(TW: Medical Trauma, Medical Gaslighting, Chronic Illness, Mental Illness.)
I’ve surfaced again.
Originally, I’d planned to just post one of the pre-written posts I’d made a few weeks back- and I thank my past self greatly for writing them but, my desperation to feel like a person again is too strong today. While, I know that might sound overly dramatic, I can promise you that it isn’t. Since my surgery, I haven’t been able to do much.
For the most part, I spend my days laying in bed, watching House reruns on Peacock, and only occasionally getting up to go to the bathroom. Angel takes amazing care of me, better than I ever could have hoped for but, even so the thought of being trapped in bed helpless is driving me stir-crazy. As it is right now, it’s hard to do almost anything for myself. I’m not able to get up and walk around- not like I had much mobility before but, I feel like even more of my independence has been ripped away from me. Bending over is impossible. I’m not allowed to lift anything, or I risk compromising my stitches.
I love her. I really, really do. If I need something to drink, she gets it for me- most times without asking. She’s constantly making sure that I take my medications on time, and that I have everything I need. Lucky doesn’t even describe what I am for having her because, while my little brother, Pip, tries to help here and there, it’s not the same. He’ll bring me a popsicle, a grilled cheese, or a drink, occasionally if I ask him to but, that would be the extent of his caretaking skills. If I have an appointment, she drives me to it, especially when it’s in Schaumburg, at 10:15am with a doctor who may or may not have gotten all of his licensing out of a dollar store cereal box. I have no idea what I’m going to do to repay her for all that she does for me- even though I know she doesn’t expect anything, I still feel like I must do something for her.
But what I mean by that is fairly simple. As you already know, when I woke up last Wednesday after surgery, I felt a heaviness and numbness in my left side, and the side of my face. I told the nurses, who told the doctor. The doctor then came in, and said it was going to be fine, and that it was “probably just from how I was laid out on the table.” Yet, I knew for a fact that I wasn’t face down on my left side. They bring you into the OR awake, have you move over onto the table, and from there you get into position. But I was tired, and groggy, and still under the effects of anesthesia and the Benadryl that they’d given me, so I didn’t really question it further. After all, doctors are supposed to help us, right?
Right…?
The next day, as you know from my last post, Angel brought me into the ER. The left side of my face was still numb, and hard to move. My arm, and left leg also felt incredibly weak and heavy aside from my usual chronic pain. On top of that, I was also running fevers, constantly nauseated, and vomiting every time I took my medication, due to what was prescribed. I spent about 8-hours in the ER getting poked, prodded, pin-cushioned, and tested for just about everything under the sun. CT scans, x-rays, the whole nine yards.
Thankfully, they didn’t find that I had a stroke. However, they did find that I had developed something called Bell’s Palsy. A nerve dysfunction that causes a sudden weakness in the muscles on one side of the face. In most cases, this thankfully goes away, and is only temporary, so it should hopefully resolve over the next few weeks. The weakness makes half of the face appear to droop. Smiles are one-sided, and the eye on the affected side resists closing.
I’m lucky. It isn’t a severe case, and my eye isn’t really affected too much. I’m mostly presenting with numbness in the lips and mouth, and my smile has become one-sided. Almost to the point where I want to make a Heath Ledger “why so serious?” joke. Because dark humor and sarcasm are the only things that really keep me going right now, otherwise, I would probably be crying myself into a puddle on the floor. You know?
They also found that there were hyperdense nodules in my kidneys- also known as a cyst, or maybe multiple. I don’t know. So, I was told to go see my GP, and set up an ultrasound, just to make sure everything is okay. My anxiety says that nothing is okay but, she’s an asshole, and I cannot always trust her judgement. If I listened to her every time, she told me to freak out, I don’t think I’d be sitting here today. So, off to the GP we went on Tuesday, and let me tell you that I have absolutely nothing nice to say.
My doctor is a fucking moron. You’d think that when someone comes to see you because of cysts in the kidneys, the least that they would do is examine you, right? Maybe make you pee in a cup but, instead, I got all of 97-seconds of bullshit. The tech sat with us for a long time, going over my history, asking questions, doing vitals, and being as gentle with me as he could. (I liked him a lot better than the doctor.) He even asked me about some past symptoms that show up in my chart, and like many other professionals I’ve talked to, asked if I have EDS. (Which we should hopefully find out in the coming weeks, as I have an appointment with a specialist.)
But my doctor? Came in, asked how I was doing, I started explaining and he said that he’d give me Zofran for the nausea and vomiting. He only gave me the prescription for an ultrasound because the lady from the hospital had called his office and said I needed to have it done, and then, said to me and I quote “If I’m not doing anything for you, it means you’re fine.” We have a recording of it, and even though we have it recorded, I’m still in absolute fucking disbelief.
Life just kind of sucks right now, and my mental health is SUFFERING.
My writing is suffering, and so am I. But I’m still just trying to take it all one day at a time and push through it because, I don’t know what I’d do otherwise. I can’t give up. That’s not the kind of person my mom raised me to be, and someday, when I see her again, I want to be able to tell her that even on my deathbed I have no regrets.
-Sky
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