3 weeks later and still no change. Same symptoms and now I'm getting consistently more tired all the time.
It just so happens that I have an amazing Family Doctor. I went to see him and he was so concerned and spent so much time trying to help (as a matter of fact, he's been with me this whole time, still is my doctor, actually). We finally decide that in order to run all the test he wants to run, we'd be a lot more efficient if I were admitted to the hospital.
So, here we are, mid-September, and I am now officially on a leave of absence from work and in the hospital. *At this point, I have so much faith in my doctors and the practice of medicine that I'm POSITIVE something will be found. I'm extremely confident that this would be the start of the end of my troubles.
They run every test imaginable. I had MRI and cat-scans of the head and brain, the back, the abdomen. I had so much blood work that they used up all my veins they could access and put in a PICC line for the duration of my stay. I had spinal taps and all kinds of uncomfortable neurological tests where they stick needles in you and shock you with electrodes. I had swallowing tests and physical therapy tests. If you can think of a diagnostic test, I had it. I had ultrasounds of the abdomen and heart. And the list goes on.
I spoke to a nutritionist and an immunologist and an infection diseases doctor (because EVERYONE that knew I went to the Philippines just insisted that it was a bug I picked up over there). I had a neurologist and a cardiologist and a radiologist. I had the largest team of doctors that I could have ever imagined.
And guess what? every test was normal. Every one. No one could find anything wrong...except the eye doctor, and it was pretty obvious that my pupils were dilated and unresponsive. But everyone kept saying they'd never seen anything like it. No idea what was going on, etc. They did, however, tell me that my eyes would never recover because they were dilated because the nerves were damaged. Too bad. GAH! I was devastated! How do you so callously tell a previously-healthy 25 yr. old that her vision is impaired for life? Jerk.
Well, the next step, after a full week in the hospital and no answers was to head to the University of Alabama in Birmingham to see a Neuro-Ophthalmologist who might be able to help. This trip was gonna be fun, though, because UAB wasn't in-network with my insurance.
No comments:
Post a Comment