THIS IS WHAT IS GOING ON: Here’s the story – of the black toed lady …. Who didn’t want to go into the ER… but did…
Back in the end of July I got a virus, complete with 102 temp – it was like a flu type thing but I’m pretty sure it wasn’t the flu. At the same time – I spent sometime outside in the back – sitting on the patio for awhile. I got a bunch of mosquito bites. Each of those bites were infected in a few days time. I went in and got some antibiotics. Finished the course, after a few days, they started being infected again – so I went into my reg. doc and got another round of antibiotics and he did a culture and blood tests. Finished that course of antibiotics…. Which was about the 29th of August.
So on the 1st of September I went on a walk at the collage with the boys. While walking …. I wasn’t watching where I was going 100% and was talking to Nathan. So while doing this – I was walking on the edge of the sidewalk and I ended up stepping on the edge with my foot half off of the sidewalk and my foot twisted sideways for a minute. I just corrected the situation and kept walking. My foot stung a bit but it was okay. Later Sunday night it started to hurt more and more. I got ice pack on it and was babying it a bit. I thought it was sprained, didn’t think I broke it.
But Monday – I went into Urgent Care just to be sure. They did an x-ray and declared it was a sprain. After I got home on Monday – later on that night, I noticed some of my non-completely healed wounds (mosquito bites) were becoming infected again. Oye!
Tuesday rolls around and I called as soon as I woke up to try to get a same day appointment with my primary care provider …. I managed to get in. So then I ended up going and getting gas (Cal did it) and then got Tina …. Then to the DR. I went up – called back… I put my foot up on the chair next to me.. I told him what was going on – with the sprain and the wounds getting infected again. He told me the cultures had results on them – I assumed they hadn’t because he normally would call. He told me that I definitely had a strep infection in/on my skin. Specifically, …. Group B Streptococcal Hemolytic infection on/in my skin. He also mentioned that I had a very low amount of Pseudomonas which he said is a rare thing to get. So who knows. So he does another culture and RELUCTANTLY gives me a prescription for ten pain pills. I think he did blood work, not sure – I don’t remember. But he prescribes me two more antibiotics …. I go to drop off my pain med one, ask them if they got the antibiotics …. Nope. So I start to try to look for them…. Um… eventually I called the clinic and they were lik…. “Yeah they went to Walmart!” I don’t go to Walmart – well – I mean I do, but not for meds. So I ask the lady that is filling in for my doctor’s normal assistant to send them to Walgreens … and I find out, only ONE got sent over instead of both. Gah!!
Sidenote: This weird thing happaened - these veins pop'd out of my leg - it was odd ....
Wednesday – I had an already (previously) made appointment to my diabetic doctor. I needed to go and that morning when I woke up I had noticed that my toe had an ulcer and it looked like there was black skin around the wound. This wound goes back a little bit – I stubbed it a couple months ago and it had split open and so I had been trying to get the toe to heal already. So I told him what was going on because I’m worried about Necrotizing Tissue or even Gangrene … something isn’t right. So my Diabetic doc says it’s likely just the strep and bring it up at Wound Care tomorrow ….. so I talked to him about the mix up with the prescriptions and he asked me which one got sent over – so I told him – He told me he’d send the other one to Walgreens and that way I could get it started ASAP … So he sent it over, and adjusted my insulin dosage from 50 units to 55 units because the antibiotics were messing with my glucose. Only – he ended up sending the EXACT same one in … oye!! I ended up going home – getting in bed, and not moving much because it hurt. I think I actually ended up falling to sleep for the night and went to bed early.
Thursday:
Right away in the morning, I had an appointment with Wound Care and so did my step-dad – so we all went together LOL ….. He was in the hospital for 13 days due to an infection in his knee. So funny that we have a lot of the same crap going on – but completely different crap too. Anyway – we went there and they (Mom and Dad) filled out their paperwork and I got called back. So he (my Doc) didn’t want to “upset” my foot much. He took one look at it and gasped. I pointed out it was running away with the show, and that I was worried. I showed him the pictures I showed my endocrinologist the day before and he winced at me. He told me he wasn’t going to clean them out today (Thursday) he was just going to treat them and….. he did but didn’t clean them. He looks at me – locked eyes – and said “If it gets ANY worse, you go in.” Okay, I’ll go in …. I promised. I already knew that – probably ….. would end up going in with in the next 24-48 hours
…
Friday morning – I woke up and it looked like the tip of my middle toe was black. It was at least purplish/black …. and that’s soooooooooooo not normal. So I messaged my mom… “gonna have to go into the ER” …. She messaged me back “let me pick up your spawn first, then we’ll go in.” I literally packed up like I was being admitted, because I figured …. That’s what was going to happen…. Part of me was like…. Maybe if I pack, I won’t be admitted, though …. LOL…. Wishful thinking right?
So I finished packing.. and we left. Headed to the ER. Got there … went through triage…. The nurse asked me if I felt safe at home, and I said no….. the stairs were out to get me. She was amused. I will joke and laugh my way through pain – that’s what I do …. But I do have a pain wall I’ll hit and thing it’s nothing but tears and sobbing. Anyway …. I got through triage, waited a little while and got called back. So I waddles back to a room. The PA that saw me ordered blood work …. I ended up with an x-ray of my foot and blood work. The x-ray seemed okay but the blood work… not so much. So the white blood cells count was elevated … then he says that the sed rate isn’t good ….that it’s an inflammatory marker and normal in a woman my age would be 20 or under. Mine was 108. So yeah – that’s concerning. It was at that point that he told me it’d be his recommendation that I be admitted.
It took a little bit, the Harrison Hospital Bremerton campus is usually filled on beds all the time. They managed to find me a bed pretty quick. They said room 405 before I left the Silverdale ER. Then the ambulance showed up to transport me. Mom met me there. When we got there…. they put me in room 408 …. LOL …. I was like – CRAP …. So I messaged my mom right away, told her, but she didn’t see it – lol - but the EMTs were still outside my room so she figured it out …
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The room is nice. It’s a single room. Woooooooohooo!! I have a small closet, my own bathroom (no shower) … a nice big window with the best view in the whole hospital. I am pretty sure on a clear day, you can see Mt. Rainier on a clear day.
I was solid all afternoon/night in the ER … and I managed to keep my shit together … until a little while after my mom left. She got my stuff up here – the stuff I packed and I had gotten two doses of morphine and was still in a crapload of pain. It got to the point where I hit my pain wall – and I was up crying the rest of the night. Literally – crying all night. The nurse had called the DR to try to get them adjusted, and he wouldn’t …. I know she felt so bad – and I was literally up all night crying from the pain. I had a new doctor the next day so – it got changed but yeah ….