Yesterday
- Got my fifth blood test done. You would think by now that I would’ve gotten used to it; you can still see the marks on my skin from the other times. But every time they remark on my tiny veins and I’m looking away and trying to breathe in deeply (INoutINoutINout) and then I feel the needle’s prick, I’m thinking, Holy shit and trying not to whimper like the wussy I am.
- Stanford appointment, during which the new neurologist saw me for maybe…oh, five minutes (“your tests look fine, we’re not sure what it could be”)? The student who was interviewing me on my condition and giving me the physical exam spent literally 10x more time with me than the doctor himself. I guess it’s true what a friend said: it’s worse when they think you’re an uninteresting medical mystery. I’m now being referred to the epilepsy clinic (even though we are all pretty sure it’s not epilepsy, and I already had a sleep-wake-sleep-wake EEG done), from which someone will call me and if I’m lucky, schedule me in sometime before Christmas. I’m now taking bets on whether they’ll end up referring me to another clinic/department (with me being on the side of DUH, yes).
This week
- Hello, new symptoms from malfunctioning body. Oh, what’s that? You decided that I should have more chest pain, only of the longer-lasting and not as sharp variety? Wait, there’s more? Pain in various other new areas and even more heightened sensitivity to temperature? You REALLY shouldn’t have.
- Went over my insurance coverage. Thankfully, we’re not going over the lifetime maximum yet, but yes, the bills are certainly mounting. And why do I keep getting billed more than I should for certain things?!
- Got my results from the basic blood tests back (done last week after I found out about the whole ER debacle). Lucky for Stanford ER/my old neuro, they didn’t show anything out of the ordinary.
I’ve started just having to view this whole thing as ridiculous and finding humor wherever I can. Otherwise, insanity would have claimed me by now (and we’re not ruling out the possibility that if this continues, IT STILL MAY). As it is, you can believe that if New Year’s hits and I still don’t have a diagnosis, I’m going to be plenty unhappy.
But! There is some happy news from the week, which include me finally having made up my midterms and a friend visiting and awesomely bringing me balloons, a DVD, plus karaoke software for my laptop (Kevin, you ROCK). Also, instead of spending an obligatory Thanksgiving with people who usually make me crazy during the holidays (sorry, family), I’ll be de-stressing over at Annie/Angie’s. So yes, I do still have things to be thankful for…and when life is this crazy and weird, I’ll take all the good I can get.
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Sorry to hear that the health saga continues.
But I’m glad you can still find things to laugh at and be thankful for.
BTW, I hate needles, too (thank goodness heroin is not my drug of choice).
Ugh. Girl.
Sad as that is. I hate needles, too, and I only had my blood taken alone once, the day after he was born. I always made my friend go with me to distract me, she wasn’t very good at it, but better than nothing! Try to get someone to go with you if you’re not already! Have them talk to you about whatever, maybe tell you a joke or something.
I feel you. Having had my blood taken so much while pregnant. Seems you never get used to it.
As for as the health insurance, I’m glad you’re not overlimit however if you feel you’re getting charged too much for things, please be sure to fight it! My father-in-law was just telling me some hospital/insurance horror stories from over the years. One included a charge for something they never had and how he had to fight that. Another was the hospital kept billing them then the insurance came later and said they paid it ALL and the hospital flat out tried to keep the money saying, “we’ll apply it to your new patient fee” – something that didn’t exist until that second. Point is, they are not afraid to try and take advantage of people and they count on the ones who don’t really look into their bills. So if you are unsure, run everything by them again and make sure it’s accurate so you don’t get screwed over!
Hang in there!
I’m not sure what to say. I’ve read up on some of your previous blogs and I cannot believe this is happening to you! It’s been a while since I’ve been here and I’ve missed a lot. I sure hope you do get a diagnosis by New Years. It’s amazing that really how they diagnose is by a process of elimination. Sad, but true.
I’m so sorry you are going through this and I can only hope that things get better for you soon. Take care, Elea and you’re in my thoughts!
Hey,
Excellent job today, thanks so much for putting everything together and keeping us organized. Best wishes.