It’s been a challenging 2 weeks or so. The last few years I’ve been under the impression I’ve developed heartburn. Doesn’t that happen once you reach a “certain age”? Then I had a really bad attack last September when I got Covid for the first time. It was so awful. Crippling pain that lasted all night. I’ve had a bunch of light episodes since, but nothing terrible, until about 2 weeks ago. I was sick for 9 hours straight, non-stop. I thought I might have torn my stomach from it all. Stayed home from work the next day to try and rest, but it started up again around 6pm. For the first time since I was a kid, I went to the hospital. I just knew I couldn’t go through that again on my own, but I was afraid they’d roll their eyes and send me home with milk of magnesia. Urgent Care couldn’t help, so they sent me to the emergency room. It took hours and another attack (after countless EKG’s, sonograms and bloodwork for them to whisk me into a weird emergency room pod to be given an IV of fluids and pain killers. My insurance approved me to be admitted around 6-7am. More tests, more doctors. Turns out, my gallbladder had things wrong with it and had been spreading bad stuff to my liver all this time. Luckily, I don’t drink much (unless I’m visiting my parents, lol!) and the liver damage was still at the stage where it could repair itself.  That gallbladder had to come out, but they needed to take an MRI and they didn’t know when that would happen. Once it did they rushed me down and took it out in a nighttime surprise surgery. Recovery has been okay and I went back to work for partial days Thursday. By partial days, I mean I left an hour early, but was still there 9 hours, no lunch.

The hospital stay was interesting and kind of bizarre. I had a really nice room to myself and had a mountain view. It rained while I was there, so I spent a lit of time looking out the window, didn’t turn the tv on at all!  The bed was dumb though. It was the kind designed to stop you getting bed sores, so every time you shift/move, it inflated then deflated. Sometimes it did it randomly on its own! It was hard enough trying to sleep when the nurses came in every two hours to take vitals, let alone while my bed would randomly move on its own!

Luckily, I was on IV pain killers the entire time coz, I’m not sure I would have appreciated TWO bosses (one with a spouse) visiting me while I was clad in only a hospital gown, no make up, no glasses,  an IV, tons of wires and tubes attached and my hair unbrushed. The absolute worst was when the client a team member sent showed up. A CLIENT!!! Again, luckily I was on drugs and luckily she’s a sweet woman who I adore…but I’d rather she didn’t come. I’m grateful they cared enough to come, but I hadn’t even told family I was there (boy, that didn’t go over well after the fact!).

So I went to hozzie on a Monday night and got home on a Thursday afternoon. What a week that was! I wonder what that bill is going to look like! 😳 After day 2 of being home I quit taking the prescription pain killers and muscle relaxers. I just don’t want to rely on them. Surprisingly, the  pain hasn’t been bad at all. The worst was the big air pocket. I guess they had to pump me full of air to do the surgery and before it dissipates, it moves around like I’m a human spirit level each time I move, pushing my organs around as it searches for the top of wherever it’s at.

I guess I should be glad all this happened after I saw Squeeze in Vegas! I can’t imagine going through all this away from home. I flew in Friday night, met my best friend who drove, went to the show and we drove home after. I’d flown out of Ontario as that’s where they’d rented a car, so I still needed to drive aways home after I reached my car.  I walked back into my place at 3:15am Saturday, exactly 24 hours since I’d woken up, so rock-n-roll! Of course I felt like garbage and spent the entire day recovering. The next evening, my hospital saga started. Yikes!