The Upper & Lower GI-The Results

On December 17th I had to go in for my upper and lower GI. As I had previously posted, I am not a big fan of needles so I asked the nurse to give me a second to breathe, relax, and tell me before she poked me with the I.V. needle, which she did. Normally, my veins run at the sight of the I.V. cart, but the self-hypnosis worked great! The I.V, was successful on the first poke and I even smiled when the nursed poked me because although I knew the needle was going in I didn't feel any pain. That is an awesome experience. Of course, then I was wheeled into a small room filled with 2 wide screen high definition televisions that were attached to the cameras that were going to be going into my intestines. Fortunately, or unfortunately, depending on your viewpoint, I was not very coherent while the doctor was looking at my lower intestines which would have been a bit painful I guess since she found a polyp and diverticulosis in my colon. Not good things to find if you ask me. Needless to say the doctor burned off the polyp and sent it to be biopsied for cancer. I don't know the results of that biopsy yet but will hopefully find out something soon. I was more coherent, unfortunately, when the doctor went down my throat for the upper GI. In fact, I thought I was going to choke. But here again the self-hypnosis works wonders because as I relaxed the tube went down easier and came out easier so I didn't feel like I was going to choke to death in the process. Fortunately, my stomach was clear of any problems. Now I just need to find out what the doctor wants me to do about the diverticulosis and if the polyp was cancerous and go from there. I know something needs to be done about the diverticulosis, I am just not sure what can be done. I guess I just have to call the doctor and see.

Getting nervous

Two more days until the upper and lower GI. I know I should not be nervous about this as this is something that I have had to go through several times before since I have had my gastric bypass surgery, but I am nervous anyway. Mostly I am afraid of the I.V. needle which to some might seem silly, but I have had my share of bad needle pokes in my life that I have no desire to repeat. The sad part is there is usually a cocky nurse who is sure he or she knows what she is doing (and I am not saying he or she doesn't), who insists on using a large gauge needle on my very picky veins. Veins that shut down at the site of an I.V. cart. It is like my veins go into deep hiding as soon as I am poked with the I.V. To make matters worse, the nurse then proceeds to dig for 5 minutes, sure that the vein is right there when in fact it is usually blown and I am in pain and in tears, nerves on edge from trying to hold still. I must say, that I have gotten better at standing up for myself before the nurse pokes me, in trying to warn them that I need a smaller gauge needle, a warning before he or she pokes to calm my nerves, and then I am able to use self hypnosis to remain completely calm and pain free through the poking process. This makes this a much easier process on me than the previous method and I know that it is easier on the nurses as well because it only takes 1 or 2 pokes to get a viable vein instead of 3 or more. Plus there is no more tears and I am all for that.

I suppose I should also be nervous about being sedated but that part of the procedure doesn't really bother me. As long as I am not feeling any pain I figure I am doing okay. I know there is some slight chance that there could be an overdose of medication and I could die, but that is a very slim chance and not one that I am worried about. I know that this is something that my husband and family is probably more concerned about than I am because I have had a lot of experience with anesthesia having had 20 + surgeries and procedures requiring anesthesia in my life and I have successfully woken up from every one, obviously.

I am nervous about what the doctor is going to find when she goes in there. Although Dr. Balasubramanian claims there is nothing wrong with my stomach, and she is only doing the upper G.I. to please my gastric bypass surgeon, I have a feeling she may get surprised as I have pain in my stomach. But I guess I will have to wait and see. As for what she will find on the other end is anybody's guess as well. I have already been relegated to the IBS category and told I have diverticulitis. I, at this point don't really care what they call it as long as they can do something to stop the pain and discomfort I am almost constantly in.

So today starts  my liquid diet and the prep work for the doctor. I can't say that it will be much fun for me but it is survivable. I can't wait for the experience to be over with along with the hope that they will actually find something that they can treat in the process. Wish me luck.

Needing patience

It has been said that "Patience is a virtue." Unfortunately, it is not a virtue that I have yet obtained. If you have been keeping up with my blog, you know that I have had some relatively serious health issues to deal with which have not made my life easy over the past few months. What you may not have known is that during this time my husband and I have also been looking for employment and have been unable to pay our bills, making life even more hectic than it would be if one or both of us was working. Also, if I had not taken a semester off from school due to my health issues, I would have had money from my student loans to help pay the bills, but it was too much of a struggle for me to wrestle my health issues and the demands of a doctoral program at the same time.

So, why do I need patience, you must be asking yourself at this point, right? Well, I need patience with God's timing. I know that this might be difficult for my atheist friends to hear, but I am talking about my belief system here, so I am using my terminology, so no offense is meant to anyone. I know for me, God is out there, working miracles in people's lives every day. I know this, because I am here. I am alive after a devastating pedestrian motor vehicle accident when I was 9 that killed me on the way to the hospital and left me in a coma for 13 days. I am one of God's miracles. It is just hard to remember that sometimes. It should be easy to remember. Every time I look up at the wall that holds my many diplomas I am reminded that I am one of God's miracles, and I am thankful for that blessing every day of my life, but it gets difficult when I am feeling upset or depressed and not feeling like my usual cheerful self. That is when I need patience the most. Patience with my self. Patience with others, and knowledge that everything will eventually return to "normal" in God's time.

But that is the hardest part for me. I have never been good at waiting. At Christmas time when I was little, I became very good at peeking at my Christmas presents under the tree, I had such a hard time waiting for Christmas day and eventually I would get caught and get into trouble for it. Yet, I digress.

Patience. Why do I need patience? I need patience because I have to wait for everything to fall into place. For the job interviews to start showing up. Which, by the way, they have started to do. I had an interview yesterday with Anka Behavioral Health in Stockton, CA that lasted for an hour and 40 minutes. That seems like a positive sign to me. The only down sides to it are that it only pays $14 an hour and I wouldn't be able to go to school at Alliant University because of the hours. I would have to stay at Argosy University. Also, I have an interview in Chico on December 14th with Northern California Catholic Counseling Services. So things are looking up. I think I just needed to start showing momentum on my part by completing my Alliant application and getting that turned in. I have to show patience, however, in waiting for the results for the decision on that as well. It is such a hard thing for me to have to wait for other people to make up their minds when I want to know right now. Again, patience is a virtue I will have to work on achieving in order to maintain some form of inner peace. I have improved with age, but I am still impatient to a fault. It makes it hard for there to be surprises under the Christmas tree. Oh well.

The Biopsy Results

I must say, I was nervous and scared about the biopsy. I didn't know what was going to happen before I arrived at the appointment. The whole process was a mystery to me, even though I had a basic idea of what was going to be done. It is kind of obvious by the description of the procedure after all. They were going to be sticking needles into my breast to cut out a sample of tissue to see if there was cancer. I don't like needles, so I was terrified. The good news is, I didn't need to be. I didn't feel any discomfort at all, not even a needle prick.

I attribute this to a couple of things. First, I used self-hypnosis to turn down the volume of any sensation in the breast area so that I would not feel any pain (and I should mention, I was watching the needle be inserted on the ultrasound screen). I felt absolutely nothing, no pressure, no sensation whatsoever. It was also helpful that the doctor let me talk and ask questions about the procedure as he was working so I felt at ease with what was going on and he explained each part of the procedure before doing anything. This was a completely different experience than the last time I had to have the ultrasound done, because I felt heard and supported through the whole process, which is a big improvement.

The doctor did a total of 3 biopsies on the 3 cysts on my left breast. It was kind of fascinating to watch the whole process on the ultrasound screen. Very much a surreal experience, like I was looking at somebody else's body being worked on instead of my own because I wasn't feeling anything due to the self-hypnosis and the local anesthetic the doctor had injected before using the biopsy needles. After the doctor was done with each biopsy he inserted a tiny metal marker by each spot so that each time I get a mammogram from now on they can keep an eye on any changes in that area.

Yesterday, Thusday, December 1, I got the best news in the world. The radiologist called and said there was no sign of cancer! I was relieved, to say the least. I will now have to get a mammogram every year for follow-up, however,  because of the cancer history in my family. I must say, I am impressed that Kaiser jumped on the ball in getting me evaluated for cancer so quickly after an abnormal mammogram. I am a definite proponent for early mammograms if there is a cancer history in a woman's family.

Now, I just have to wait until December 13 to find out what is going on with my stomach/abdomen. The one area where I really do not feel like I am being heard by the doctor. I will have to work on finding a way to get my voice heard with the GI doctor in the following 9 days. Wish me luck.

Anticipation in waiting

I don't do really well when I have to wait. And, to make matters worse, when I try to follow doctor's orders, or in this case, pick up a prescription, I hate bureaucracy. Let's just say patience is not my strong point. After my doctors appointments on November 17th, I went to pick up my prescriptions that the GI doctor ordered. I get help paying for my prescriptions from Medicare and Medi-cal, so I rarely if ever have to pay over $1.10 for my prescriptions. I was shocked, therefore, when I went up to pick up my prescription and they wanted $89 for the abdominal medication. That is expensive when you can't even afford to put gas in your car to make it up and down the hill between Pollock Pines and Sacramento. So, I asked them to either ask for a different medication of apply for a TAR through Medi-cal to pay for the medication and I would come back for it later.

I waited through the weekend, a total of 5 days actually, before returning to see if the pharmacy had made any progress. Of course when I arrived at the pharmacy, I didn't get to talk to the same person that helped me previously, so the clerk had no clue what I was talking about. When I asked if the pharmacy had applied for a TAR for the medication, she point blank asked me, "Why would we go through all that extra paperwork when we can just ask the doctor to prescribe a different medication?!?" I tried explaining that it had been five days since the prescription had been sent in, but she told me to sit down and wait. She would call me up in a few minutes, once she had figured out what was going on. In the end, she did call me back up and say that I would have to wait for the doctor to call back to change the prescription.

At this point, I went to the Health Education department to try to get a hold of my doctor via phone or e-mail. I didn't have any luck with the phone...for some reason I could not understand it was not going to work for me on that day. So in tears, upset, I get on the Kaiser computer and type in the information to e-mail my doctor and find out that she would be out of the office for the rest of the week. I am aggravated and feel like giving up, but I know I need to see about getting this medication that the doctor has prescribed, so I go back to the pharmacy and stand in line to talk to the person that I had talked to during the previous week to see what could be done. Fortunately, my primary care physician had stepped up to the plate and prescribed a different, yet similar, medication that I could afford in the mean time, so I had my prescription waiting to be filled when I arrived at the front of the line. I only had to wait another 20-30 minutes. Thus ending that potential disaster.

Needless to say, I think we all feel badly when we aren't listened to, like there is somehow something wrong with us even though we have valid information we are trying to present simply because the other person does such an effective job of shutting us down. Unfortunately, this is a frequent event in the American healthcare system. It would appear that the doctors, pharmacy technicians, x-ray techs, and the like listen long enough to hear what they think is important (the key words being what they think) before shutting the patient down to feel slightly abused or at least unheard because all of the patient's symptoms haven't been stated. I have some suggestions for making sure this doesn't happen to anyone in the future, but it only works as well as the healthcare system is willing to listen. First, I would recommend taking someone you trust with you to the doctor, who knows your symptoms, who is also willing to speak up when the doctor has shut off the conversation. This is important because it not only gives the doctor another perspective of what is going on, but also gets them to pay more attention when there are two people telling him the same symptoms versus only one. Also, write down all of your symptoms to remind you of what they are, so that if you get stressed during the appointment, you don't forget anything. I know this sounds kind of funny, but this has happened to me more than once, so that is why I am recommending it. Another recommendation, is to e-mail your doctor your symptoms, if you have that option, so s/he has it all in writing beforehand. This way, if you have forgotten anything in the e-mail, you can tell the doctor any remaining symptoms at the appointment. Finally, I would recommend interrupting the doctor if s/he hasn't heard all that you need to tell her/him about what is going on. It is your body and you have every right to have all of your symptoms heard to lead to the best treatment possible.

In case you can't tell from my previous postings, I do not do well with waiting. Anticipation in waiting is not my friend. The case in point, waiting for the biopsy that I have to have done today has made me an emotional wreck. Fear has had me crying for hours on end, wondering if I have cancer, wondering what is going on with my stomach and abdomen. Crying in pain from my abdomen, when the medicine isn't working as quickly as it needs to. Fortunately, I have other tools beside medication to manage pain, I just have to remember to use the hypnosis before I get all stressed out. It is so amazing how the mind-body connection works. Of course, now, I have to remember to use the hypnosis today, when they are poking me with needles, so I can turn down the volume of any discomfort I am feeling and not react to any pain. I realize I can face whatever comes my way, but it is the fear of not knowing, that is eating me up. But today is the day, and I have to face it. I would like to say I am ready for it, and on some level I am. I want this over with, but I am afraid of what they will find. Soon the anticipation will be over with at least. All I can say is "wish me luck!"

Today is the big day

11/17/2011  Today is the big day. I am sitting here waiting in the GI doctor's waiting room, not really sure what is going to happen at this appointment. Not much, I fear, for this is only a consultation appointment in preparation for something in the future. In reality, I am tired of waiting, tired of being in pain, tired of not knowing what is wrong with me. Fortunately, during my long wait for this appointment, I have learned some very good coping mechanisms beside taking pain medications for controlling the stomach discomfort and pain thanks to the wonderful 4 day hypnosis training that I had with my brother-in-law, Phil La Puma. It is amazing how much control we have over our bodies just through the power of our mind. I have been able to help some of my family and friends with hypnosis as well since my training class and have always received positive results. But I digress.

I am finally called back into the examining room where I am weighed. I point out that I have lost about 4 pounds without trying within the last 2-3 weeks, but there doesn't seem to be much interest in what I am saying. I get seated in the exam room and wait for another 20 minutes. At this point I am getting concerned because I have my radiology appointment scheduled right after the GI appointment, so I go out to ask about seeing the doctor. Fortunately, she was on her way into the exam room.

I don't know that the doctor and I hit it off very well.   It seems as if the doctor was irritated that I was not on her time schedule. That maybe her time was more valuable than mine, and to tell you the truth, this kind of irritated me. I try to explain to the doctor that I have another appointment scheduled after my appointment with her and then I start to explain what has been going on with my stomach, the two visits to the emergency room for the extreme pain, the feeling similar to having a blocked intestine that I had had in 2006, and the fact that I am still in pain two months later. The doctor had me lay back on the exam table, where she poked and prodded my stomach and I told her where the pain was, basically where my stomach pouch is from my gastric bypass surgery and down the left side of my abdomen where my colon is. She has me sit up and before I can finish telling her what other symptoms I have been experiencing, she pronounces my illness to be IBS-irritable bowel syndrome.

Now, I am in a state of shock. I have been diagnosed with IBS before, and it has never felt like this. I try to explain this to Dr. B. but she quickly poo poo's me and says that IBS can make you feel like you are going to die, but there is really nothing they can do for it but give you medications to control the spasms, which she prescribed and sent to the Kaiser Folsom Pharmacy. Then Dr. B says she will schedule a lower GI for me because I did manage to explain to her that I had had some bleeding. I also told her that my gastric bypass surgeon also wanted an upper GI done, much to her chagrin, since she firmly believes that there is nothing wrong with my stomach, but since I would be under sedation anyway, Dr. B. agreed to do an upper GI as well. The appointment for the GI's were set up for December 13, 2011.

I left that appointment feeling defeated and ignored. On the one hand, I guess I had an answer to what had  been bothering me over the past two months, but on the other hand, it was not an answer that I agreed with. I felt that I was being pushed under the rug, ignored, left to fate to deal with whatever consequences my stomach would mete out to me at least until December 13th anyway. But now, I had to focus my attention on a different part of my body and go to my radiology appointment.

The radiology department was downstairs from the GI department, and I arrived with barely 5 minutes to spare. As I checked in, I started crying out of fear of what they might find in the mammogram. I knew if something was found in the second mammogram, I would be taken for an ultrasound and would know some results that day, and I think that thought terrified me even more. But I was here to discover what, if anything, was growing inside my breast(s), so I had to follow through with the appointment whether I was prepared or not.

I was taken straight back for the mammography. It wasn't as uncomfortable as the horror stories claim, but I could have just been in a state of shock from my previous appointment. I did want the mammogram over and done with that is for sure. After the x-ray technician took the required x-rays, she had me wait in the internal lobby while the radiologist looked at the results to determine if I needed to have an ultrasound. I think that this was the most intense 10 minute wait I have ever had to have, sitting there hoping that the x-ray didn't show anything. Unfortunately, the x-rays did show something and I was to have an ultrasound done.

They would not let my husband Gary go back with me as moral support to have the mammogram or ultrasound done, so I was alone, with no one but the technicians in the room. The only comfort in that is that they were all female, so I didn't need to feel embarrassed about being exposed to the world. But there was no hand to hold as I cried when they discovered the three cysts in each breast. Of course, I didn't find this out as they were found, but I knew something was wrong since the tissue did not look the same as the rest of the tissue. It looked like holes in the tissue, so I knew something was wrong, just not to what extent.

The radiologist came in and started talking to me, telling me what they found. I asked for my husband Gary, knowing that the doctor would have to repeat what he had just said, but knowing that I needed the moral support because it felt like my world had just collapsed beneath me. Although there was only really one cyst that they were worried about because it seemed membranous. They want to do a biopsy. I want them just to take it out...surgically remove them all, get them as far away from me as possible, but the radiologist insists that although the surgeons may take the cysts out, they will not want to have to go in twice, so it is better to do the biopsy first. It is sad to say, but I am more afraid of a biopsy needle than I am of having them slice and dice me. I would rather be asleep and feel no pain whatsoever, than worry about them making a mistake with a needle, or having to go back and do surgery later. But, needless to say, I now have a biopsy scheduled for December 2, 2011 and I am scared.

Tomorrow is the big day...

As you read this, you will notice that I am a little behind in posting. So in posting tomorrow is the big day, it really was on Thursday, but I am writing this from my journal so it will have to wait until I get caught up. I'm almost there!

11/16/2011  So, tomorrow is the big day, although I am  still wishish it hadn't taken them so long to schedule these appointments. But I can't complain now as it will all be over with tomorrow, I hope. I am scared of what they might find but prepared to fight for my life if it comes down to it. I very much have an "if it is broke, fix it now!" attitude. I am not good at "let's wait and see" that's for sure.

I have been trying to maintain a relatively calm demeanor but that hasn't been so successful. I have cried off and on and have been in a state of emotional turmoil. I cry at the drop of a hat and quickly lose patience with Gary lately. I know that isn't fair to him so I try to keep to myself. He has been very understanding and loving towards me throughout all of this. He has held me in his arms while I have shed streams of tears, never complaining. It was a very comforting experience to be held, protected, kn owing he was there for me. The importance of a strong support system during any time of stress is so important. I am now a firm believer in that. Something to always remember in my counseling practice for the future. For now, I just have to make it through tonight.