Thoughts, Raves & Outright Beatings

Hey, it sounded like a nice title, right?

As perhaps one of my three regular readers may have noticed, I haven’t been around much in the past week. I was frankly too weak to write anything, let alone anything of any meaningful import.

Monday morning, I woke up with some pains in the lower left side of my abdomen. While they weren’t killing me, they were getting progressively worse throughout the morning. Finally, one of my more senior co-workers suggested I see a doctor, or, if not, ER. I followed her advice, thinking it wouldn’t take more than a typical lunch hour. I left several messages to schedule an appointment at what I thought was my doctor’s office. I decided I couldn’t wait and went to the local urgent care clinic. They told me they couldn’t help me there and sent me straight to the ER of the nearest local hospital. I was finally admitted after an hour. I was immediately tended to by one of the ER Nurses, as well as the ER Doctor. They took some samples and went on their way. I did a few calls to my boss promising I’d be back soon. I did my final call to work when it finally looked like I was going to be their the whole afternoon, when the nurse stuck some morphine in me.

I was there for about 6 hours; service was slow (it’s ER, after all), but the people were friendly. Eventually, I was wheeled in for a CT Scan. After that, the NEW ER Doctor introduced herself, and informed me that I definitely had a mild case of diverticulitis.

Oh…fucking…great…

I was told that I needed three days on a clear-full liquid diet, eat pureed foods afterwards, and maintain a high fiber diet, without nuts or seeds.

Oooooooooooh kay…

I was put on Flagyl, Cipro and Vicodin. I bought what thought would work. Lots of soups, boullion and such. Eventually, I started feeling ill from all the sodium I was taking in. On top of that, trying to maintain a liquid diet while inhaling these stomach-destroying medicines was just killing me. The acid reflux I was experiencing was just eating up my insides. I ended up cutting coffee from my diet, which I was loathe to do, because I dig the caffeine fix, but anything to get this acid to stop.

On top of this, I was just so…fucking…tired. Even going back to work, I was hardly in a position to speak half the time. So depressing.

It was nice on Twitter to have some old friends from the Bay Area “find and follow” me during this time and show me support. Thanks, ladies!

After two days of this, I tried to get a follow-up appointment with my doctor, per ER’s suggestion. Since I’m out of the country next week, I needed a checkup by Friday, at the latest. It turned out that he no longer worked at that practice, and the other doctors had to “approve” me, before seeing me.

That’s right. I’m a patient left behind by one of their old partners, I’ve just been let out of ER with what could have potentially been a life-threatening illness, and I now have to be “approved”.

Well, fuck you too! Thanks for helping me out of a bind, assholes!

Fortunately, another one of my co-workers set me up with an old doctor of hers, and he was able to see me right away. He pretty much concurred and expounded on what the ER doctor said, and said I could go on to a purreed diet.

So, out comes the applesauce, baby food, etc. I even broke down and bought some Ensure, which I really didn’t want to, after witnessing my mom down it like the dickens while SHE was in the hospital, in her 60’s and 70’s. However, the low-energy existence was getting really old. I waited a day, though, because I also purchased the “Soup Man’s” Seafood Bisque, and I just HAD to try it.

That stuff was SOOOOOOOOOOOOO Good. First minimally solid food I had in quite a while. Hey, it’s soup. If I chomp on the shrimp enough, it will become pureed.

It didn’t matter. Some lower-abdomen pain came back the next morning.

Dammit!

Back to liquids I go.

Last night, Hubster and I ate at Saigon 88. It’s frankly my favorite of the recent rash of Vietnamese places opening in this area. The Pho is to die for. I figured it was a safe bet, with my current dietary restrictions. Alas, all their soup has a LOT of stuff in it. I went for the wonton, as it seemed to have the least amount of stuff in it. Well, it came, and it was good, and I even got to slowly and immensely chew on a few of the wontons, with it’s ground pork. But it also had sliced beef, and broccoli, and the waitress seemed a little unnerved that I left a lot of food behind when I was finished. We did our best to assure her that we did, in fact, enjoy our meal, and that it was the fate that I was dealt that forced me to leave the food behind. We left an extra large tip, just to prove our good intentions.

Today is the first day in quite a while that I’ve been really excited about traveling. The Ensure is doing wonders. I also bought Metemuscil, BeneFiber, any supplement I could get my hands on. They all seem to be working. And it’s great for helping me to chase down my antibiotics. As for how I’ll get by eating in Dublin, I’m sure the native Irish diet will do just fine. I’ll just have to skip eating in all these recently opened Thai restaurants there, or something. Damn…

I had enough energy to visit a friend who wanted to lend/give me some of her sweaters, get my car washed, go do some last minute trip shopping in Spanish Springs, and, of course, pack.

Again, I may be blogging from Ireland, I may not. Definitely will be videoing. May just be twittering. Supposedly, the hotel has WIFI. We’ll see.

In any case, this will be my last post on American soil for two weeks. Twitters to follow. Check the status on the upper right hand part of this blog.

Bon voyaggeees!