News Update

On Monday July 27th I woke up at 2:00 am with really bad stomach pains that radiated around to my back. I slept in and out until 5:30am, then got up and took my morning dose of pain medication that I take for my arthritis which I can't take on an empty stomach so I have a cup of yogurt too. At about 6:30 am I begin to feel nauseated which led to what you usually associate with that. After that, the pain continued so I finally called my son and had him come and take me to the ER. I thought I knew what it was from but I have never gotten the back ache before. They did an EKG and that came out a bit abnormal. So that led a whole bunch of other tests, including a heart stress test and an echo. The echo showed a blockage of some sort in one of the frontal arteries. So a cardiac catherization was suggested. At first I said no, but then I spoke to my regular doctor and he convinced me to do it. I was transported to another bigger, hospital in Green Bay because the hospital I was in doesn't do that procedure. After the procedure I felt fine, no pain or very little anyway. During the night and early morning, the nurse would come in and check it every hour or so. At 6:15 am there was noise outside my room window that woke me up. I turned over and the small incision, which it isn't really, just a small hole, started to hurt. About 1 minute later, the nurse, Josh, came in to check on me. I told me I felt fine up until the time I turned and asked if he could check it. He looked and said "I told you to let me know if you felt blood." I said " I didn't feel it. I didn't feel anything until just a minute ago." He said "I'll be right back." Ran out of the room, came back another nurse who was carrying a bunch of wash cloths and Josh had a package in his hand. While Josh put pressure on the sight, the other nurse started to clean me up. Almost down to my knees and half way up my stomach. They needed to change the sheets and my gown. He then put on a pressure bandage which caused extruciating pain. That stayed on about 3 hours. By the time the day time nurse took it off I was in tears. She got me up about an hour later in the chair. I ate lunch and my son came in to get me about 12:30. I was afraid to go home but he said he'd stay for a few days. If Josh had not come in, I probably wouldn't have said anything, I was expecting pain at sooner or later so I would have thought it was normal. The bleeding had stopped on it's own by the time he had come in, it looked worse then it really was.
After all this, all I need to do is take a couple of pills. A "statin": generic form of Plavix and a baby aspirin. There are no diet changes needed.
I was in the hospital in Green Bay from Tuesday the 28th until the afternoon of Thursday the 30th.
I feel ok now. I tire easily but that will pass. There is very little pain.
I had a actual running water shower last night. It felt sooooo goooood.