Written November 3rd, just a few days after returning home from the hospital.
This morning I watched the sun peek into our room as it was coming up, I would have happily traded it for a little sleep. For those wondering what has been going on and how we are doing, this is a little bit of what we’ve been going through this past week.
10:30pm headache started, more from just trying to get my head comfortable enough to sleep. I did an ice pack on the back of my neck to hopefully help with pain and most likely inflammation. Dozed off to sleep.
1am awake with head pain, tried propping pillows to be comfortable for my head. Took Tylenol, tossed and turned couldn’t sleep because of pressure and pain.
3:15 got up because sleep feels impossible tonight. My head is still aching and hurting but my stomach is growling so I ate some plain crackers and a drink, it’s then I realize sitting with my head not touching anything feels best. Had a little breakdown and cried quietly because I didn’t want to wake anyone else. Heading back to bed with 600mg of Motrin.
5am still no sleep and no relief from the head pain. Laying down hurts and makes the pressure worse. Going to try to sleep sitting up in the living room. I am beyond exhausted. Pressure starts lifting but still can’t sleep, work traffic is starting and I know soon school traffic and sunshine will be starting. I go back to our bedroom quietly but it wakes Jerome up. He wakes up and asks if I’m okay, I start sobbing telling him I can’t sleep, my head hurts from the pressure and I’ve heard 2 trains go by and the loud garbage truck at the elementary. I tell him I was trying to sleep in the living room because it feels better sitting up. He jumped up, came over to me, held me, and let me cry on him but also tried to get me to calm down because since all of this, my bp has been up too. He gets a bunch of pillows and makes me a place on our bed so I can sleep without lying down.
I fall asleep and dream vividly. In my dream, some people had stayed in our house for a short time. I had to go away but when I came back home and opened up the door I was upset and mad. They had broken our staircase, it was lying in pieces all over the stairs, splintered wood that once held a lot of memories, and now it was just a mess. I was so mad, then I turned around and I was facing a concert area, it hadn’t started yet and the band was warming up and they sounded awful. They were there, the people who had messed up our home. I was angry, so angry but holding it in. I yelled at them but they didn’t hear me, someone standing beside me in the dream told me to yell at them harder, let them know how I feel. So I took a big breath, I was so mad they messed our home up and left, I yelled, not a scared yell but an angry yell. A very angry yell. Then I felt a hand on my right arm, I thought they were trying to tell me to be quiet so I got mad and yelled harder. Then I woke up, my husband was holding my arm trying to gently wake me from the dream I was having, I was screaming in my sleep. He calmed me back down and I tried going back to sleep. He fell back to sleep, I know he is exhausted too. This past week has been traumatic for all of us.
The sun wasn’t up just yet, it was peeking through the door. I couldn’t stop thinking about the dream. I watched the sun get brighter in our room as it was now morning. I thought about the dream and how it felt like it was in correlation with everything here. Everything was fine last Thursday before the hospitalization. I was gone for a while. I came home Tuesday and everything felt different. There was/is a lot to process. I’m afraid our home will never feel like it did before the hospital stay and now everything feels destroyed. I’m mad, I’m scared, so scared and I just want to yell as loud as I can,” I’m scared! I’m not ready for this! I’m not strong enough to go through this! I just want everything put back together the way it was before I went away!”. But I can’t, I feel like I can’t, I know I need to be strong and hopeful.
For those that don’t know yet, in short, I spent a week in the hospital. What started as an anaphylactic reaction to an iron infusion (my iron level wasn’t tested before infusion, and was given too much iron) ended up with us in a second hospital, CT scan, CT scan with contrast, finding of a large bone mass at the base and left side of my skull that goes up behind my ear that shouldn’t be there that could or could not be cancer only more testing will show, an MRI, lots and lots of labs/bloodwork and a bone scan at the nuclear science lab at St. Mary’s.
0 comments