First Few Days At Home

The last two brief updates were only shared on the Facebook page so we thought we'd update the blog for those who are only checking here.

I was able to go home on Thursday and the first night and morning went well so Kyle decided to go in to work on Friday and my sister Rebekah (who is also down visiting from Edmonton:) came over for the day to care for me. Around noon I started getting pretty strong painful abdominal and low back contractions and began passing a lot of blood and some blood clots from my bladder, within an hour of that I fell to the floor and nearly fainted. I'm not sure how I didn't fully faint, I just kept making noise and tried my hardest to keep my eyes open even though it was all black. I felt nauseous and unable to take a full breath and lost my hearing for a bit. When my hearing started to return there was a loud ringing and hissing sound that lasted about an hour. I'm so thankful my dear sister was here as she helped me back up, whisked the two kids downstairs (my son Brandon and her daughter Alexis were here too), and she called Kyle to come home from work and take me to the hospital.

The hospital was of no help as the ER was filled with over 40 people and they had no bed available for me to lay on while I waited. The triage nurse checked my vitals and my blood pressure is quite below normal, so my near fainting incident is likely due to low hemoglobin and the additional blood loss I suddenly started experiencing. My oxygen at the time was 92, so not low enough at the time to be rushed in. Obviously 100 is best but anywhere in the 90's they don't "panic".  I tried to sit and wait as long as I could, but sitting in a chair is SO painful. After an hour and a half the pain and contractions were so bad I was crying, even though I had taken an oral morphine pill before we left home. Kyle said the triage nurses there were quite rude to him and had no sympathy for me so Kyle and I were thinking the pain I was in was not worth the wait to be seen by a doctor.

Just before we left Kyle ended up running up to the nurses unit I was discharged from the day before and spoke to one of the nurses there about my condition and she even came down to see me. God bless her caring soul. She obviously isn't allowed to give any medical advice but was able to chat with us and share her thoughts, we agreed the pain I would be in sitting and waiting for who knows how many hours to see a doctor was going to set me back and cause too much damage and more to recover from when I'm already so weak. Kyle and I decided to monitor the blood loss and my condition at home overnight and come back at a less busy time or wait for my doctor/surgeon to order us tests to figure out where the blood is coming from and where exactly my hemoglobin is at and if I'm in need of a transfusion. I left a message for my doctor yesterday, who says messages are checked hourly, but have heard nothing back yet.

I called my naturopathic doctor as well and he is always so quick to get back to me and eager to help (he gave me his cell and home number a couple years ago) and he gave us guidance as well. Overnight the blood loss lessened and has currently subsided. I still feel very light headed and have a pressure headache. I need to hold on to walls or use a cane to stand and walk as I'm quite weak and dizzy. Talking too long makes me feel short of breath. I've struggled with low hemoglobin at times over the years so I know the feeling and I'm sure that's what's causing these symptoms. Following the advice to take something to help with being so backed up from all the narcotics I've been on this week has also helped with the abdominal contractions considerably. Overall overnight I made enough improvements that we feel ok to wait for a reply from my doctor. So unless anything gets worse, we think staying home and in bed resting is best for me right now.

I have also caught a cold this week. And my son Brandon seems to have caught the flu last night (he's been with Lucas at my parents all week so thankfully he's being taken care of for us, thanks Mom and Dad!) So please pray for us. That these "hiccups" will pass and that I'll be able to just rest and recover without my cold getting too bad and that I won't catch the flu now too since I was around Brandon most of the day yesterday.

Thank you all for your continued support and prayers.