Still in hospital but good news

So, I'm still in the hospital but not having Congestive Heart Failure any more. Most of the fluid from my lungs and heart has been removed. I can breathe better and my heart is beating good. I had an echocardiogram done yesterday. The Dr. says that it shows good heart muscle and pumping action. It also shows a mitral valve regurtitation. This mitral valve problem may have been there for awhile, they don't know. Either way, the Dr. says that with the exeption of the valve I have a healthy heart in all four chambers, YEAH!
Tomorrow morning they will do a esophageal echocardiogram to see more details of my valve. This will help them decide if it is a "wait and monitor" problem or a "needs repair/replacement" problem.
After this is over, I can go home and try the rest of my recuperation from pneumonia and the whole mess. So, I think God let this happen to find my valve problem. I had attempted to get my other Drs (gyn and primary) to check my heart, but they kept saying I didn't a good enough reason for checking it. I had a "gut" reason for a few years now. So, I'm glad to have found the problem, so we can fix it and move on with life. The lord Jesus has always taken care of me and I thank him so much for continuing to do so.

Writing from the Hospital

So, I'm writing from the hospital. I've had one heck of a week. Last Tuesday I became very ill and Wednesday morning decided I needed to go to the emergency room. They admitted me for pneumonia. On Thursday, while in the hospital I find out that my blood cultures reveal blood poisoning (Sepsis) of the bacteria that had infected my lung. I was given high doses of strong antibiotic called Levequil or something like that along with another one, which I don't remember the name of, but it made my head itch badly. I was told basically that the itch was worth the cure, so I took it. On Friday, I began bloating really badly. I told the nurse about it and she shook it off and told me it was a side affect of the meds. I was nausaus as well, again, told side affects. I asked if he was going to do any xrays before I left and he said no.This continued thru Saturday. When the Dr. came in to Discharge me I told him. He said, side affect and to take some antacid. I went home. I began to improve with the pneumonia and fever, but continued to bloat. By Monday morning I noticed that even my legs and feet were bloated. I had tried on some of my pants on Saturday and couldn't even get them around my butt. Monday morning I weighed myself. I had gained 22 pounds in only 5 days. Not Good. So, after several calls to Dr offices who didn't open on MLK day, I went to the emergency room.

Now here I am, admitted with Congestive Heart Failure. Wow, I can hardly believe it. Part of me wants to cry and be so sad about the prospect of a possible earlier demise then what I ever thought I'd have. Another part of me wants to say, well at least we know and now lets find a cure. So, I'm going with the second part of me. I will eventually die anyway, we all do, so I get a chance of preventing mine for a bit by finding the cause and following the treatment. At least I didn't have a heart attack out of the blue and just die. So, that is all I want to write for now. I'm getting a bit tired. Of course the whole time I was writing I didn't have one interruption from hospital staff. They are waiting for me to attempt a nap. Which is what I'm going to do. Later.

So, I realize I haven't updated my blog in a while. First, my Bone marrow biopsy was good, meaning I don't have anything that is diagnosable. This is good because I don't have anything too serious right now. The doctor said my results were "interesting" LOL. Anyway, long story short is that the parts which were abnormal were areas which can be abnormal for either an autoimmune/inflammatory disorder or a mild pre-leukemia. So, I am still a lab rat :) The oncologist wants the rheumatologist to rule out autoimmune and after I seen the rheumatologist (Dec 21) he has wanted the biopsy to rule out pre-leukemia prior to treatment for autoimmune disorder. So, from both Doctors it is a monitor and see what happens down the road. If I begin to get worse as months/years go by then whatever surfaces, that is what I will be treated for. Meanwhile I take anti-infammatories for an achiness and take good care of myself so my immune system doesn't have to react to itself. The end.

Now, for life update. Christmas was very good, but we missed Amber and Carlos. This was the first year that Amber spent away from us at Christmas (now that Carlos and she are married then in-laws get a turn), which is fine, such is life. We had a wonderful time in Silver City with Ashley and her boyfriend Gabe. Thanksgiving was spent at Ashley's in Silver City(due to the convenience of travel for Amber and Ashley and days off). Next year, I have no idea where we will be for Thanksgiving, but John insists that we aren't "going anywhere" for Christmas. I think he got tired of traveling so much. We had went to the trainings for the Chrysalis in Oct, Nov, then Thanksgiving, then Dec, then Albuq, then Christmas to Silver. I really would love to stay home for Christmas, but I don't want to be alone with just the two of us. So, I hope next year the kids can travel to see us or I will be very sad at Christmas time.
I'm going to be taking a math class (online) this spring. It starts in two weeks. I hope I can do it. I haven't had math in about two years and it was basic algebra then. This class sounds like fun. It is Math Appreciation and it has problems in it like I used to do for fun in the brain books (logic puzzles, etc). I really like math, but I don't know all the mathematical terms and reading a word problem without knowing all the terms and procedures can be intimidating especially when it is online and your teaching yourself LOL. Oh well. My resolution for the new new year is #1 Get through it with my sanity in tact LOL and #2 Maintain my current weight loss.