kiki_miserychic

I paid off a couple more hospital bills that came in. It's getting annoying because they bill everything separately. There isn't one bill, but 20 bills for individual things like sterile gauze, doctor's time, the room, transport, aftercare nurse's time, bandage tape, and so on. I decided to go all in and pay off my car completely before I have no money left. I'm not sure it was the smartest thing, but at least my car is paid off and it's mine, so I don't have to worry about having no money left after hospital bills. This is the poorest I've been since I was 7 years old and my great-uncle opened a CD account in my name. (Side note: that was college money that my dad gambled away, yay!)

I had to take the semester off of school, which has turned out to be a better and better choice as time goes on. I've been working more, so I have more money than I did when I could only work on the weekends. Sadly, that money has gone to pay ridiculous hospital bills. Going back to how shitty my dad is, he promised to pay what hospital bills were left after insurance. Now that I'm not dying and the bills have started coming in, he's not paying.

I went to breakfast with my grandparents this morning and studied a bit while drinking coffee. I have my forth and final PRAXIS teaching licensure and certification exam on Saturday. I went overboard studying this week. I'd planned to study over two weeks and be confident and ready by Thursday, using Friday for overall review. I finished my outline and information gathering far sooner and I studied far more than I'd planned. It's Monday and I feel like I could take the test right now. I suppose that's a good thing though.

I received the results from the one I took in March too. I got a 191 out of 200, which is quite good considering the average is like 170 or so.

a few recent DeviantArt photographs of mine:

Kitchen Window


Mostly Ceiling


Violet of African Variety I


Violet of African Variety II

( Where I ramble and relate vidding to Twyla Tharp's The Creative Habit Learn It and Use It for Life )

( Where I relate the book to The 5 Obstructions (with trailer) and vidding )

All of this has brought me to a vidding idea. I would like people to leave me "obstructions", restrictions like having at least one clip that plays for 10 seconds without cut, not using effects, or anything. I'll pick out some and complete a vid according to the specifications.

My Stepdad's Birthday Party: the Usual Disaster (not safe for work because I swear and warning for grossness because there's a clip of the wound on my leg)

password: reallifeness

02/20/09 Birthday Party: the Usual Disaster

( spoilers for the last two episodes of House, but it's less about the show and more about my crazed emotions and soapboxing about Intervention Specialist things )

My doctor's appointment ok. They're bringing in another doctor at the Wound Center and he came along with my doctor for the day. We went over my case history, which was great fun for me... not. I get that he was shadowing to get a feel for the place, but he put gloves on started poking at my leg with no warning. I said something like "whoa, you're not my doctor" and got a bit irritated. I felt like an jerk, but he wasn't technically employeed by the Center yet. It hurt something awful too because my leg didn't even have the numbing liquid on it yet. My actual doctor made joke about him trying to steal her patients. One of the nurses apologized later, saying he had been doing that all day because he's used to working with patients, but not people.

Good new: The second wound is healed! I don't even have to have a bandage on it. The doctor said the front one should be healed up by the beginning of March. There's light at the end of the MRSA Tunnel!!!!!!!

Second Christmas Part 1
password: ilikecheese

(Opening crazily wrapped presents, Julia won't wear clothes, Rick hits my hurt leg, Julia is fascinated by her walking horse, Frog gets abused by Julia, and I snort.)

Second Christmas Part 2
password: ilikecheese

(Carter plays with flying toy, Parker plays with Legos, Julia plays with her fairy Godmothers, everyone plays Rock Band badly, Julia dances to Eye of the Tiger, and the toliet breaks.)

Gingerbread house with Becky
password: ilikecheese

Becky and I try to do a gingerbread something every year. It's nice for the most part. We don't argue that much.

The doctor didn't annoy me as much as today. She didn't make awful jokes about my leg or make me play Name that Tune. She was a low grade irritating. Although she did make fun of my dressing. I had to change it again yesterday because of my epic fail at dressing changes. My second dressing from Sunday slipped halfway off my wound somehow and I had to change it. The one I went into the Wound Center with was slightly off center and the doctor said she hoped it wasn't done by one of her nurses. I explained that it took me 45 minutes to do the first dressing change because I kept getting lightheaded. She said that was fine and that I'd get better at it. I said that it was packing the silver stuff that hurt and made me lightheaded. She didn't seems to care too much about it and basically her answers were along the lines of suck it up.

I had a bunch of questions today because I've some major pain issues this week. Much more than anything since the surgery. I've been getting muscle twitches in my thigh, which hurt so freaking much that I can't do anything for almost a half hour afterwards. The doctor said that it's normal and it means that it's healing. That's not as comforting as it should be because it hurts now.

I'll be off studying for my PLT until January 10th, so I probably won't be around too much.

Guess what movie I'm dying to see?

Christmas Eve video in which we frost a cake, try to trick my aunt into going to the eye doctor, and make fun of Bo Bice.

password: ilikecheese

I went in for my second doctor's appointment at the Wound Center and got my dressing changed for what feels like the millionth time. Once again, the doctor was agressively happy at me. She kept singing show tunes and made me play Name That Tune while she at poked me. If I was in a better mood I would think she was endearing, but geez, she's digging in my leg singing that the sun will come out tomorrow. Oh hell to the no.

I have to do my own dressing changes this week, which will be a disaster. I can already see how awful it be. On the bright side, I'm likely improving if they're going as far as to have me change my own dressings. The nurse said that it's half as shallow from when I came in. It's only 2cm deep now, so w00t! I told them that I wasn't sure I could do the dressing changes because it was only last week that I looked at it, puked, and passed out. Do they really think I can do the Aquacel Ag 4x4 and the Tegaderm? Once again, oh hell to the no.

I felt weird on Monday. I couldn't think, was puking, felt weak, and was a bit dizzy. I had kept hitting snooze, so I had to get ready for class in ten minutes. I took my first final, which went well I think, but it took me a while because I had trouble concentrating. After that I had to wait around for my exit conference for my teaching field. I felt completely drained, but I went home and tried to study for my other finals. That didn't work, so I started watching some tv in bed. I didn't realize what was wrong until I saw blood on my bed spread coming from my upper thigh. I had bled through a pair of sweatpants.

I had my aunt take me to the ER. I Googled some stuff and thought it was a spider bite While she was getting ready to take me. I thought they would give me a shot and tell me to take it easy for a week. It took a few hours in waiting rooms, but I finally saw a doctor, who stared at my leg with his mouth hanging open for a few seconds before saying he was admitting me. He went to get another doctor, who took a blood culture. Then all these people started poking their heads into my curtained off area like nurses and interns. I knew it was bad when people that worked at the hospital came to gawk. A nurse gave me a gown to put on and told my aunt to help me get undressed and into it. She wouldn't help me at all because she didn't want to touch me, thinking she would get sick. I was weak and my leg was still bleeding, so I bleed all over the gown I put on, which made it pointless. I was a crying mess when the nurse came to get some blood. I have bad veins, so it took a few tries to get one that worked. My aunt wouldn't hold my hand or anything, which was the worst part. The nurse said he was sorry my aunt wouldn't help and got me a new gown. The hospital was busy and it took another few hours to get me a room. In that time they gave a strong pain killer through my IV, which made it easier for me to ignore the people that kept looking at me like an animal in the zoo. My aunt left at some point to sit in the waiting room because she was worried she'd get sick. I guess that now I understand that she didn't want to get sick, but at the time it just hurt.

I was sent to the CDU early Tuesday morning. I had no idea what the letters stood for as I was being rolled through the hospital. There were no signs with the full name, so I thought it was the Contagious Diseases Unit, which freaked me out. As I was brought through the CDU, I passed by all the curtained beds to be taken to the only room with a door. They put me in a room all by myself with a door instead of a regular bed with a curtain, which freaked me out even more. I had no humility or shame left, so I started crying like a baby. The nurse calmed me down and starting asking me questions for the forms. After answering all the questions she asked if I had any for her. I asked what CDU stood for and she said it was the Critical Decisions Unit, which is a fancy term for them not knowing what's wrong. They started me an IV of more fluids, an antibiotic, and another pain killer.

I settled in and tried to sleep, but I was so upset and scared that they had to give me something to sleep. A bunch of people came in to draw more blood, poke at me, stare at my leg. The Infectious Diseases doctor came in and told me she thought I had a staph infection. They started up a stronger antibiotic. I watched the Travel Channel and Rachel Ray all day. It was impossible to sleep at night because there were a dozen people in and out of my room. I tried to read a magazine, but I didn't have the concentration level required for a Vogue article.

The surgeon came in, pushed and poked me, and said I needed to have surgery to take it all out. The labs came back and I have Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA). I was the last surgery of the day, so the wait left me stressed and anxious. I was supposed to have a liquid breakfast, but no one brought me anything and I didn't realize what time it was until it was passed 8. Dinner was at 4:30 the previous day, so I hadn't eaten in about 25 hours and I hadn't drank anything for almost 12 hours. My aunt came in drinking a bottle of water. That bottle of water looked so freaking good.

It was so cold in the holding area before I went in. They kept piling heated blankets on me while I waited. I was rolled into the freezing cold operating room and wiggled over to the operating table. The anastegologist had a series of needles he was going to add to me IV that would eventually put me to sleep. He put in the first one and said he was going to go slowly as they started getting ready. They brought up the extensions on the side for my arms. The nurse was explaining why they were strapping my arms down and I fell asleep before she finished her sentence. I had a weird dream-like moment of a lizard in a red dress trying to make me eat a pear in the recovery room.

They assigned me an aftercare specialist nurse for a few hours after the surgery to keep me in water and walk me to the bathroom. They took out about a few centimeters of my thigh. I thought I was going home after the surgery, but they took out more than they had thought would, so I needed to stay overnight to be sure I was ok.

The next day I tried to sleep as long as I could so the day wouldn't seem as long. They had trouble getting a hold of the surgeon to get his approval that I could be discharged. It was 3pm when they got a hold of the doctor. He had went home and slept through all the calls. Just as I was leaving, I got lightheaded and passed out. They put me back in bed, started another IV, drew some blood for testing, and took my blood pressure, which was extremely low. A few hours later the tests came ok and they had to get my release authorized again. It was amazing to see the sky and breathe air that wasn't stale. The drive home left my leg aching and it didn't get much better when I got home. There was a huge argument in which my aunt told me grandmother to stop yelling at me because I'd been in the hospital for days and my leg was hurting. My grandmother actually said "her leg hurts? Well mine do too," like she'd had a piece of her leg cut out. I don't understand my grandmother at all. It's like she doesn't care what happened to me or that I could have died. She was mad at me because I had a half of a basket of laundry on Monday when I'd went to the ER. That's what she was yelling at me for: a half a basket of laundry.

I go to the Wound Center in the morning to have the bandages changed. They'll tell me more than after they've assessed it. I might need another surgery or another course of treatment. Best case is that it's healing properly and I'll be healed in 3 months.

Sad Fish for My Empty Tank

A friend did a lesson on living/non-living and had goldfish that she didn't want to keep. I bought a fish tank forever ago and never got any fish, so I took them. They don't seem too happy and I'll need to get a bigger tank.

password: ilikecheese