paging Dr. House

I am a big fan of the TV show House. It wasn't until the second season that I discovered and I was instantly hooked. Since the end of last summer I have been wishing that there was a "real" Dr. House practicing somewhere. Throughout my life I have been a fairly healthy person. There is never anything majorly wrong with me. However from time to time I end come up with some "strange" abnormality. One example that sticks out is when I was in college and lived with my good friends, Kimberly and Sheri. One morning I woke up and I could not move one of my thumbs. It eventually went away, but it was difficult to do much of anything while it "wasn't working." Sometime around the end of last August I noticed something different. The vision in my left eye was a little blurry. I called and made an appointment with my eye Dr. I have reading glasses that I use on the rare occasion, but otherwise my eyes are healthy. After an eye exam I was told that I had a swollen optic nerve. The next step was to see an eye specialist. He saw me and ordered and MRI and set me up with a neurologist. I really didn't know what to think about all of it.



The day of my 27th birthday my mom went with me to the first appointment with my neurologist. He is a wonderful man who actually comes out to the waiting room to get you. His philosophy is that if you need to see a neurologist then you do not need to see a nurse first. He does an exam and discusses the results of the MRI with me, perfectly normal. He goes over a few things that could be causing the swelling. Next, he tells me what I had dreaded, he wants to do a lumbar puncture that day. I'm pretty sure that my mouth dropped open. I kind of laughed and said, "but it's my birthday." Clearly he didn't care. I was not at all prepared for this and I was really glad that my mom came with me on that day. He goes out into the hallway and lets then nurses know that they need to prepare to do this. I really didn't have time to think about what he was about to do. I remember over hearing him say that "this is kind of an emergency." I'm not sure why he put it that way, but it was pretty scary at the time. Next thing I knew I was in the next room in a gown laying on my side. It was over before I knew it and truthfully it was not that bad. I'm glad I didn't have time to dwell on it. The worse was yet to come.



Once that was over the nurse worked on trying to put an iv in me so they could start me on steroids. That was horrible. I was so cold and my veins were not cooperating. At one point she was semi-straddling me and I was laugh/crying. She finally got it in and started the dreaded steroids. After the allotted time I was permitted to head home. Like I mentioned before it was my birthday. I had a few visitors and tried really hard to lay flat. Looking back I wish I would not have moved at all. For the next few days I had to go to the local hospital for more IV steroids. The port that they left in was horrible to work around. They had to put in the bend of my arm and it really hurt. I do not really remember when the headache started, I just know it was there. Apparently the tiny hole that was made by the lumbar needle did not heal over and my spinal fluid was leaking causing the worst headache one could ever have. As long as I laid down I was not in pain. It was miserable. I was so tired of watching TV. There are only so many things one can do while lying flat on their back. Three minutes was all it took for me to feel the pain. The Dr. kept telling me that I should just drink caffeine and rest. I laughed and said I can't do anything but rest. Finally, after what seemed like a month, (maybe a little over a week after my LP) I was scheduled for a blood patch at my local hospital. That is a story in itself that I will not bore you with right now. It was like an immediate relief. I wanted to hug the guy.



So, what did we learn from all the test/pain/misery/Dr. bills? NOTHING. They ruled out a few things but had no explanation for why my optic nerve was swollen and there was vision loss. I was scheduled for follow up visits for 6 months to see what it looked like then.



Fast forward to last week. I went to see my eye specialist. He looked over the results of my visual field test I had done the Friday the week of my D&C (what a fun week). For about 5 minutes he literally did not say a word. He only muttered a few, "huhs". Finally he looked up and said that the visual field test was worse and that he was concerned. He did an exam and confirmed that my optic nerve was in fact still swollen. He said that after 6 months the swelling would have gone down if it was some sort of infection causing it. He went on to say that he was concerned enough that he wanted refer me to a Neuro-Optomologist. He said that he did not have any answers for me as to why it was still like this. I just sat there and did not know what to say. The nurse said that she would have to call me with an appointment. I spoke with her today and I'm scheduled for some time in June. She said that she was waiting to speak with my eye specialist to see if that was okay with him to wait. If not he will have to personally call the, "super" neurologist as I have been calling her, and try to get me worked in sooner. I am scheduled to see my "regular" neurologist this coming Monday.



I really do not know what to think about all of this. When I started this post I didn't expect to go into such detail. I suppose I just needed to get some of my story out there. Part of me wonders if the reason I lost our baby was that my body is not able to care for 2 lives at this time. Perhaps not. I do not know the reason for the loss and I may never know it. God knows and that is all that matters. My mind has been very busy lately thinking and feeling sorry for myself. It is difficult to be hurting both physically and emotionally. I suppose my eye is not causing physical pain other than the annoyance of the blurred vision and headache but it is still physical. I try to stay positive and most days I do just fine. I have been greatly encouraged by those around me and I thank each and every one of you. I would just ask that if you feel so inclined to pray for me, please pray for guidance for my Dr.'s, so that maybe we can have some answers. Maybe there will not be any. Maybe this is just the way my vision will be. I don't know. For now I will just try to be patient and wait for the nurse to get back with me about my appointment. Perhaps I can catch a rerun of House to keep me entertained. I'm pretty sure that if I did see him he would confirm that, "It's not Lupus." (Sorry, I could not resist a House quote.)



Thanks for "listening".--Jess