Mayo Clinic Day 3 & A Lesson Learned

By now it has really sunk in, we are at Mayo Clinic! The child kept saying this over and over "I can't believe we are here! At Mayo Clinic."  I think I was still numb from it all and still wondering if I should really be here or not. Since I don't have cancer and I'm not 'dying of anything.' It has just been such a whirlwind of testing, meetings with the doctor etc. Today was the physical exam and let me tell you I've never been examined like that in my life before. I think that the doctor went over ever INCH of me! lol. He had me bending, stretching, moving and all sorts of stuff in addition to the exam.

Now for the fun stuff hahaha. I was suppose to get undressed for this exam and put a gown on. lol. Well the day before when I had the Holter Monitor put on me, I had a sports bra on (I know TMI for you guys! lol) so there was no way I could get my bra off, it was just hanging off my EKG leads...lol during the exam, which was very entertaining to see it flying all over the place when the doctor had me jumping around, bending and stretching all over the exam.

Then the doctor is still in the room typing away at the computer and he tells me to get dressed...lol. So I getting dressed with the doctor still in the room...weird! I could not for the life of me get my bra untangled from the leads...lol. Finally just had to unhook them, get dressed and rehook them up. Thinking back, I hope that the machine turned back on after we rehooked it up  :O(

The unsocialized homeschooler had fun playing piano several times while we were at Mayo Clinc, here he is playing at the Siebens Building, he also played in the Gonda Building. He drew a pretty good crowd. There were some really good piano players that we got to listen to over the week we were at Mayo.

I had more blood work and the most exciting part (NOT!) was I got a bottle of steroid pills to take, had to take 1 every 6 hours for 3 days. By the time I took the evening dose I was feeling pretty well, muscles no longer aching and we were up goofing around. We spent the evening at the library, which is connected by the Subway to our hotel and Mayo Clinic. I worked on a homeschool review for The Old Schoolhouse Magazines Review Crew and the child looked at the Star Wars book section. The library is GREAT! If we have to go back we plan to spend some more time there. We could have gotten a $10 library card while we were there since I was a patient at Mayo, but I was too cheap, we just stayed and looked at book for free  :O)  Spent more time swimming and relaxing. Sleep was not on the agenda due to the steroids. But WOW was I sure feeling good. Wish I could live on steroids, nothing feels so good.

One lesson learned. NEVER text people at 2 AM, just because you can't sleep does not mean that others are in the same boat! lol.  I sent a funny text to some friends and my sister-in-law at 2am. I said "If I was there I would drag you out to Bill's. I'm flying high on steroids...lol." Guess what? there are a lot of people that leave their cell phones on 24/7 and they got that message at 2 AM! But thankfully it got a laugh out of them all. My sister-in-law just grinned and rolled over and went back to sleep. Bill's is a restaurant that is a little 24 hour hole in the wall, with GREAT food (best fried cheddar cheese curds and grilled cheese sandwiches in the WORLD!) and lots of fond memories for my friends and I. Right Valerie, Lane, JT & David? Yes you can laugh now.

So we are half way through the week, still no answers, but we are making some wonderful memories. I am truly blessed to have an awesome almost teenage son to travel with, a wonderful husband who I can call at anytime when the steroids were making me crazy and  I was living on an hour or two of sleep and the world was crashing in on me. As well as my friends & church family that were up holding me in prayer. AMEN! God is good even in our sufferings.
2 Corinthians 12:10 “Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, in persecutions, in distresses for Christ's sake: for when I am weak, then am I strong.” What does not kill us makes us stronger.
Moe

How I Spent My Day & An Update On Me

After being in the hospital for 13 days (4 for surgery and then 9 for an infection after surgery) I got to know some of the staff and many of them had taken care of me both times I was in. I decided to fix up some treat bags for the staff that I could remember by name and also took a few large boxes of microwave popcorn for the rest of the staff. I would have made up more treat bags but many of the staff wore name badges backwards where you could not read their names :O(      So they missed out. My dear sister-in-law that is an RN brought in a big tray of cookies for the nurses one night during my stay. I was really shocked when I was walking down the hospital corridor when one of the nurses looked up and recognized me from a distance with street clothes on and a heavy coat. I've been out of the hospital since I think Feb 6th or 7th it's all a blur to me. She said "Well hello stranger!" That was a blessing to be recognized, again I NEVER felt like a number with this staff! As our son and I were leaving to head to the elevators I just cried, it is still very overwhelming to have gone through all this and to still be weak and not up to par.

The treat bags had gum, candy, suckers and chocolate in them, the black bag is special for one of the nurses that has Celiac Disease along with her children having it, so it's full of Hodgson Mill products and some other goodies. Hoping these treats are a blessing to them.

So our day started out like this I took our son to Chuck E Cheese since he had 90 tokens to use up from the past and present school year, I always check the coupon section of the website for when they have token specials, usually 100 tokens are $20 which those last a long time. I give them for doing well on math speed drills or pop quizzes. Sometimes if work is done really well with no complaints I will surprise him with 1 or 2 tokens. He keeps them in a baggie so he can just grab them when we are going to be near a Chuck E Cheese and he can spend them. Sometimes he likes to save them up and spend a few hours playing, other times he wants to run in and play a few games of Skee-Ball. Chuck E Cheese also has Chuck E Cheese Rewards Calendars that you can print out and get 10 free tokens for turning them in, they have chore charts, homework charts and more.

They now carry GLUTEN FREE PIZZA too!! It comes pre-made and individually wrapped, so you know it's SAFE! What a blessing for our little ones as well as adults. I do not know the corn status of the pizza, you would have to check that out. They also have a GREAT salad bar too.

So on to my day, while our son was playing games and having fun, I was sitting at a table packing up treat bags for the nursing staff and doctors. I found some Gospels of John at the Christian book store, but they only had 2 on hand  :O(     I gave one to my surgeon, his first name is Peter and I wrote in the book that I would have given him the book of Peter, but John was so much more exciting to read  ;-)

I was totally exhausted from my day of being out and about, plus I did not sleep but 2 hours the night before since I had to take a double dose of steroid meds for the blood test. I slept in the car on again off again. I had to be in town by 8am for a blood draw, slept for about 30 minutes in the car after that, went to the Christian book store, napped in the car for about 15 min, went to Chuck E Cheese, that was good since I was just sitting and not up and about. Then went to the grocery store, napped in the car for about 30 min after that and then delivered the goodies to 3 different places and napped in between those. This is all perfectly normal after having the surgery and then the infection. I should be back to normal by Summer. I actually feel pretty well, though if I over do it I KNOW IT! lol. I told my guys that I am not leaving the house for the next few days and will be sleeping as needed. I am still sore especially when I make the 100 mile trips to the doctors, and I did that 3 days in a row last week and I was hurting, felt like I was bruised on my entire torso from the bumpy roads.

We have some great products to review for The Old Schoolhouse Magazine Review Crew coming up so we will be working on those. School is going well, so glad that we skipped Christmas break so that our son could take a winter break while I had my surgery, it worked out well since I have had a longer recovery time. We started back to full time school this past week, while he was at Grandpa's house he dabbled in math, science, history and of course his favorite subject reading.

Stop by my blog

http://adoptivemomhomeschoolinganonlychild.blogspot.com/

Surgery tomorrow..............

Well, friends I'm signing off here for awhile. I have to be at the hospital tomorrow morning for my surgery. After years of being misdiagnosed with stomach issues, doctors had always told me it was nerves, depression or stress causing my stomach issues......well they were wrong. So now I have to have part or all of my colon removed. They will decided once they get in there and get a better look at things.

The one nice thing out of all this was when I had a doctor that saw my CT scan tell me that he was very sorry that I had suffered for so many years. I told him "Oh, so it's not really all in my head?" And he told me that he could see from the CT scan that it was definitely not all in my head. Another specialist had a good laugh when I told him that I was told I was depressed and that was causing my stomach issues. He said with much sarcasm in his voice "Well having chronic diarrhea many times a day for years might make a person a touch depressed." lol. The doctors also apologized for me being one of those "medical mishaps" as they call it. Where someone slips through the system and is not treated correctly. Glad there is a name for this.......lol. As our Pastor always says "Doctors practice medicine." It's all just practice........EEEKKK!!!

Fear not if things don't go well and I end up in Glory. I know that Jesus has gone before me to prepare a place for me, John chapter 14 verse 3. The book of 2 Corinthians chapter 5 verse 6 says "Therefore we are always confident, knowing that, whilst we are at home in the body, we are absent from the Lord:" 1 Corinthians chapter 15 verse 55 says "O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?" Do you have this same view of your own future death? Or do you fear death? Having a personal relationship with Jesus Christ can remove this fear. To find out more ask me or go to NeedHim.org or call 1-888-NEED-HIM.

Love ya all,
Moe
p.s. I'm not even worried about our homeschool. We have gotten all the 4-H books out and plan to have our son read over those, sketch out his projects for the year and stuff like that. Lots of reading, cooking and enjoying time with his 80+ year old Grandpa. He plans to set up a tent in Granpa's dining room and camping out for the week.

What have I been up to?

Well here is what I've been up to since September 9th. Hopping around on crutches and waiting for my Ortho doctor visit. I found out today that I broke my foot (in a hard to heal spot :O( no wonder I've been in so much pain for almost a month! The doctor looked at the X-ray, looked at my foot and then looked at me and said "You've been walking on this?" lol........yes, I have! lol. What else could I do? Sit and do nothing?

My dear husband painted my toes so that I could have pretty feet (ok, I'm not saying my feet are pretty enough to model sandals........lol) in my ugly blue cast, I wanted a purple cast, but they had run out of that color today. I go back at the end of the month for a recheck to see how it's healing. I'm not doing real well in the area of crutches, hubby keeps saying "Go, Go Gadget legs" lol.

Moe

Book review coming your way soon!

Book review coming your way soon!

I just received a copy of Too Much Stuff from author Kathryn Porter and will be snuggling up with a warm blanket to read up on how I start "Winning the War Against Clutter." Stay tuned for more on this! It was also exciting to find out that Kathryn Porter and I have a lot in common, just a few things are chickens and homeschooling. What a small world.

Have a great week!

I'd like to welcome Heather to my blog.

Nice to see you on here Heather!!
I'm working on getting better   :O)     
Doctors say they want to keep me comfortable for about 6-8 weeks and get me healed up so that they can run some tests on me. They say it's far too dangerous to do any scopes on me right now. So all they can go by are CT Scans and MRI. So I am trusting my Lord, holding my dh and ds tightly and enjoying the ride!
Take care,
Moe

Sorry to be gone for so long.........

I ended up in the hospital for 5 days with acute diverticulitis. Had an incredible ambulance ride when they transferred me to a larger hospital. Those 3 guys has me laughing all the way there!
I am to be home resting and healing up so that they can do some testing. My dh's family has been wonderful!! His sister has really helped me out tons with doctors, nurses and hospitals, it can all be so confusing when you are very ill and out of your head. My church family has been bringing meals in, how wonderful is that!! It's been a real blessing to see our son step up to the plate while I as gone. He did his school work and chores, made meals for himself and dad, he also knew where all the 'hidden' meals are in the freezer......lol. I always have some sort of chili, soup or casserole in the freezer for a quick and easy meal.

Well my point for being on here today was to share something that I found from the Bible that has been a  real encouragement to me today, as I know that I am not the only person on the Internet feeling poorly today. I was pouting around this afternoon, had a very bad day reflux wise, as I am flared up from my throat all the way down to my colon  :P      Ended up on the phone with the nurse 2x and finally think I will make it through until tomorrow when they want to see me again. So here it is.

Weakness in the Bible: 2 Corinthians 12:9-10
It is a paradox of Christianity that true strength is found in weakness. Jesus himself embodied the world's idea of weakness, even to the point of submitting to an excruciating death. However, just as Christ's saving power worked through that "weakness," so God's power is often most visible in the midst of suffering, humility, and weakness.

2 Corinthians 12:9-10 (KJV)
“And he said unto me, My grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in weakness. Most gladly therefore will I rather glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me. Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, in persecutions, in distresses for Christ's sake: for when I am weak, then am I strong.”
Gospel.com

I do have a few prayer requests:
1. No more reactions to antibiotics (had 3 in the hospital)
2. Antibiotics will be effective since I am on so many stomach drugs
3. No more blood thinners, these T.E.D. Hose are driving me crazy!
4. DH can concentrate on learning his new job, lots of reading and testing along with the stress of me being ill.
5. Insurance issues won't occur, our current insurance ends 12/31 and the new job insurance is to kick in 1/1.
6. Doctors and Nurses will be competent and know what is going on with me. Since I was told that what I have has been missed for many years and severe damage has been done. I have actually prayed that the doctors would be woke in the night thinking of my case, I pray that they will be milling it over in their mind and looking at it from all sides. This new doctors even apologized for the suffering I have endured, that in itself was a real blessing to hear.

Everyone have a wonderful week!