It has been a while.......... My last post was Dec 14, 2023 ! I have been busy in so many ways.... Mainly struggling with my health. Boy when it hits it's like a landslide with one thing after another sliding off and bumping into another making another mess!
Dec 26,2023 Hubby and I both were diagnosed with Covid. It was a struggle for both of us and me in particular since my lungs are terrible. Did ok for a while or at least the best you can do when both of us were sick with that nasty stuff. Crawling around trying to just walk across the room...... no appetite when you could find the energy to cook even the simplest of things....... so you manage to drive to town and go through a drive through and you might as well save your money...... NOTHING Tastes good at all!
I thought we were in the process of getting over it when I wind up in the ER for 24hours pumped up with all kinds of steroids to the point my blood sugar went crazy and had to have insulin. Boy that was a first ! Man I learned some new medical tech in all the hook ups they do. It might be TMI but I tell you that was something else. Instead of a catheter for women they had something you kind of sit?? on like a hot dog sponge and when you had to go it catches it in the sponge and vacuums the liquid out in a container. They pumped so much fluid and Lasix into me I filled up their 2 liter container 2 times in 24 hours! WELL that was a experience!I was sent home with more meds antibiotics and steroids of some kind.
Ok so I'm home and thinking I am doing better a week later I am in ER AGAIN! I told hubby just go home and I would call him when he could pick me up not knowing what I was in for! This time with a 1/2'' kidney stone from the left kidney!!! Wasn't any way they could deal with that in this hospital and sent my up to OKC in a ambulance. I told hubby where they were taking me and what for. You have to remember this is smack dab in the middle of covid!
I went to the OKC hospital and they did a emergency surgery to remove the kidney stone blockage. I wake up they take me to a room all hooked up to IV's a catheter and who knows what else. I was major sick.They got a gallon baggie full of nasty white infection stuff out of me the next few days. I was septic. I asked one of my other doctors a month later ... how bad I was and he said only 40% of the people that are septic actually live through it so I guess God isn't done with me yet. The hospital waited for the antibiotics to kick in and the infection to clear up and a few days later they did another procedure to remove more kidney stones. I was in there a total of 6 days. Hubby can't drive that far with his Parkinsons so they sent me home in a UBER! That was a first also. They put me in the car and sent me home. It was really interesting. The gentleman was a black man in his 60's. Boy you couldn't tell he was that old at all! He was actually a housing builder and he just did UBER as a fun side thing when the building season was bad weather. Car paid for and his wife was some kind of district mangage over a food franchise of some kind. I had to tell him where Shawnee was he had no clue. I had hubby meet us at Mc Donald so I could get me something to eat.I was starving! Hospitals have no clue how to feed someone with Alpha Gal allergy ! It was ridiculous. They messed up the menu in the computer also and couldn't fix it. GRRR.
Now I experienced something else on my UBER ride home...... We were pulled over on interstate! The man was extremely nervous! I mean he was saying what's wrong I wasn't speeding?! Cop came up to the passenger side window to talk to him and check things out. Cop said the speed changed in the construction zone and the car had Florida tags. The driver told him the car was new. Cop also said it was unusual for a single passenger to be riding in the back of the car. I spoke up and told him he was taking me home. Cop said O Your a UBER driver? I told him yes he's taking me home I'm not being kidnapped of anything! LOL I told my daughter about my ride home and she said that was called DRIVING WHILE BLACK. Of all things! It was unbelievable how scared and nervous he was and he was a decent human ... clean cut , polite as could be. Makes you see those cop shows where a black person drives crazy and all because they are scared with a whole new light . Funny got to Mc Donalds and was putting my stuff in the back of the crew cab and he saw Frosty our white 80# pit. I said shes gentle and loves everybody and asked if he wanted to pet her and he was a nervous emphatic man definitely didn't want to pet a BIG DOG much less a pit. That poor man if I had him drive me all the way home on about 5 miles of dirt road and no houses around he would have been a nervous wreck! His little low slung car wouldn't have done well on that dirt road anyway.
It was nice to be home and to eat food I could actually eat without getting sick. Funny thing I was for sure still weak from all that but I was walking lopsided! I was leaning to the left when I walked and I actually felt lighter lol
Now it was nice to be able to work on getting my strength back.I was still really really weak. They sent me home with antibiotics and more steroids. Directions to drink 62? oz's of water a day. They also scheduled me for more surgeries every few weeks. I had a total of 6 surgical procedures 5 on the left and 1 on the right side kidney. Some of the meds they sent me home with was cardizem for AFIB. I don't normaly do what the doctors tell me to since they try to kill me so often in some way but the AFIB was happening a little to often so I did as I was told. Used to I would get AFIB if the ALPHA GAl allergy kicked in on something but this was happening without a allergic reaction. After about a week of taking it I couldn't walk across the room because i didn't have any O2. So I quit. It was so bad I was going to a doctors appointment and midway down the hall I had to find someone to get me a wheelchair and deliver me to the appointment!
Sometimes I do wonder about just how smart doctors really are. I got to looking at all the discharge papers and test results when I got out. I was septic, had pneumonia, anemic, a kidney stone, dehydrated.Well golly Gee!!! One of he main indications of dehydration and anemia is irregular heart rhythm!! What the heck did they go to school for??? Really! So... used to the spastic heart would last anywhere from 12- 24 hours depending on what caused it. But when I took one iron pill it dropped down to only 4 hours! After more iron and lots of water it doesn't happen often now. Like I said sometimes I swear they're trying to kill me!
So with all that out of the way..... I have been trying to get my body back to the way it was in October of 2023. I had BP of under 130 / 80 with about a 80 pulse and my A1C was about 5.5 with no meds other than asthma meds.Since all these issues and the steroids I now have osteoporosis ! The kidney stones were made of uric acid. A doctor said drink or eat more calcium to keep from having too much uric acid. So since I can't do anything from a mammal cows milk is out. I have been drinking Silk Coconut milk with over 400mg per cup and taking a pill combo for bones with at least 1200 mg calcium a day.. Bone doctor had a fit and wanted me to take a shot since the pill put me in bed a week and I couldn't move. I looked at the side effects of both shots that lasted over 6 months.( Can you imagine being messed up for at least 6 months!?) Any way they had side effects I was already dealing with like the anemia stones etc. I told the doc nope not going to do it! He had a fit saying your so bad now just walking you could break a bone!!!! I told him with the side effects they cause going along with what I have already it would be like throwing gas on the fire!! I said I will take my chances with adding calcium and all the other goodies. I think my odds are better considering all those side effects. Goodness like I said Doctors are just STUPID sometimes!!!
Blood pressure is still messed up and having to take meds for that but I keep trying to get things back under control. Just think this is all started with the Alpha Gal allergy to mammals and asthma meds (ADVAIR it causes kidney stones in women my age) and me not being able to keep up with all the stuff the meds I take and what they are depleting to replace.
I swear everything is a project it seems like. Scratching my rear is a project some days!
With all this helping hubby with parkinsons when needed.
I have been baking though! YEA!!! I'm much happier when I'm baking. I am stocking up on by holiday baking supplies. Still trying out recipes and sharing all over town. Hey! I get rid of all the stuff hubby will not eat I can't eat and it puts smiles on a lot of faces all over town and even the doctors offices. LOL
Love
Ranchmama
