I will be 16 weeks on Saturday! YAY...
I have been through a ton of stuff since the last time I posted. On July 13th I had my 2nd Doctors appointment , I did my normal urine sample, and as soon as I walked into the Dr's office I was asked if my cup of water had sugar in it from the mid-wife. I told her no, that it just had to small pieces of cantaloupe in it for some flavor. She said my urine came back with high ketones.. so high that she referred to it as a diabetic having a large Slurpee for breakfast. She quickly said that I needed to go straight to the ER to get fluids, and that I am not to go back to work until further notice. After spending 10 hours in the ER, a lady came down to talk to me about home care. The next day, a nurse came to my house and set me up on an IV and I was pretty much on bed rest, only getting up to throw up, and use the bathroom.
So, by that time a week has passed.. I am still throwing up my fluids, as well as stomach bile. I went to my follow up Doctors appointment that Thursday, and again was told that I needed to go home, and pack a bag because I needed to go to the hospital ASAP, that I needed to get a picc line, put in for my new IV, and that the Mommy and Baby unit was waiting for me.
A short breakdown later, Chris and I were headed yet again to the hospital.
After all the general questions the nurse had to ask me, I was finally able to relax and take everything in. I am thankful that I had Chris there, with me as well as a room big enough for two beds so that Chris was able to stay. From there... I was know as the patient in Room 12.
I was only suppose to be in the hospital for a day, they hooked me up to fluids and then we waited for the shift change and my new nurses to come in.
The next morning, they came to get me to put in my picc line. I was a nervous wreck at that point, because I didn't know what to expect. For anyone that doesn't know a picc line is pretty much like an IV line, but more permanent. It was placed right above my right elbow on the inside of my arm, and travels up my arm.. over my collar bone and stops at the top of my heart.
After I was done was getting the p. line placed, I returned to my room and one of my Doctors came in and said that I was staying until the middle of the following week. So my planned two night stay turned into a six night stay.
During my stay in the Mommy/ Baby unit.. I had the best nurses anyone could ask for...well except for one! On my second night in the hospital my nurse that night.. freaked out on me because of my vitals and and everything else going on.. she started to panic and kept saying we need to get you up to the fourth floor, you need to be put on heart monitors and watched over night... your levels are so low that your heart could stop any minute. (cue tears and my panic mode) By this time its 9 o'clock and I was just exhausted and wanted to go to sleep and all I kept hearing was this rude nurse telling me I needed to go to the fourth floor. Chris had asked her how long I was going to be on the fourth floor and she responded back in a rudely with "that's like me telling you how long she is going to be sick for.. I don't know." This nurse explained NOTHING to Chris or I about why I had to go to the fourth floor. Finally about 12 o'clock I got settled into the fourth floor room.. which let me state.. the fourth floor is the stroke unit.. I was put on a heart monitors.. I was not able to get up to use the restroom with out the bed alarm going off.. because apparently they thought I wasn't capable of going by myself and told me I needed a nurse. I now refer to the fourth floor as the dungeon.. my room was dark.. dirty and old. I had to have the nurse go and find a pull out chair for Chris to sleep on.
The next morning one of the favorite nurses came up to the dungeon to check on the baby's heart beat and she looked at me and said.. this room is disgusting. I'm talking to Dr. C and as soon as your potassium is up your coming back down to the second floor, they aren't keeping you here another night. I spent the whole day on the fourth floor and was finally brought back to the Mommy/ Baby unit about 4 o'clock that afternoon.
Come to find out my other nurses that I love.. have each been in different departments of the hospital so they kind of knew my situation and how to deal with it. But the evil nurse from the night before (who is older then all the other nurses) was not use to my situation. The reason why I had to go to the dungeon is because my potassium was at a level of 2.1. A normal level is 3.5 - 5.0. If it would have dropped lower to a 1 then my heart could have stopped.
After they got all my levels back up... potassium.. sodium.. phosphates etc. I was pretty easy from there. I was put on a nasty liquid diet for the first four days, which consisted of soup broth.. nasty cherry jello that was yellow(???) and juice. That was three times a day. I barely ate any of it. After that I was put on a bland diet... baked french fries and turkey sandwich.
When I was finally discharged from the hospital.. I was sent home with my picc line still in and put back on home care. So a nurse comes everyday.. to check my picc line.. and to make sure that I am adding everything to my liquid food that I am on. My house looks like a medical facility with all the white bags filled with syringes... needles... cords... medicine...etc. The refrigerator has been stock piled with my huge bags of IV fluids.
I went to the Doctors again on Wednesday, and was told I was to stay on my home IV until I could eat regular food three times a day. And still not able to go to work. All I have to say is thank goodness I have great insurance as well as Aflac!!!
So that's it... that's everything that has been going on with me.
xo~c
