Something is Different + OctoPhoMo: Day 9 in General Mental Anesthesia

I’m combining entries, I hope you don’t mind, I just don’t have the energy to post more than once today. I don’t even know what to say.

I suppose I’ll start with: “Guess where I spent the night?”

I’m home now from the hospital… (again). (I believe that’s 7 times now in the past year). I Spent the night last night and like a broken record, I was sent home without all the proper testing done because I don’t have insurance.

There’s been so much talk about my ulcerative colitis and deservedly so, it’s besting me at the moment, actually over the past year, and there has been some mention of my back injuries. One thing that the colitis has caused above and beyond the obvious is an exacerbation of my back injuries because I’m unable to work out / exercise / stretch etc… being bedridden most of the day. Prednisone further complicates the matter.

Prednisone causes osteoporosis (thinning of the bones). Osteoporosis may also result in fractures of the spine, ribs or hip joint with minimal trauma. These occur after the first year in 10-20% of patients treated with more than 7.5mg prednisone daily. (I’ve been on 40mg and as much as 250/day in the hospital for over a year now). It is estimated that up to 50% of patients on long term oral corticosteroids will develop bone fractures.

It also causes muscle weakness, muscle pain (myalgia) severe joint pain, backache/pain, trouble healing, tendon rupture, vertebral compression fractures, neuropathy and about 100 other things!

So, as many of you know, I’m just getting over an illness and bronchitis. Coughing has been 95% better for the last few days, sinuses have been clear as well. Two nights ago I got up in the middle of the night, checked my phone; it was 3:30am, but I accidentally unplugged it, so I got up and as I reached for the cord, I sneezed. It was one of those that came out of nowhere and as it occurred while I was bent in a 45 degree angle without me being able to brace myself… instantly something snapped in my back! I screamed!!!

Now I have 3 herniated discs, a compressed disc and other damage, but one of my herniated discs is T9 (mid/upper back). I know that pain very well, I deal with it every day of my life, it’s debilitating! It mostly hurts just to the right of my spine, but now it felt dislocated or moved, I don’t know how to describe it other than to say, I felt tremendous pressure impinging on my right lung. I couldn’t breathe.

At the same time, I started coughing uncontrollably which made matters worse, I even started bringing up phlegm (which I hadn’t done in 6 days).

Also, I suddenly got searing mind-numbing pain in my right pelvis to my hip area. It felt like I was being smacked with a sledge hammer, it was throbbing and recurred every 5 - 10 seconds! Plus I was experiencing chest pain in the exact same location where my back was hurting. I went from being fine, to wishing I was dead all in the span of one second!

It took about 30 minutes before I could calm myself down, but I could only breathe in half breaths. I normally dig my back into walls and give myself deep tissue massages with my back buddy (theracane massager) but now I couldn’t even gently touch that area of my back because of the pressure on my lung. Something was different.

All of yesterday I just fought through it, tried to walk it off, hoping, praying it would improve. I took a Flexeril (muscle relaxer) and a Tramadol (pain killer) but no effect whatsoever. Considering how much difficulty I was having trying to breathe… I went to the ER.

My primary care started me on Lisinopril a week ago because she was concerned about my elevated blood pressure lately. At the hospital last night (despite being on blood pressure medication) my bp was 167/107 and my heart rate was at 134. This led to an EKG, blood tests, then I had x-rays. I couldn’t move my right arm outward in any direction. It was very emasculating at times when they forced me to move around when I knew I couldn’t....

It took about 9 hours before they said the tests came back ok. Nine hours of lying on my left side awkwardly because I could barely move without screaming.

The one test I needed (an MRI) they refused to do (no insurance) and so they were going to release me. Those of you who know my history, does this sound familiar?

I said: “Look, I don’t care about being released, but I do care about being released without any knowledge.” The Dr’s response was that he believed I tore and/or strained muscles and the inflammation was so severe that it was pushing on my right lung. He did say that area of my back was hard as a rock (I’m thinking to myself… “Like Duh!”) So he gave me a hefty dose of Naproxen - 1,000mg, followed by a morphine chaser.

I don’t know what the big deal with morphine is… I can’t differentiate between the morphine I took and 2 Tylenol. It just does nothing!!! All in all both meds took my pain down about 10% (at best… it was hardly noticeable) and only lasted for about a half hour, but I still couldn’t move, still had shooting pains in my hip/pelvis, down to my right knee nor could I breathe as the mounting pressure on my lung was forcing me to cough nonstop which hurt like a mother f*cker! (pardon my french). The pain was bad, it made the crippling colitis cramps an afterthought!

They made me wait another couple of hours, but by now I felt worse than I did when I showed up. I asked to speak with the Dr.

I just said: “I didn’t come here for pain meds, I want answers. I want to fix the problem, not just treat the symptoms and I feel like the reason I came in here hasn’t been addressed. I know my back injuries and the pains associated with them, this is different, something is wrong” but still he refused to give me an MRI. He said that the pain in my hip/pelvis was caused by my S1 herniated disc pinching the nerve (even though I wasn’t having lower back pain) but offered no other details or diagnosis. I was just wasting my breath (what little I had).

So here I am, it’s the following day… I am beyond exhausted, home now. with the entire trip to the hospital really (other than some more prescriptions) just a big waste of time.

I know something is wrong, it feels like my right lung is in a vice being squeezed, I just don’t believe that a torn muscle is the cause. Maybe I’m wrong, I’m not a Dr… it just seems too simple for all I’m suffering… I have an extremely high tolerance for pain, so it just seems weird to me; then again… this all started with a sneeze.

ADDENDUM:

So here’s something that bothers me… Last night / this morning while in the hospital, I was given 1,000mg of Naproxen. I hadn’t eaten in about 7 hours and I was permanently on my left side as I was in too much pain to move (as seen in the pics above I’m leaning to left). I remained unable to move and in that same position for several more hours afterwards..

So later this afternoon after being released, I go to pick up my prescriptions. The Naproxen is a 500mg script and clearly and in big bold print right on the bottle it says: “TAKE WITH FOOD & DO NOT LIE DOWN FOR AT LEAST 10 MINUTES AFTER TAKING THIS MEDICATION.” WTF?!?!

It’s as if the Dr’s don’t know about the effects or dangers involved or they just don’t care (or both). Smh…

Thanks to all who’ve shared / donated the GoFundMe page set up on my behalf by Terri Finkelstein Lorang. WWW.GOFUNDME.COM/JAYEERYK (Anyone who can help me share this page and get it out there so I can be treated will have my undying gratitude). The back issue sucks, but there’s not much I can do about it and probably nothing until I speak to a neurosurgeon. I CAN beat colitis however & I’m 2/3 the way to being able to make that all important 1st appointment to see Dr. Bonnie Mackey who saved my life in 1998. I desperately need to get off the Prednisone and if you’ve been following me then you know that this is the only way I’ll be able to. I’m very appreciative for all the support, love and care. You are all in my thoughts. Thank you and G-D Bless!

OctoPhoMo: Day 9

Thank you for putting up with the duel entry.

FAIRY or FANGS

Pretty sure I’ve got to go FANGS with this one…

NOSFERATU (Behind the scenes after a show with audience members).

A couple of promo shots I took of 2 other vampires from the same show.