Being Sick Sucks

Being sick sucks.

I’ve been fortunate enough to not be sick with anything more than a cold in a long time, but that changed pretty quickly last week.

A couple of weeks ago – and completely out of nowhere – I had some really, really terrible abdominal pain. I woke up one morning, ate breakfast, and then all of a sudden it felt like someone reached into my gut and squeezed my insides as hard as they could.

It was awful.

Like some of the worst pain I’ve ever felt ever awful.

Fortunately, my living hell didn’t last forever and between my doctor wife and a combination of over the counter meds I was able to get the pain under control. Assuming it was just some sort of stomach bug, I didn’t give it much attention and went on with life.

Unfortunately, the soreness never really went away.

So, last Thursday I finally went to the doctor.

He diagnosed me pretty quickly with an acute case of diverticulitis. Although, he thought I was on the mend he went ahead and ordered a CT scan just to make sure everything was healing properly.

Based on what he said – “we’ll only call you if something is wrong” – I thought I was in the clear. So, I headed over to the hospital to get the CT scan…..

….and never left.

Ok, I did, but not for a long time.

After the test, the radiologist came in and told me they would be admitting me to the ER immediately because the CT scan showed that abscesses had formed as a result of the diverticulitis and if they weren’t treated, well, bad things would happen.

I asked the doc how long I would be there.

He said he didn’t know.

I asked if we were talking about hours? Days? Weeks?

He said he didn’t know.

Oh, and did I mention my phone died right after the CT scan so I couldn’t call my wife and tell her what was going on?

It was awful.

Luckily, I was eventually able to get in touch with her and didn’t have to be in the ER too long. The docs found a room for me, got me hooked up to an IV…and told me I was going to be there for a while.

Probably 3 or 4 days.

Well, that’s what the first doc said.

The next doc I saw said the infection was so bad they were already making long term plans to chop out part of my colon.

I was more than a bit stunned and, honestly, incredibly overwhelmed. I’ve never had major surgery before and the prospect of having part of my body taken out was, well, scary.

Combined with the thought of what the heck I was going to do for childcare (because my wife is in residency and all of our family lives a million miles away), I was really on edge.

It was awful.

But things got better.

Thankfully, I’ve got a great family and my wife is in a fantastic residency program. Her program director got somebody to cover for her so she was able to stay with me in the hospital and my amazing family dropped everything and drove up to Connecticut from Tennessee (and Virginia) to help out with the baby.

And the next day things continued to get better.

While I had my extended stay in the hospital confirmed, the docs were no longer talking about chopping out any body parts. Just lots of antibiotics and no solid food for a while.

Praise be to God.

For reals.

Long story short, it wasn’t nearly as bad as it could have been. I did have to spend 4 days in the hospital hooked to an IV with a drain in my abdomen while being tortured with crappy hospital food, but I escaped the surgeon’s scalpel.

On Monday, they sent me home with a ton of drugs to take and yesterday I finally got that awful drain taken out.

So, things continue to get better.

I’m definitely on the mend and definitely feeling a lot better than I did last week, but I’m sure it’ll be a while until I’m back to 100%.

But that’s ok. At least I get to keep all of my body parts.

Anyway, I just wanted to let you guys know why I disappeared this week and assure you that I should be back blogging soon. Hopefully next week if all continues to go well.

In the meantime, I covet any thoughts, prayers, or good vibrations you’d be willing to send my way.

Because being sick sucks.