Oh no, back again! - part 7 in a tumorous saga

(watching TV)

So now I am home after being in the hospital since the 11th of August. Eleven days.

Not such a long time but for me, a formerly healthy person, it seemed like an eternity. Spent a wonderful weekend at home with my wife fussing over me like a mother hen. Then Monday and off went Michele to work at St Ursula’s School, leaving me at home by myself. No problem as I was in a perpetual daze/doze due to all the medications I was on. But on Tuesday morning I phoned Michele in a panic, I was battling to breathe and had to remain sitting. It felt like a metal band around my chest. She rushed home and took me to my GP. I was taken for x-rays and we had to wait for them and take them back to my GP. The prognosis was grave, I was informed that it seemed like my heart was enlarged and I was rushed into hospital, the same one. Michele was irritating the nurses by repeatedly demanding that oxygen be given to me while they ignored her. She thought the oxygen would be a good idea as I was battling to breathe.

My specialist physician was on holiday and could not see me. There was a specialist physician, intensive care sub specialist on call and the nurses contacted him. He arrived in the late afternoon. He was extremely unhappy with the lackadaisical approach of the nurses and berated them quite sternly for not contacting him immediately and not giving me oxygen. He sent me for another x-ray and when he saw the result he was able to conclude that my heart had not enlarged but due to the fact that I was not breathing deeply enough, the ratio between heart and lungs was disproportionate. Upon further examination he saw that there was a clot in my one lung and the bottom section was dying. He realised that I had had a pulmonary embolism where a clot had miraculously passed through my heart and got lodged in my lung. He knew of the severe risk of my clotting blood and instructed the nurses to regularly inject me with a blood thinning agent through stomach injections. (I erroneously mentioned these injections in my previous article; I have been gently censured and advised not to submit any article without my wife reviewing them first).

(effects of injections on my stomach)

I was also given warfarin, this stuff is like the poison found in Rattex (to kill rats obviously); it thins blood. The dreaded stomach injections were to continue and the viscosity of my blood was to be continually monitored. I was put in a male ward with other patients, some of whom were having serious health problems. The one fellow was a friendly Afrikaner with appalling diabetes (more and more amputations were having to be done), to pass the time we played chess when I did not feel too nauseous.

About a week later, a sister arrived who would allow warfarin to be dispensed to me when I went home. I was instructed on the dangers and strict dietary guidelines to be followed. I had to sign a document as evidence that I had been appropriately instructed and knew of the risks. The hospital had my blood viscosity under control and I was allowed to go home on Monday the 5th of September 2015.

I started to go back to work and was able to work for a few hours every day before falling asleep. I would then wake up and work some more. I had to get a lift to and from work as I was not allowed to drive. I was feeling nauseous so I did not eat (literally), it was a minor victory if I could eat half a slice of toast in a day. At this stage my two eldest girls were in university so family finances were very, very tight. The remainder of September and most of October passed in this way. I lost a lot of weight and my weight fell below seventy kilograms.

The embolism had filled me with a great deal of irrational fear. I dreaded sleeping in a dark room and had to have a small light on. Michele had to touch me before I could go to sleep. I liked to have the curtains open so I could see the night sky. It took me quite to fall asleep because of the pain from the shingles and my frozen shoulder, but eventually the pain would dissipate. Michele could also not show any extreme emotion or I would go off the deep end emotionally, so she had to be calm and measured in all circumstances when around me.

Michele told me on Saturday (26th of September) that the following week was the school play and she would have to attend the school every evening. I panicked and broke down, I could not stop myself from sobbing. Alarmed, Michele contacted my GP and explained the situation. She was sent to a pharmacy to get some “emotional parachutes”, I could not be left alone and had to go with. People in the shopping centre were alarmed when they saw this sobbing man being assisted into the pharmacy. The pharmacist was expecting me and I was given a tiny white pill which I took immediately. Without a word of a lie, within a few minutes I was smiling and even giggling with sheer emotional relief. I was warned about the extremely addictive nature of these pills and advised to only use them when absolutely necessary.

In later weeks I managed to wean myself off them, when I felt another emotional meltdown coming I would leave my office and pace outside for 20 minutes to half an hour. I had quite a sense of accomplishment when I could avoid taking the pill. However, it gave me the feeling of security just knowing that in my black bag I have a pill for “just in case”. Today I still have the pill in my black bag, several years later. Remember the character Linus in Peanuts? He always had his security blanket with him. I am just like that.

In the following week, on Monday the 6th of October, I was feeling extremely nauseous, tired, weak and anxious. I was afraid that I was having another embolism, I was checked back into hospital but when my specialist physician checked me over, he could find nothing specific and said it was all in my mind. It was the combination of medicines and I would just have to endure it until these extreme feelings disappeared. I was then checked out of the hospital the following day, a Tuesday.

I continued to feel terrible and I did not improve in the slightest. By Friday I could not bear it any more so I went back to my GP. He wasn’t there so I went to another family doctor in the same practice. She wanted to book me back into the hospital but I was extremely reluctant and refused. She said she would have to take some samples of my blood for emergency testing and put me on a drip. I agreed and was put into a small room where the drip was attached, I remember I got extremely claustrophobic and the drip took a small eternity before it finished and I could go home. Back on the Saturday morning where the doctor had received the results of the blood test back. She then was brilliantly able to uncover my problem. She found that my cortisone dosage was being reduced far too quickly; my body was unable to make its own cortisol and I was now suffering from Addisons disease, a name for the withdrawal effects of lowering cortisone too quickly. She compared it to jumping off a roof rather than taking a single step at a time to get to ground floor. My cortisone dosage had to be increased back to its original levels. I was sent back to my specialist physician who confirmed the GP’s diagnosis.

It is now the battle of my mind as drug levels are reduced, first cortisone then stillpain, I don’t know what will happen in terms of the warfarin. To combat one health problem with drugs seems to lead to serious side effects and another problem… Lots of ammunition for the conspiracy theorists.

Each day is a victory, each day I get stronger…