The Resurrection Of The Smart Phone

OR: The Ragings Of A Crazy Insomniac

Here I sit at 2:40 AM in a rather particular situation. I have my big doctor appointment tomorrow with my primary care Doc to discuss what I ranted and raved about in a blog a month or so back. Actually its today, at 11 AM, because it is now a new day. There is a significant amount of research I must bring to the table, a blanket of knowledge I must possess if I am truly going to catch her attention and get her to take a second look at an inflammation marker on my blood test she wants to chalk up to "that is just how I am". In fact I was given an abundant opportunity to prove that knowledge is power today, or yesterday, as it is now 2:50 AM. I went to the dentist on Thursday afternoon then called my mom  to chat on my way home. Her friend answered my mom's cell and told me my mother was in the ER. So of course I headed directly there because her symptoms were concerning. Severe migraine, tingling numbness, stuff like that. 

But I got hopelessly lost. People kept telling me to get off on an exit that does not exist on a freeway coming from that direction and taking that interchange. I drove past where it was supposed to be four times and finally decided it just did not exist for me. But none of this is my fault! I am a California girl. There is the ocean and there is east. There is Mexico and there is north. Very simple and linear. But Phoenix has a completely psychotic system of freeways called "loops". Big giant multi-lane highways that circle the city. Huge problem when you live in a metropolis comprised of grids because the same "loop" going the opposite direction, but called the same name, will intersect the same street at two completely opposite ends of the valley, not to mention the loops themselves intersect each other like four times. But in a fit of "this is frivolous and driving me crazy" I shut my smart phone down last week and went back to my little bitty old one that does not know how to hook up to that addiction we call the internet. Anyway I went 50 miles out of my way without my GPS and wound up using all my gas I had budgeted for the week which was coincidentally the exact same amount of money that darn data package costs for the smart phone. Do I even need to say I was a very unhappy girl? Shortly after I arrive at the ER the doctor came in to inform my mother her CT was clear. He was very rude, abrupt and dismissive. He told her to go home, this was an after effect of a concussion she had some months ago. The only other thing he could do is give her a spinal tap to rule out a stroke which she did not need, according to Dr. ER. I assume that term "spinal tap" usually sends most patients running away screaming but I cried at the mere mention, for I remembered the two I got when I was having my strokes and how scared I was. I observed his brisk and "put out" attitude and let him leave as I looked at my mom and her friend and said "Now you know what it feels like to be a Fibromyalgia patient!" 

But I was formulating my plan, oh yes I was. Extracting exact patterns of a week of migraines and tingling numbness from a person drugged up on Dilaudid was interesting, to say the least. But when that doctor came back I started on him and he switched to a different dance very quickly. I informed him I had two hemorrhagic strokes last year. I clarified all the information I had gathered from my mother. I used all sorts of fancy doctor words and pushed him with my knowledge because goodness gracious I have plenty of it! I asked him eye to bull-headed eye if his professional recommendation was that she get the spinal tap or go home. He was much more astute and interested. Then he left again and when he came back he asked my mother what she had decided about the spinal tap, did not tell her she did not need it and to go home. He had miraculously conferred with a neurologist during his departure as well. I needed to research medications and procedures during the long hours emergency rooms absorb, but again I did not have my smart phone. Mom got discharged and thankfully went home to follow up with a neurologist tomorrow, which is now today seeing as it is now 3:15 AM. So I am wired and doing my own medical research and overwhelmed with my life and cannot get a hold of the darn cell phone company to turn that bloody smart phone back on because it is the middle of the night! But hey, its only an hour and 15 minutes before my husband gets up to go to work. I think I just might be able to make it...

Thanks for joining,

Leah