Sunday, February 7, 2010

2 years of hell

That's what my life has been... 2 years of hell. (Insert you little violin, playing a little song just for me, but this is my blog and I'm still going to bitch if you don't like it... stop reading now! Keep reading, maybe you might relate!) It all started in April of 2007 when I fell down the stairs drunk in a pair of too tall heels. Who knew a simple little ankle injury would fuck up my life. A month and several misdiagnosis later, I was in the hospital with a blood clot the size of Texas in my leg (stop me if you've heard this one!) and two small clots (thank god they were small) in my right lung (we nicknamed them Bert & Ernie). After 6 days in the hospital, a few days on complete bedrest I was ready to go home... to my brand new life with a clotting disorder. No more birth control, no more smoking, coumadin for at least 6 months, and no drinking. HELL!! Take away the birth control, and I get SEVERE PMS... AND HORRENDOUS CRAMPS. Then came the mental effects of nearly dying. Severe anxiety attacks... depression... a psychiatrist diagnosed me with mild depression, post traumatic stress disorder, anxiety disorder and panic disorder. That came with a couple of medications to control my panic attacks and mood swings and such. Of course, it took time to find the ones that actually worked for me. And then came the migraines. Headaches like I have never expierenced before... usually around the same time I would get severe PMS. Sometimes so badly I couldn't see straight. As the months went on, they came more and more frequently. And then... just when I thought I was getting my mental health in order... I fell down some stairs (yes, I know, AGAIN) while in Hawaii on vacation with my boyfriend. This time, I couldn't just bruise a bone... I really went all the way. I got myself a spiral fracture of both bones in my ankle... basically I broke it in 3 places requiring surgery... a plate... 6 screws and 2 pins to repair it. It also meant that I had to be completely off my ankle for the next 6 weeks... then in a walking cast for 5 weeks. You should have seen me scooting up and down my stairs on my butt for weeks on end. It was by far the worst pain I have ever endured.. and the biggest pain in the ass. You just don't realize how much you need a leg until it is taken away! So now that that's taken care of... let's get back to those pesky migraines that still have not gone away... and did I mention are just getting more and more frequent. I saw doctor after doctor... who put me on migraine medicine after migraine medicine... all without success. I saw a neurologist who sent me for an MRI which showed nothing... and then he put me on yet another migraine medicine which of course didn't work. So when I finally got a migraine for 6 weeks straight... I decided to take some drastic steps. I went to this center where they do injections to treat chronic pain... actual shots into your head, neck, shoulders, back. They are a sort of anti-inflamatory that when injected works to soothe nerves and muscles. Also I started going to a chiropractor, who x-rayed my back and showed me how messed up it really was... requiring treatments 3x a week. So while I am trying to make myself healthier... I get yet another setback... this time from work. All of this is 1 year and 10 months. And that's just the health stuff....
Let us not forget about my several car troubles costing a couple thousand dollars... one time leaving me stranded on the side of the freeway... an accident on Thanksgiving that was ruled my fault and resulted in a nice ticket for me... my several photo radar tickets...
And of course, my always tight financial situation, due mostly to my never ending medical bills.
I now see a therapist about once every 2 weeks.
A chiropractor 3 times a week.
My pain injection doctor once every 2 weeks.
My pychiatrist once every 6-8 weeks.
All in an effort to get control of my health, my life.
But it just seems like everytime I get a handle on one thing, something else pops up... everytime it seems like my life is finally getting on the right track.. heading out of hell, someone or something derails me.

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