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So apparently it's my turn in the hospital now...
So apparently it's my turn in the hospital now...
#1
So yeah.  The thing with Aaron's passing left me understandably paranoid.  The night before last, I had what felt like a terrible case of gas and was attempting to write it off as such, but it just kept getting worse and worse.

It turns out my paranoia was well founded - I have Appendicitis, and it's already perforated, causing an abscess in my abdominal cavity.

Fortunately, I came in when I did just before things could get real bad for me, and now I'm on some nice opioids and potent antibiotics.  The game plan is that since it's already abscessed, it's better to just clean it out and let the appendix heal - we'll be doing that tomorrow.  Then I'll be sent home to recover, and then later on come back for the actual Appendectomy.  In the meantime they're keeping a close eye on my to make sure my condition doesn't suddenly deteriorate.

Fortunately, this isn't costing me anything because I'm on VA Healthcare.  The only thing I worry about is missing out on classes, which starts on the 26th.
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RE: So apparently it's my turn in the hospital now...
#2
Oh, dear. It sounds like they caught it in time.

Have you let the school know about the medical emergency? It would suck if they cancelled your enrollment because you were in the hospital on the 26th.
--
Rob Kelk

Sticks and stones can break your bones,
But words can break your heart.
- unknown
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RE: So apparently it's my turn in the hospital now...
#3
I still remember my bout with appendicitis when I was in high school -- I definitely got off easier than you did, but knowing how little fun it was, I feel for you. Get better soon, BA.
-- Bob

I have been Roland, Beowulf, Achilles, Gilgamesh, Clark Kent, Mary Sue, DJ Croft, Skysaber.  I have been 
called a hundred names and will be called a thousand more before the sun grows dim and cold....
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RE: So apparently it's my turn in the hospital now...
#4
Be well, man. Best of luck.
Sucrose Octanitrate.

Proof positive that with sufficient motivation, you can make anything explode.
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RE: So apparently it's my turn in the hospital now...
#5
Get well soon, please.

I love the smell of rotaries in the morning. You know one time, I got to work early, before the rush hour. I walked through the empty carpark, I didn't see one bloody Prius or Golf. And that smell, you know that gasoline smell, the whole carpark, smelled like.... ....speed.

One day they're going to ban them.
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RE: So apparently it's my turn in the hospital now...
#6
Doing alright so far. The antibiotics IV drip they've had be on has beaten back the infection to the point where my guts have become....

....quite vocal.

Supposedly, barring some horrific circumstance that suddenly floods the South Texas Medical Center with emergency surgery cases, I'll be getting that abscess drained today and I'll be that much closer to getting on my way.
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RE: So apparently it's my turn in the hospital now...
#7
Interventional Radiology said it was a no-go: the abscess is in a spot that has no safe avenue of access.

Typical.

So now they're just pumping me chock full of antibacterials through IV solutions, which they'll soon move to oral applications in preparations to send me packing home. They've already got me scheduled for a followup on the 6th.
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RE: So apparently it's my turn in the hospital now...
#8
Wait, what's Radiology got to do with it? Were they planning to (more or less literally but with something that actually penetrates instead of microwaves) kill the hostile microorganisms in the abscess by nuking it rather than physically opening it up, or something? Also, much shock, best wishes, etc. Sorry to be late on that, I installed Star Trek Online a few days ago and hadn't done anything online since until deciding it was time for a mental health break yesterday.
--
‎noli esse culus
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RE: So apparently it's my turn in the hospital now...
#9
(08-21-2019, 10:28 AM)classicdrogn Wrote: Wait, what's Radiology got to do with it? Were they planning to (more or less literally but with something that actually penetrates instead of microwaves) kill the hostile microorganisms in the abscess by nuking it rather than physically opening it up, or something? Also, much shock, best wishes, etc. Sorry to be late on that, I installed Star Trek Online a few days ago and hadn't done anything online since until deciding it was time for a mental health break yesterday.

Figure out if they can access the appendix without having to go through other organs or otherwise damage them. Apparently, they can't, which implies they'd have to go through the intestinal tract. That's to be expected given the general location of the appendix.

The main reason you'd try to drain the abscess is to limit the size of the infection by draining debris and free floating live bacteria. If they have to go through his intestines just to get at the appendix they'd just make things worse because those wounds would also be very likely to cause nasty infections. Which is why they're not going to do that and just double down on the antibiotics. Those things work, it's just going to suck worse, and take longer for the infection to get eradicated than if they'd been able to drain it.
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RE: So apparently it's my turn in the hospital now...
#10
Radiology doesn't actually have anything to do with Radiation Therapy/Treatment; that's generally considered part of Oncology. Radiology as a department has grown to become the catch-all for all of Medical Imaging, so things like Ultrasound, MRI and CT are all included.

My guess here is that they were planning a paracentesis (i.e. jabbing a needle in his belly very carefully) to drain the abscess, but after looking at images/data of where the abscess was located they decided there was no easy way to get to it.
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RE: So apparently it's my turn in the hospital now...
#11
Yeah, anytime you're dealing with any sort of imaging of the body's internals, that's where the Radiology department gets involved.  X-Ray, MRI, CT, PET, Ultrasound - all of that is Radiology Department in most hospitals.

Interventional Radiology is the subset where they're not just looking, but are also going to be poking around and moving things.

But yeah, no worries about not catching on right away.  I've been guilty of this myself before.  I'm just glad that I got this looked at before my life was seriously threatened.

It sucks being special, though, in that normal procedures that would usually provide a quick, clean fix don't apply to me.  Sad
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RE: So apparently it's my turn in the hospital now...
#12
Be glad you are not the first guy who is special.

The first guy? Him they opened up. And possibly killed before they realized their otherwise reasonable assumptions were wrong.
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RE: So apparently it's my turn in the hospital now...
#13
Ah, okay. I was just drawing a blank on how Radiology could be Interventional without, you know, involving hopefully-harmful-only-in-a-targeted-way raditaion exposure. Being the general umbrella for all mechanically assisted imaging makes that much more clear, and wasn't the case when my Mum was a nurse as a kid and most of my medical exposure comes from - Ultrasound was in fact under Obstetrics then (at least where she worked) regardless of what they were using it for,. Which pretty much meant her, as head OBGYN nurse, which was pretty cool, and meant I got to do a really comprehensive science class report on it in ... junior high, I guess? I don't think I was tall enough for the memory to have been high school.
--
‎noli esse culus
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RE: So apparently it's my turn in the hospital now...
#14
Shit, that really sucks. Here's hoping the treatment at least -works-, dude.
Sucrose Octanitrate.

Proof positive that with sufficient motivation, you can make anything explode.
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RE: So apparently it's my turn in the hospital now...
#15
Shit man, nothing ever goes right for you, does it.  At least you caught it early, giving the docs lots of options.  As a security professional, I approve of your paranoia.

Currently sick myself with something I got on the flight back the U.S., and I'm not convinced the antibiotics are doing anything to the sinus infection.  Had to drive into the office too, so I could train my new underling minion peon henchman.  Probably made me sicker but at least I like the guy.
"Kitto daijoubu da yo." - Sakura Kinomoto
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RE: So apparently it's my turn in the hospital now...
#16
Hope you have a speedy recovery.
“We can never undo what we have done. We can never go back in time. We write history with our decisions and our actions. But we also write history with our responses to those actions. We can leave the pain and the damage in our wake, unattended, or we can do the work of acknowledging and fixing, to whatever extent possible, the harm that we have caused.”

— On Repentance and Repair: Making Amends in an Unapologetic World by Danya Ruttenberg
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RE: So apparently it's my turn in the hospital now...
#17
Likewise, to both of you.
--
Rob Kelk

Sticks and stones can break your bones,
But words can break your heart.
- unknown
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RE: So apparently it's my turn in the hospital now...
#18
(08-22-2019, 02:42 PM)Labster Wrote: Shit man, nothing ever goes right for you, does it.  At least you caught it early, giving the docs lots of options.  As a security professional, I approve of your paranoia.

Currently sick myself with something I got on the flight back the U.S., and I'm not convinced the antibiotics are doing anything to the sinus infection.  Had to drive into the office too, so I could train my new underling minion peon henchman.  Probably made me sicker but at least I like the guy.

Ooof.  Sorry to hear that, Labster.  Just keep at it with the AB - if it seems like it's not making any improvements, then what they are doing is keeping it from getting worse.

And yeah, you're not the only one noticing lately.  When my dad got word, mom says he just shook his head and said, "That just figures."  Keep in mind, he ain't the type of person to believe in bad luck or anything like that, and yet he's acknowledging that somehow probability is definitely skewed against my favor.

As for me, I'm doing better.  My guts have been sensitive to even the light jarring walking provides.  However, after being on the oral antibiotics for over 24 hours now I can report that I'm starting to feel better.

I guess that with these drugs going through the digestive track, they can attack the infection more directly than even an IV drip would allow.

If nothing else, it's nice to be able to sleep in my own bed again.  That memory foam bed they had me in was meant for someone FAR heavier than me!
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RE: So apparently it's my turn in the hospital now...
#19
(multiple explitives deleted)

GORRAM IT!!!!! Granted we have a thread for this, but gorramit its good to hear you are here and not *that gorram thread*
Hear that thunder rolling till it seems to rock the sky?
Thats' every ship in Grayson's Navy taking up the cry!
NO QUARTER!

No Quarter by Echo's Children
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RE: So apparently it's my turn in the hospital now...
#20
No worries, Star.  This is just part of that lucky draw I got in the genetic shuffle from my mom's side.

See, I don't just age gracefully, it also takes a lot to actually bring me down.  Grandpa Farmer was over 75 years old, and he had abused the fuck out of himself.  Grandma Farmer got taken out by Advanced Alzheimer's Disease - and not until she was well into her 80's.  The entire family is chock full of people who are so damn stubborn that Death has himself a helluva fight on his hands if he tries to take one of us in.

Consider that I had appendicitis where my appendix had....  well, kinda ruptured.  It was perforated and had caused an abscess to form.  Right now I'm guessing that's where it actually started hurting.  From what I understand, I should have been feeling it a lot earlier than I actually did.  Like, once the infection had set in and not at that advanced state!

And when I did start feeling it?  It didn't feel much like anything more than some gas and cramps.  Normally, that doesn't cause me trouble for more than a few hours.  They tend to be some very unpleasant hours, but it does pass.  However, after a certain point in time, I knew that this had officially crossed the line from "Just Relax, Dude" to "Okay, We May Have a Problem Here".

Hell, I didn't even start running a fever until I decided it was time to visit the hospital.  I was only about 99.2 or some such when I went into the ER, and I topped out at about 102.5, but not until my second night after being admitted to the surgical ward.

I was actually even able to drive myself to the hospital.  It took even longer than usual because I had to detour around some late-night construction work (they're upgrading the interchanges here to full-on stack interchanges), but I got there safely regardless.  It just wasn't a pleasant experience.

Murphy can try, but that fucker is gonna have to do something a lot more drastic than appendicitis to take me out of the game.
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RE: So apparently it's my turn in the hospital now...
#21
Fuck Murphy. You get better soon, dude.
Sucrose Octanitrate.

Proof positive that with sufficient motivation, you can make anything explode.
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RE: So apparently it's my turn in the hospital now...
#22
I was switched to a different class of antibiotics yesterday and that seems to be helping more. Sometimes, staying on the antibiotics just means you're taking out the competition for the thing that is hurting you. Seriously, this is the worst case of sinusitis I've had in over a decade, if not longer, and I've had a lot of cases. Not as bad as the whooping cough was, but sheesh, there were like seven days in a row where each day I felt worse than the last.

None of this is anywhere near as bad as what BA is going through, though. Geez louise, get well soon.
"Kitto daijoubu da yo." - Sakura Kinomoto
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RE: So apparently it's my turn in the hospital now...
#23
Hey guys, just checking in to let you know I'm doing okay.  It's the first day of classes and I'm feeling alright.  The antibiotics are doing good and my bowels are finally starting to return to something resembling normal activity.  (Liquid diets suck.)

The nursing staff are glad that I'm counteracting the antibiotics by drinking plenty of probiotic yogurt-drinks.  They always seem happy to run into a Vet that actually knows what's what and that the magic pills are not cure-alls that handle everything.  (Like the time I got a dog bite - "Did you treat the wound any?"  "Soap, Water, Alcohol, and Hydrogen Peroxide."  "GOOD.")

EDIT: I'll have more news in this thread once I have my followup appointment - Friday, next week.
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RE: So apparently it's my turn in the hospital now...
#24
Definitely good to hear, BA. Keep treating yourself right Smile
--
‎noli esse culus
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RE: So apparently it's my turn in the hospital now...
#25
Just be careful - and maybe stay off your feet for a bit longer.

Glad you're feeling better.

I love the smell of rotaries in the morning. You know one time, I got to work early, before the rush hour. I walked through the empty carpark, I didn't see one bloody Prius or Golf. And that smell, you know that gasoline smell, the whole carpark, smelled like.... ....speed.

One day they're going to ban them.
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