Running in Circles

Well another month has gone by and honestly I've been too depressed to blog because my life has been nothing but sickness, medical tests, and laying in bed, while also trying to keep up with work and school. There's really nothing about this past month that I want to remember so I had no motivation to blog. Okay, so maybe I'm being a little dramatic... I'm just so ready to feel healthy again!

Since I last wrote, I've had a battery of tests done including an EDG scope, CT scan, multiple ultrasounds, and multiple blood tests - and all of my tests came back "normal". The scope showed that my esophogus was inflamed and swollen but the Dr didn't find any ulcers or anything that would be causing me severe pain.

Next the Dr wanted to check my gallbladder. He said that could be the reason for the inflammation in my esophagus and the cause of my chest and stomach pain. I got a Hida scan done and it came back showing my gallbladder functioning but only 2% away from not functioning. It seemed like we finally found the problem. Well, today I met with a surgeon to see if getting my gallbladder out would relieve my pain and he seemed to think that it wouldn't. He thinks my symptoms don't necessarily point to a problem in my gallbladder and taking it out might not even help at all. Is it crazy that I was praying that it was my gallbladder? I was so hoping that having a small surgery would take away all my problems.

I feel like I've been running around in circles for the last 9 weeks. I get my hopes up every time a doctor says "this is your problem - here's how we fix it" and then get let down every time they find nothing and leave me with no answers. After every appointment I end up back where I started. The only improvement is that I've been prescribed medicine to help with the pain while they try to figure out what to do next.

Maybe I just have a virus that needs to work itself out. Maybe I will wake up one day and feel back to normal...

On a positive side note, I did mange to get everything straightened out with insurance so I don't have to stress about going to the doctor when I need to. It actually turned out to be super easy to switch my insurance from Mississippi to California (Thanks for the advice Angela!)

Anyways, I'm so tired of talking about being sick... For the month of February, I'm making it my goal to blog at least once a week about something other than sickness :) I'm going to attempt to take my life back even if my body doesn't want me to!

Prayers for a Better January...

Sorry I've been MIA for the last month. I had so many great holiday posts I wanted to write but to be honest December was one of the worst months I've had in a long, long time and writing on my personal blog was the last thing on my list. On top of several things going on with my family and friends (that I don't feel are appropriate to talk about on a blog), I've been very sick for several weeks and nobody seems to be able to help me. WARNING: This is going to be a long story, but I really need to vent... Don't feel like you have to read all this :)

Last you heard (on this blog anyways) is that I had bronchitus, the same bronchitus I get every year that has always been easily cured by one simple round of antibiotics. Well, no such luck this time. I've been sick for over 5 weeks now, seen 4 different doctors with 6 different appointments, 1 trip to the ER, several blood tests & xrays, and about 10 different prescription meds... and with all that I feel no better than when all this started and don't really have any answers.

Essentially it started when I got meds for bronchitis and was prescribed a zpak and prednisone (the same meds I get every year and have never had a problem). This time, I had an awful allergic reaction to the zpak that sent me to the ER. Then I went on ammoxicylan, which seemed to work great at getting rid of the bronchitis but I was still feeling horrible chest pain and severe exhaustion. Come to find out out I have an ulcer in my stomach caused from the prednisone (or so they think...) and was put on meds for it. They also took some blood tests and found that I have an underactive thyroid (Hypothyrodism).. which apparently accounts for my exahuastion. After these tests (two weeks ago), I was optimistic that everything was figured out and I would be feeling better soon. Again, no such luck. I've tried 3 different meds for this apparant "ulcer" that I have and none seem to help at all - in fact, I've ended up getting worse because of the side effects of those drugs which makes me wonder if I am being treated for the right thing. The only thing thats improved is the exhaustion since they started me on medicine for my thyroid, but the chest and stomach pain have not improved. Apparently, the next step is for me to get an endoscopy of my GI tract... where the put a tube down your throat into your stomach to take a look around... yeah, not fun...

And to make matters worse, I've been having a hard time even getting in to see a doctor at all because of Tricare (military insurance). Technically right now I am not at any base - we've outprocessed from Columbus but don't report to Travis AFB until March 14th and I'm not at Altus AFB with Jake so I really have no doctor in all of this medical mess. It's been such a pain dealing with the insurance and the clinic at Columbus and trying to get so many out-of-town referrals from across the country. It's been a very stressful situation, which I'm sure isn't helping me recover any faster. Any tips on dealing with Tricare are very appreciated!

On top of all that, today I had to say goodbye to Jake for another 10 weeks :( We were able to spend the last 10 days together (which were wonderful, even if I wasn't feeling great... everything's better when my husband is with me...) but now he is back in Oklahoma to complete his last few months of training. At least this time, when he gets back we will be able to finally resume our lives together at our new base... we've been apart 4 months already so now I can definitely see the light at the end of the tunnel!!

Okay, now that I've had a chance to vent, I'd love to ask for your prayers. First please pray for my family as they are going through some tough stuff right now and can really use your thoughts and prayers this week, and secondly I ask you to pray for my healing. This ongoing sickness, especially being off and on so many different medications with no relief, is really taking a toll on every part of my life - physically, mentally, emotionally... and I'm starting to really wear thin.

Anyways, I hope you all were able to enjoy a great holiday season with your loved ones; despite everything going on, I was still able to have a really nice time with my family and friends.

Praying for a better January and a wonderful 2011 for everyone!

Happy Birthday Blog!

From time to time I like to look back at old posts I've written on this blog, and while doing so I realized that as of this week my blog is TWO YEARS OLD! Since I started this blog, I've graduated college, moved to Mississippi, experienced life as a newlywed, got my first "real" job, adopted two dogs, furnished two homes, decided to go back to school, started my own business, learned how to handle the ups and downs of military life, got braces, moved back to California, and the list goes on... Through all of that, I continued to blog and document my thoughts and daily happenings (happy, bad, good, sad) and now 341 posts later I have an amazing journal of just about my entire married + Air Force life thus far. It's so neat to look back at my life and get to remember the little details!

The biggest thing that amazes me though (and always will) is how I "fell into" my perfect career because of this blog. If I had never started this blog two years ago I would've never started playing around with blog designs and HTML, never known that it's something I enjoy and have a knack for, wouldn't be back in school, and definitely wouldn't be working for myself and loving my job every single day! It seems like it just kind of randomly progressed over time but I know better - God had this in His plan all along :) It's just funny to see that something as simple as starting a blog changed the course of my whole life. Happy birthday blog!

Blog Deja-Vu

Thank you all for sending over your email addresses. This blog is officially private and it feels fabulous! Anyways, today I wanted to write about my "blog deja-vu". First I should start by saying I've been awfully sick for the past week. It started towards the end of my Oklahoma trip so as soon as I got back I went straight to the Dr to get it taken care of - I have NO time to be sick! Who does?

I was pretty sure when I went in that I had bronchitis, even though I had no symptoms except for trouble breathing. Sure enough, I was right. How did I know? Well, almost exactly a year ago I blogged about having the same thing. I was reading through some of my old blogs last week and came across one where I was sick and the way I described how I was feeling was exactly the same as now. It's an atypical bronchitis so I have no outside signs that I'm actually sick (like coughing, sore throat..). It's really strange, and apparently my body thinks that every year at this time I need to get it! It made me wonder if over the years I will look back to my November/December blog posts and always read about me being sick. Maybe next year at this time I should just go to the doctor and ask for some antibiotics in advance :)

Anyways, I'm finally starting to feel better and am excited to get caught back up on work and school and life. And I'm really excited because in just 2.5 weeks I'll be headed to Portland for Christmas to see all of my family! I seriously LOVE the holidays! I'm listening to the Michael Buble holiday station on Pandora as we speak.

Before I go, I want to show you a funny picture of Bailey & Badger. Last night I was laying in bed snacking on some banana bread and apparently the dogs really like banana bread because they sat and gave me these pitiful looks the entire time I was eating. I can never seem to get them to sit still but I guess I found a new trick!

My Blog is Going Private...

As of Monday morning, my blog will be set to be viewed by invited readers only. I've been debating whether or not to do this for a while now but yesterday I got a few "anonymous" rude comments on some of my blog posts and that made up my mind. Not sure if it was spam or just a random mean person, but either way it made me realize that only my family and friends should have access to the details of my personal life.

So here's the deal... Anyone who already receives my blog through email (which as of now is mostly my family) will still have complete access - No need to do anything. Anyone else who follows my blog or reads it through my links off facebook will need an email invitation. To get an invitation, leave a comment on this post with your email address and I'll add you, or you can send me a facebook message. I love and appreciate all of my 60+ blog followers and don't want to leave anyone behind so please don't hesitate to ask for an invite.