| THIS IS A READ-ONLY ARCHIVE FROM THE SORABJI.COM MESSAGE BOARDS (1995-2016). |
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You see, the day before xmas, running errands with my shorty, I think I might have pulled a muscle, or so I thought. I was putting her in her car seat and something 'snapped' in my upper chest/back as if a muscle was pulled. It bugged me most of the day. It got better the next day but started to get worse that night, xmas eve. Spending the evening with my kid at some friends house having dinner, my back and chest muscles started to act up again. I suspected it was due to being on my feet and being tired. An aside....xmas eve...the little girl got food poisoning. I spent most of the evening catching vomit from the poor critter who was fine by morning light. After gifts I raced her to mommy to do their thing. I went on to have a champagne brunch and later went to Angry Sams on very litle sleep. Coming home later that night after plenty of Xmas cheer, my back was really tight and my breathing tight. I assumed my breathing was tight because I was having a muscle spasm of sorts. Call the doctor on the 26th. The office is closed but be prescribes some muscle relaxers and pain killers over the phone, both will do nothing for me. The next day I see the doctor. My left lung doesnt sound so good. Im sent to the hospital for an xray. Upon doing the xray, the tech asks me to wait before leaving. Minutes later Im told they are getting a bed for me. I know very little but the tech mumbled something about a collapsed lung and a chest tube. Once admitted, the surgeon stops by and explains. They are going to insert a 1/2" diameter tube between my ribs to drain fluid and re-inflate my lung. Insert terror and morphine. Seeing i was very uneasy they give me valium and eventually morphine just prior to being cut open and fitted for a tube. I've spent one night in a hospital and it was for the kids birth so im extremely uneasy...and with good cause Im soon to find. The following morning, the doctor authorizes a morphine drip. The next 5 days or so are a blur. The tub was pulled out last monday and i was released. Hopefully my lung is doing what it is supposed to be doing and they wont have to open my chest like its a fucking barn to go noodling around and repair my lung. The cause? Spontaneous pnuemothorax. Being tall and skinny and a smoker and between the ages of 20-40 stacks against me since I suffered no major chest trauma such as a car accident or gun shot wound. I think Nate stopped by to visit during the Great Haze as a i call it. it was very nice but man I don't rememeber much. Apparently I was a bit of an excusable asshole during that time. The departure from reality with a morphine drip was something else, to be sure. Peeing in a tank is nice, as are sponge baths by your girlfriend, but the gurgling of a machine sucking lung juice from your chest cavity for days on end is not. My breathing is pretty good. But man, this will probably have to go down as some of the shittiest holidays ever. Since my recovery time was unknown and the girls mother was scheduled to travel abroad this week, the baby went to her grandparents in NC. so im missing the baby girl mucho. Im off the pain meds, though I thouroughly advocate the creation of a placebo clicker similar to that that dispenses the morphine in the hospital. I was told for days after my release at night my left hand was squeezing something that wasnt there. I also havent had a smoke in over two weeks and am actually doing pretty damn good. This weekend I got in my first social setting around smokers and was even repelled by it so that is very encouraging. |
Do you have stitches where the tube was? How long until they know for sure that it's okay? I hear you on the morphine-drip haze. The 6 days i spent on one are a big fuzzy dream. |
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Do you think you're going to quit smoking? 'cause that would rad. I'd have to mail you cool things for encouragement purposes. |
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Well, that would be more than enough for me, anyway. |
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i'm sure you'll be fine. |
keep us updated. I didn't know that your lungs could just collapse like that without any outside trauma. |
and yeah....a tube sucking lung juice for 5+ days is all i needed. actually....just the procedure to insert the fucker was enough. i have a pretty mean quarter-size scar too. had the stitches removed this morning. i also went for an xray and check up. my lung is about 80% and expected to get back to 95-99%. it will never be 100% due to some scarring as my case was pretty bad. but im good and no surgery should be needed. sem-its a bit misleading...the doc explained it to me...its not entirely at random. because of shape of my body and thus my long lungs, im more apt to pull a muscle ibn my shoulder which might cause a slight tear, something seemingly innocuous and then it causes an internal fissure...then the fluid builds and collapses the lung. its seemingly random, but there is a source of trauma but its rather flukey. it seems to have started with that weird muscle-pulling sensation i experienced putting the kid in the car. for the first hour of the tube, the most uncomfortable, as the bulk of the fluid is draining and the lung is rexpanding, that same spot on my shoulder was in immense pain and pressure. very strange. i still have a nice big script of vikeys i will continue to enjoy liberally. |
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i'm glad you're okay too. very scary. i'd never heard of such a thing. why all the fluid though? where did it come from? so i was gone and need to get caught up on other stuff. what happened with your marriage? where are you living? how old is the baby girl now? |
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the lung juice....well im not exactly sure where it came from. |
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lung juice would be a great name for a punk band. |
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potassium. for some reason I imagine v on dialysis, which might account for nocturnal leg/calf cramps |
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Last night I had restless body. All night I could not get comfortable. The felines were not pleased. |
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hey sarah, everyone. very sorry about your lung, patrick. |
No idea if I'm running from or to... |
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so are you feeling any better now patrick? |
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the not smoking thing is going ok. it could be better, but im still 95% a non-smoker. the human condition that allows us to forget pain is all too good. |
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but surgery was better. and it statistically i have a less than 10% chance of this ever happening again. they took 3% of my lung. i wont miss it. |
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You no likey the morphine? |
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And, guess what, V? I'm coming to London in June... |
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i didnt suffer any anemia this time, so my recovery has been quicker even though they actually went into my chest and removed part of my junk life is somewhat back to normal. because i recognized the pain when it set in while i was at work, i got my ass to the hospital quicker thus my lung wasnt fully collapsed. the morphine, this time made me sick so i got off the drip and just took pills and the occasional dilaudid or morphine shot at night to sleep. i was much more lucid this time which was frustrating. i did have a chest tube in the whole time. basically this tube that is in your chest all the time attached to a type of machine similar to a water pump on a fish tank. it helps reinflate my lung with bubbles and sucks out any fluid build up. thinking im progressing the doc turned off the bubbles, expect to discharge me after 4 days. but the lung recollapsed and it kept me there an extra 3 days. it was very very very frustrating for me as i generally felt fine otherwise. two photo gigs, my girls birthday party, my first music gig with my GF and two weeks of work all shelved. not mention i was in the middle of a move. my ex was refusing to bring my daughter to see my, finally giving in on the last day. reason cited was she was protecting her from seeing me like that (i was fine, except the bubbling tub poke out my rib cage, though covered with a shirt). Th eex was playing control bitch and it was her way of punishing me for other shit we had dealt with just prior that i didnt let her control. Anyway, im back at work. Im finally moved. we had a make up birthday party for eva....a pirate themed party. and if i say so myself, i was looking pretty fucking good with nasty scars to match. if i can shamefully call nate out to so graciously hook me up with that blog he was going to make for me, i can post some pics takin with my bitchin new dig cam. |
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do i have your email patrick? |
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my daughters indian doctor Happy said it best when i told her "ah, yes your body sought balence". and in perhaps some sort of metaphysical way, my body did seek balance. It has nothing to do with smoking and everything to do with my heigh, age, or so they think http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/ency/article/000100.htm |
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patrick, i'm glad you only have two lungs. i'm sorry about all that, hope you're feeling better. and yeah, stay away from that morphine. |