Chaos and Conundrums of Health Kerfuffles

It's been a bit since I have updated so some things have changed. On August 7th, I went for my reevaluation with the family doctor. We realized that my dizziness is coming from two different avenues.  The wavy dizziness is coming from my neck and the spinning dizzy is coming from my blood pressure being out of control. Dr. Sandy increased my blood pressure medication to get the blood pressure under control and put me off work longer until I can be reevaluated on 8/16/19 and that will allow the medication to take effect and for me to go to two more PT appointments. After the doctor appointment I had to stop and get my blood drawn for my kidney doctor and a urine test. The urine test showed that I have a kidney infection which is not good with the kidney issues I have. I started taking antibiotics. The blood tests showed that my parathyroid hormone level should be between 15 - 65 pg/mL and its actually at 108.5.  The nephrologist called me and I have to stop taking certain med...

Steve drove me to physical therapy today and the new therapist is about 90% sure that I do not have vertigo and is in agreement with the other therapist that it is my neck and most likely from computer work. I have been given therapy exercises to do at home 5 to 6 times a day at least 10 times each and I will see my new therapist next Monday and Wednesday.  I will not be released back to work on Wednesday as I was hoping. While I am upset about missing all of this work, I am seeing it in a positive light at this point. Perhaps, it happened for the right reasons. I was being told to slow down, adjust to my new lifestyle, learn about my kidney disease, learn how to eat correct, and focus on myself and my family. Nothing like the scare of a stroke to change one's thinking.

I've been avoiding this, not because I don't care, but because I'm not sure of what to say. Patti has been a rock through all of this. Don't let her claim otherwise. I've always had a different approach to crisis. When everything is in good hands, my attention does not need to be there anymore, it needs to be on the mundane everyday things that go on in the background. One example of this from years ago... an ambulance was called for someone that lived with me. My attention was on them until the paramedics arrived. Then my focus shifted to making sure the cat didn't escape through the front door and that the paramedics had a clear and unobstructed path. Priorities, people! As I'm overwhelmed with all the new information (and it changing almost daily), I tend to handle what I can. I make sure the animals get fed. I make sure the grandson gets to bed properly most nights. I cook most days, clean some days. I find time to try to excel at work and climb my w...

Steve and I met the nurse to discuss my diet.  I am down another TWO pounds.. read it again TWO pounds in three days. That is a total of over NINE pounds in a little more than a week. She was proud of me when she looked at my food journal. So she specializes in diabetic diets and I have a special diet due to my kidney, I am low protein, low phosphorus and low sodium. When I say low protein, we are speaking three ounces of protein a day and almost everything has phosphorus so its been a struggle. People have been extremely helpful but it's a hard diet to understand, I can't switch to whole grain bread or brown rice because those are actually bad for me. Eating more chicken, again bad for me. Certain fruits and vegetables, bad for me. Chocolate and nuts, horrible for me (Don't worry, I figured out a cheat for my mother in law's chocolate torte! There is nothing that will keep me away from that!) Meal planning has been a pain in the ass, eating out horrendous, and I eve...

I have to say there is a positive in here... while being petty and pissy about everything else, I did start changing my diet and I checked my weight when I dropped off my FMLA paperwork at the doctor and from 7/22/19 to 7/29/19 I lost 7.25 pounds so there is a positive.  I know that some of you might be like, "Patti, that is a very small, almost minuscule change... why you celebrating?" Sis, let me tell you, in this turbulent journey, we are celebrating any success that is coming this family's way. 💓💓 Also at this time, I scheduled an appointment to meet with one of the nurse's to discuss the dietary changes that I need to make since I don't meet the dietician until October 1st. I see her on August 1st. I am really looking forward to that appointment. 

Physical therapy at 7:45am on a Tuesday morning and I was up, ready and raring to go. I wanted to do everything that needed to be done. I checked in and met this very upbeat young lady that was going to do my evaluation.  I began my testing and had a few dizzy episodes and she told me that she felt that I didn't have vertigo and that she was going to talk to another physical therapist because in her opinion, it was something to do with my spine and my neck. She felt a lot of inflammation in my neck.She was concerned because vertigo would not give me symptoms such as facial twitching and arm tingling and numbness as well. She also questioned if I had fallen or had been in an accident. She asked if I had been sick in the past few weeks. All the answers to these questions were a big fat no. So now we wait until a new physical therapist can be brought onto the scene and a diagnosis for my dizziness can be found. I have to thank my family for being extremely patient with me and drivi...