So, I've had a lot of questions, and quite honestly don't really like discussing it even with Matt, so I figured the easiest way for me to explain it to everyone, without reliving the emotional roller coaster 100 times, would be to just recap here.
I've had "lady" problems since I was 11. "It's" never been normal, and has always come strong with a lot of pain. When I was 18 I found I had Polycystic Ovary Syndrome. Check out WebMD if you want details, but basically I have a bunch of tiny cysts that cause a serious hormonal imbalance along with a bunch of other fun side effects - including infertility. Because I've had it, and other problems, so long, I tend to "grin and bear it" rather than worry when things are miserable.
With that being said it was mid-December when I started to feel lousy. I initially thought my pleurisy was flaring up again, or I had some other season related illness. I started to feel tired all the time, no matter how much sleep I got. In gradually became harder to do daily tasks and because of the general lousy feeling I also became very depressed.
To say the least, the holidays and after were less than a fun time for me. It became harder by the day to drag myself into work, and I was coming home sick or calling in more than I ever have (even when I was having some other severe medical problems).
It was a few weeks ago that it really started to get hard to function. My entire body felt sore and all of my muscles were extremely weak. I would be so winded after walking upstairs to go to bed it took over 10 minutes of lying still in bed just for my heart beat to become semi-normal again. To a point I was telling myself it was still the 'flu' or whatever, more because I didn't want to deal with anything bigger. Over the past week things became really bad, and new symptoms occurred. I started to get dizzy, frequently. I couldn't get my eyes to focus on anything. I had a constant headache. Last week I had a tooth extraction so over the weekend I decided it was the Vicodin so I stopped taking it Saturday morning. By Monday things were still getting worse and I didn't really feel comfortable even driving alone. So, Tuesday afternoon Matt picked me up and we head to urgent care.
First, I want to say I'm super impressed with NOMS urgent care. They really have it together and the doctor there (who I later learned is the Director of Medicine for NOMS) was phenomenal! The doctor, after hearing I had "it" since Thanksgiving, immediately wanted to check my hemoglobin. He gave me an anti-biodic just in case it was an ear infection, then sent me to the lab. Wednesday morning, about the same time I got to work, I got a call from the Urgent Care doctor and he had the lab results. My hemoglobin was "ridiculously low" as he put it (the low normal is 11.5, and mine was at 6.5) and he was going to call the "follow-up" doctor for the urgent care clinic to see what he wanted to do. Within an hour Amanda was picking me up from work and I was headed to Bellevue to have some pre-work done to get me ready for a blood transfusion. They scheduled the transfusion for this morning. We showed up about 8:30, they hooked me up, and that's where I was for 5 hours. The transfusion went well, but I was admittedly scared. I had a follow-up with the urgent care clinic (which btw, that dr happens to be the PRESIDENT of NOMS, talking about getting all of the hot shots) and he's setting up appointments for me with a couple of specialists to see how to try to combat the diseases to avoid this in the future.
So, as scary as it was, it's getting better now. Still pretty weak, but the dizziness is almost completely gone and the other symptoms are much better. I really appreciate all of the prayers and concern. After talking to the doctor it's going to be a long road, but a doable one, which was nice to hear.
