So here is the timeline of my nightmare...
July 21st, 2002 - My Birthday and the entrance to the gates of hell.
July 23rd - Jamaica Hospital, Queens NY - Uhh.. 'scuse me. I'd like to live if you don't mind..
July 25th - Amtrak Crescent #19 Southbound out of Penn Station, NY to Lynchburg, VA.
July 26th (5am) Arrive in Lynchburg, stop a WalMart for a few things and collapse into my step-dads arms.
July 29th - sick and tired of my nasty hair and unable to stand for long enough to take a shower, I get a haircut. Looked really nice too. Went for Chinese afterwards, all I could taste was salt in my wanton soup. Tossed my cookies.
July 30th - Dr. Lewis, originally from Long Island, takes a look at me and decides I need a CT scan of my painful area.
Aug. 1st - Get my CT Scan from this really cool southern Rad Tech, dude rocked. Totally into NASCAR too, kept me at ease and mostly pain free, even as I took 100cc's of contrast. On the hour drive back to the house, Dr. Lewis has already gotten the results of the CT scan and wants to see me immediately. When I get there, he has already essentially had me admitted to UVA (univ. virginia med center) based on what the poor rad tech saw. After I got out of the hospital, the rad tech told me, to the best he could describe the CT, "it was nothing but cringe."
Aug. 2nd - Arrive at UVA and get my CT examined by the head of the Neurosurgery department. Given 2 options: "Spend the weekend with us here in the hospital or die suddenly." Not so bad, had my own room with a view I couldn't see, a TV that got some strange channels from West Virginia where I got to see the WV State Lottery Show.. damn creepy. I smoked like a fiend on the way over to admitting, and when I called my girl on the cell, I was so loopy I told her I had "the Big C." Little did I know I was wrong.. My mother however wisely yelled out "its not cancer, its a tumor!" so my girl could hear her. At that point to me there was no difference. So anyway, enter into the hospital I did. That's when the "sticking" began.
Aug 3rd - Nothing special about this day, except for all the bloodwork and tests and such.
Aug 4th - I came to love Sundays in the hospital, NASCAR if you could find it, and no doctors around to harass you. Heh.. That's what they have nurses for I come to learn. IV's, monitors, and a medication schedule. Well wasn't this exciting and new. I believe this was Day 1 of Dilantin dementia - cuz I coulda sworn that NASCAR had allowed completely new body stylings for the race that day. Any drug described as "useful heroin" I don't want to know about. As I put it in my badly scrawled journal - "Disoriented, Delusional, Detached - that's how Dilantin leaves you. Sleep is not an option. Welcome to lockdown"
Aug 5th - More testing, baseline testing (I remember saying something about star trek.. I have no clue), and another MRI this time with foam lifesavers stuck to my head. At least I had a nice haircut.
Aug 6th - Night movements began. I began to grow restless in my bed. I'm 6' 3" for gods sake! Get me a longer bed, or shorter legs! 5:30am call my girl on my room phone. I don't remember any of this, but apparently I was complaining that there was a homeless guy sleeping in my bed, so I was trying to find my other bed, but couldn't. She handed me off to her mother, who convinced me to call the nurses somehow. She called my mother on her cell phone who was staying at a hotel just 2 blocks away from me. Other than that, not much memorable.
Aug 7th - Hey! What do you mean Surgery?? Oh count to 100 huh? Yeah I can do.. zzzzzzzzz My surgery lasted 6 hours or so. They had to retract the right side of my brain, and go right down the middle basically. This is where I got the dent in my head I plan on scaring my grandkids with one day.
Aug 8th - Woke up in Neuro ICU at some point. The doctors were asking me if I knew where I was.. a crowd of doctors. I think I gave them a look, and said "I should damn well know where I am - UVA! You've got it written on EVERYTHING." Apparently the surgery had left my sense of humor in tact. However, I had a new friend. One which meant I didn't have to leave the bed to go to the bathroom. That was interesting, and NEVER TO BE REPEATED AGAIN. I was only in Neuro ICU for 24 hours.. damn quick recovery they all agreed. However if you ask me I was there for 3 days. 3 days which no one else experienced. But I swear I was there for 3 days. Oh, And my mother had my glasses. So I couldn't see a damn thing. That really pissed me off.
Aug 9th - I got my glasses back, and yelled (as best I could) at my mother for not bringing them right away. She found it amusing. I also got a new room, from where I could see the railroad tracks that ran next to the hospital. I was moved from Neuro ICU by 2 young nurses, then left in my bed in the room by the window. I started crying when I realized I could see the trains going by. I honestly didn't think I ever would.
Aug 10th - Started getting bad fevers. Really bad fevers. They ran a few more MRI's, more bloodwork, more fun. I think this was about the time I ripped out all my IV's and such and took the drip bag they had attached to my head to drain it properly for a nice walk. Probably also around the time I swore with a hateful vengeance they had moved me to a room in the basement. They were exploring options as to why I was recovering well, but not fully.
Aug 11th - After fighting back and forth among themselves it was finally decided to go ahead and do a bit more surgery. The main sticking point was my fevers, they didn't want to operate while I had them, but they wouldn't go away until they did. So I discovered the joy of a Motrin Suppository, and the ecstatic fun when one breaks in half. And at some point, I went in to have a Magnetically programmable shunt installed. Worst part is, I remember telling one of the nurses in the hallway to surgery that I heard that a shunt can gurgle. Obviously I was still kinda out of it.
Aug 12th - Everyone and their mother came in to see the miracle boy. Yes I needed the shunt, but believe it or not it wasn't the pressure on my brain causing fevers. It was the Dilantin. Turned out I was allergic to it. So they put me on a substitute and a steroid. Problem being Dilantin takes damn near forever to clear the system, and my body's levels of it were so high it was ridiculous. Its almost as if my body was using only the first dose to work, and all the rest were being stored. So aside from that, my left side was shot. I had no strength in it. Interesting.
Aug 13th & 14 - Improving at warp speed. Docs were stunned. I was eating like a moose. UVA has the best food.
Aug 15th - I made my first phone calls. And came down with a low grade fever. Great. All the Docs came in to examine the overly warm boy. There goes my hopes for release today.
Aug 16th - INFECTIOUS DISEASE TEAM??? I DON'T HAVE EBOLA!! They were just checkin.. I was cool.
Aug 17th - Finally home. Wheres that pie you promised Momma
Aug 19th - Had my staples removed, and in the intervening weeks - Occ Therapy (needed about 3 visits), Phys Therapy (didn't need any), and more visits to UVA for MRI's and such. I made it back to NY for a Halloween Visit, and back for good on Dec 1st. 5 months thank you very much. If I had more time, I would have rested more, but I'm not good at sitting still, its the New York in me. Virginia was nice, the southern nurses were sweet. But after 5 months of that accent, I was ready to hit someone.
So there it is.. my story in a nutshell.
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