Another Rough Week

As if having my car die on me last week on the freeway wasn't bad enough! =)

On Sunday morning, I was in a rush to get to church. I hit the back of my head against the car when I was getting into the back seat to put the baby’s car seat in. I guess I didn’t duck low enough. The blow hurt pretty badly, but I shook it off and felt fine the rest of the day.

Derek remembers me telling him in passing that I had a headache on Monday evening. It must not have been that bad because I don’t remember telling him that. I woke up Tuesday morning at 7 am with a headache right behind my eyes. I took a Tylenol capsule (I have a pretty high tolerance for pain and I hate taking medications. The fact that I even popped one pill is an indication that I was experiencing a significant amount of pain). The pain progressively got worse as the day went on. The back of my head began to throb and then my whole head was in pain. It hurt to move my eyes and turn my head. Even walking increased the pain each time my foot hit the ground. I took a couple more Tylenol pills and a short nap but nothing changed.

By around 3 pm, Derek convinced me to call the doctor’s office. It was too late in the day to visit the office so they recommended that I go to the ER. As I waited in the waiting room, the tears began to flow. They were not only from the pain I was in, but from the fear of the unknown. I had never felt so much pain in my head and my mind wandered to the worst case scenarios.

Once I made it past the triage, they gave me a shot to relieve the pain. At that point, I ranked my pain an 8 or 9 on a 10-point scale (for me, a “10” would be a hot knife jabbed in my brain). The painkiller only reduced the pain to about a “7” and it made me so nauseous – not something I needed with all the pain.

They ran a CT scan and everything looked fine. They concluded it was a concussion. There was nothing more they could do so they discharged me. Again, tears started rolling down. I almost wanted something to be wrong so that I didn't have to go home in so much pain, especially not knowing how long it would last.

Getting up from the bed was excruciating. Sitting up in the wheelchair was painful. When I got to the lobby, I got really cold and my teeth started chattering. By the time I got into the car, I was in bad shape. Derek went back into the hospital and told them what was going on. I was re-admitted.

I had the chills and a low grade fever which are not symptoms of a concussion. They wanted to rule out everything deadly, so they ran some blood tests and did a lumbar puncture (similar to an epidural but instead of injecting, they extracted fluid to test for a brain hemorrhage and meningitis).

The lumbar puncture did not go very smoothly. The physician’s assistant couldn’t get the right spot so he had to poke me three times along with giving me three shots of local anesthesia. Then he called for the doctor. I kept praying that God would give this man wisdom as I continued to wiggle my toes to make sure I wasn’t getting paralyzed through this. The doctor came in and reinserted the needle for the fourth time which sent a shock wave down my left leg. So scary! But it worked and they were able to get the four viles of fluid they needed.

The results were good and they figured that the chills and fever were probably due to a viral infection. They discharged me again. I still wasn’t feeling well but by this time it was almost midnight and I was ready to go home. It took awhile for me to be able to put my clothes back on and get in the wheelchair. The journey from that bed to my bed was long and painful. My head was throbbing and I was extremely nauseous (and vomiting). We made it home and I was finally in bed at 12:30 am.

The pain was much better the next day. I was still hurting, but it was nothing like what I experienced the day I went to the ER. It took about two full days before I could be up and about. Lots of pain medication and TLC from my husband surely helped!

I have to say, God’s timing is perfect. Derek’s mom’s visit couldn’t have been timelier. She arrived on Tuesday and ten minutes after she walked in our front door, we were off to the emergency room. She has been taking care of Karis ever since. It has been such a huge help to have her with us, and I don’t know what we would have done without her.

Our friends from our small group came to the hospital to bring us dinner that night. They dropped it off just as I was being discharged the first time. When I was shaking in the car, Derek called them to see if they would come back to stay with me while he went back into the hospital. They came back immediately. They, along with many others, have been praying for me. I am so thankful!

I’m glad to have this all behind me and to be on the mends. Even as I type this, my bottles of Advil and Tylenol are close by and I can still feel a slight pain in my head. But, I know the worst is behind me and I’m thankful it was nothing more than a concussion and a viral infection.