started checking my vitals.  I could feel my body going in and out at this point and I had to force myself to focus on every letter of every word that came out of my mouth just to stay conscious.  The paramedic was immediately alarmed at my low heart rate and when I told him my heart rate at my last dr's apt (56 bpm) he didn't seem to feel any better.  I didn't have enough strength to ask him what my hr was at that point.

Several parts of the transport process (down the stairs, onto the stretcher, then in the ambulance which was the worst) were simply awful because the whole time I was swinging back and forth between feeling like A- I was going to throw up more (and I did several times), B- I was going to pass out, and C- I couldn't keep my mind off the fact that they had to move my body around and I couldn't help.  Mostly I was thanking the stars I had lost so much weight and a small part of me was chastising myself for not being thinner.  Really, I couldn't help thinking it even though I know it wasn't healthy to think those things. 

As soon as I got into the ER they started asking questions, taking my vitals and getting me hooked up to so many different machines, drawing blood for tests and placed an IV catheter of course.  I also was attached to oxygen which was the weirdest part- those tubes up your nose feel bizarre.  They asked me a bunch of questions and somehow (was it a miracle?) my primary care physician walks in, Dr. Eyer.  I actually brightened a little at this point and joked with him a bit before answering all the same questions again (sense a pattern? this continued throughout my stay).   I knew he worked the occasional weekend in the ER at the hospital, and Saturday I just got LUCKY.

I was only partial conscious when this was inserted but I remember it hurting and it was plenty uncomfortable for the 3 days I was stuck with it. Glad to have it out!

Each different doctor I met (and there were several, apparently I baffled them) asked me if I had shortness of breath before or during my initial onset of the dizziness.  I said, well yeah, I basically was panicking because I couldn't get any bearings and I couldn't stop throwing up once it started but I felt fit as a fiddle before hand.  And that is what has kept me nervous long after the dizziness subsided- it came out of nowhere and hit me like a tornado that stayed around for hours.

The following hours ticked by fast at times when I couldn't keep conscious and then would creep to a halt when my head started POUNDING.  It felt like there was a gremlin in there attacking away.  Sometimes it would be combined with severe stomach pain and those were the worst times because I was so exhausted plus I had wretched up my stomach contents already and dry heaving sucks.  I couldn't get any pain relief because now Dr. Eyer was worried about a brain bleed because of my head- so I was waiting for a CAT scan.   Thank goodness, that all came back normal, as did every other test. Only thing weird was some elevated ketones in my urinalysis- which he said is normal for me because I am losing weight.

I want to point out one thing before I move on- I was NOT dehydrated.  The Doctor said they were giving me fluids as a precaution and to keep me hydrated to replace what I had lost during the nausea, but dehydration was certainly not the cause of my dizziness.  Some people have wanted to diagnosis me and I really appreciate the advice, but sometimes I don't want to hear "O, I  had the exact same thing happen to me last year when I had heat stroke or was dehydrated or was working out to hard...."   Others asked if it was caused by my working out and not eating enough.  I asked about both and had all my various doctors assure me that my weight loss and exercise did NOT cause this.

One of the harder parts of this whole ordeal was knowing how worried and stressed out Adrian was.  It must have been a hundred times I tried to talk to him and reassure him that everything would work out or simply tell him I loved him, but the first couple hours I simply didn't have the energy to open my mouth unless absolutely necessary.  After every word I felt like I needed a break, it was very unsettling and exhausting.  And honestly, a little scary, too.

And with that, I need to get some sleep because they kept waking me up every couple hours to do a full recheck of all my vitals because my heart rate would hold around 30-32 when I was sleeping.  The nurses  were very anxious about it and told me flat out that it was hard not to keep waking me up to check on me.

Part 2 tomorrow...