Blogging in B Minor

Well, the past few days have been a rough ride.  On Tuesday, I was feeling fine in the morning – just going about my normal routine.  I left the kitchen to head to the master and almost instantly I was hit with the worst vertigo I have ever felt in my life – no kidding.  I had to hold the walls and I was able to get to the bed.  The room was spinning out of control – or I was.  I couldn’t tell which.  I have this way about me of not wanting others to be burdened with my condition so I closed my eyes and just layed there for a few minutes, praying that God would take this from me.  I really didn’t want to have to get Rachael involved in it Well, this time I was having to walk through it because it wasn’t going to get better.

At this point, I called Rachael and of course these days she’s sprinting to my aid.  She is so supportive.  I just told her the best I could what was going on and I frankly didn’t know what to do about it.  I didn’t have a remedy.  There wasn’t any medicinal remedy like I have for the occasional seizure .  I felt sick.  To cut to the chase, I reached my limit and couldn’t cope and told Rachael to call 911.  She asked if I was sure and I told her yes. In my head I was thinking that the tumor was growing, brain swelling or some other change was causing this – vomitting, vertigo – all of it are signs that a tumor is really on the move.

As I was wheeled out of the house, I never opened my eyes for if I did, I would become even more dizzy than I already was.  They got me up from the bathroom, on a stretcher, asked me a ton of questions I couldn’t answer and took me to the ER which thankfully is 2 mins from our home.  They gave me zofran which is an anti-nausea, another drug which fights vertigo and decided to admit me.  They gave me an MRI which was great news – better looking than 30 days ago!  So what was going on? 

The culprit?  The increase in my dosage of Lamictal, one of the anti-convulsants I take.  We went from 800mg per day to 900mg back several weeks ago and it ended up being a toxic dose.  It took 2 weeks to build up in my system but I learned that this is a classic result and reaction.  By Wednesday morning I was feeling much better except for a splitting headache. 

What a few days.  All is well as I type this.  But geez!  I guess as usual you just have to go with it all.  You can’t change any of of this but it sure does get old.

More soon.

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As luck (or a hashed immune system!) would have it, I ended up with a cold.  Who cares at this point – it’s par for the course and I’m working on bringing myself back out of this over time.  It will take about 6 months and I will take antibiotics the entire time which will help me.  Now I’m not sure if this was caused by me, but my son woke up on Wednesday morning with a terrible cold – running a temperature and the whole nine yards.  I’m watching out from all sides!  He’s worse than I am for some odd reason.  I feel bad for him – he’s been in camp all week and had to miss yesterday and today.  I’m hoping he can finish out tomorrow at least.

Also on Wednesday I had some strange sensations in my left bicep – just slight contractions on and off in the afternoon.  They started again in the evening and at that point I knew it was my long lost friend – focal seizures.  So, after a period of time I became annoyed with it (I was trying to watch Dateline or something) and took an additional 200mg of Lamictil and they said goodbye.  For those of you that can’t envision this – this time it was like having a strong twitch in an area of your body – you try to turn it off but you can’t.  You see, a focal seizure can be as simple as that or a marching numbness in your hand or arm.  So many people have this classic vision of a seizure – someone flopping around on the ground.  That’s just not what they are all about.  There are a lot of different types.  I spoke to my neurologist about it – there’s nothing you can read into this.  It means nothing.  People can have clean scans for years and have seizures throughout – I actually never have them since 7 months ago or so.  People can have tumor growth and no seizure activity.  It’s just not an indicator of anything.  So you deal with it which is why when it happened I took a pill, talked to my wife about it and went about my business (back to the Dateline thriller!). 

You just can’t get all caught up in this stuff – you have to have faith in God and turn it all over to Him – period.  Could you imagine if I took every issue – a seizure, an upcoming MRI scan (I have one next Tuesday), some weakness I feel on the left side of my body, statistical survival rates, etc. and worried about them and placed it all on my shoulders?  I’d be an anxiety-ridden mess!  I remember when I came back to work and had 2 weeks of radiation left.  I was worried about how I’d get through that and still work but I turned it over to God.  And?  And I worked, left at lunch and went to the Institute and had radiation treatments, came back to work and finished my day – and I was on chemotherapy at the same time.  I got through it but not because of me – I had some help there.  The task ahead of you is never greater than the power behind you, right?  It’s true.

I have my 60-day MRI check on Tuesday – see my Neuro-Oncologist on Wednesday to discuss and then I’ll be done for a few months.  Things are good! 

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