I'll Order Some Sleep with a Side of Snooze

Right before I had surgery in January, I read someone's blog post that had a "Top 10 Reasons You Know You Have Crohn's" list.  Most of the list was the usual, but one of the spots said something about only being able to sleep on your side with your right leg bent under - or some such strangeness.  And I totally was sleeping like that at the time - I just had no idea that it was related to Crohn's.  I felt like I belonged to a secret club.

But for a tummy issue that would probably benefit from some really good sleep, Crohn's has a way of making it hard times to sleep.  After I had surgery, I could only sleep on my right side or my back - sleeping on my left side made it feel like my stitches were being pulled out.  With other flare ups, I've only been able to sleep on my left side because it hurt to sleep on my right.

I'm a total side sleeper.  It makes me happy to snuggle with Will while falling asleep with the cat at the foot of the bed- one big warm happy pile of Hendersons.  With this latest flare-up, I can't sleep on either side without waking up in pain which usually leads to throwing up.  So I have to fall asleep either on my back or on my stomach.  And sleeping on your back or stomach doesn't make you a very good snuggler.

Falling asleep on my stomach is possible, but I usually wake up in the middle of the night with two arms prickling because they've fallen asleep.  Trying to roll over or push myself up with fast asleep limbs has resulted in a few not so cool rollover moves.  One night I even contemplated waking Will up so he could help shove me over because I couldn't feel my arms at all!

Sleeping on my back is okay, but I've been waking up with horrible back and neck aches.  My very awesome mom and I went to the Woodhouse Spa in Denver on Thursday to get massages and I had the guy crank on my neck and back.  Which I think helped - I'll let you know as soon as I'm not so sore from the massage.

So last night I couldn't fall asleep on my back or my stomach.  I thought, screw it, I'm sleeping on my side and I fell fast asleep.  Then I woke up in pain at 5 am and have been throwing up ever since.  It wasn't worth it.  And now I just keep adding food to the list of things I never want to see again.  Goodbye beef tostadas - never want to see you again.

Dear Insurance Company

You suck big time. Thanks for waiting for 3 weeks to not approve the medicine I need. That gives me 3 weeks of staying on my old, ineffective medicine. And now, a few more while we figure out what is next. That's 3+ weeks that the inflammation wins.

I hope I don't have to have surgery again because I'm sure you'd be pissed at having that bill to pay just because you wouldn't fork over money for a prescription in the short term.  Actually, other than the surgery part, that sounds kinda good to me right now.

I hope Obama kicks your ass and takes your names.  And then gives me a chance to throw in a sucker punch or two.

Love,

Anne

Where is Anne?

A few months ago I was in the Portland office and walked into my friend, Aleta's, office. She was holding her cell phone out extended away from her and smiling like a Cheshire cat at it. Once she noticed me standing there, Aleta sheepishly admited that she took photos of herself doing random stuff at random times and sent them to her husband as a little way of saying, "hi."

And I thought that was freaking AWESOME!

I'm often in different locations because I travel so much for work. And I'm often by myself. But there's usually something fun going on, or at least something fun going on in my head, and I don't have anyone to instantly share my fun with. So I started taking random photos and sending them to Will to say "hi dere" because I love him and I think about him a lot.

In that spirit, I took this photo today - the first person to correctly guess where I am will win fabulous prizes. The prizes get more fabulous the more accurate and specific you are. Start guessing!

Grandma Lays It On the Line

Ring ring...

Me: "Hi Grandma!"

Granny Therese: "Hi Anne! I'm so sorry you don't feel good. I wish I could take the pain away."

Me: "Thanks Grandma - I'll get through it."

GT: "So are you taking Percocet?"

Me: "No, I'm taking Prednisone."

GT: "Oh, you're gonna get fat!"

Me: Facepalm

Life Goes On...

Well, its official. Crohn's gets to be part of my day-to-day life for the foreseeable future. And while it is a familiar guest, I can't say that it is a welcome guest.

In January, I had a very painful surgery to remove 25 cm of my small intestine and clean up all of the scarring and mess the inflammation had left in my insides. It took a long time to recover and I still have a pretty bad-ass scar from the surgery. The surgery was absolutely worth it because it got rid of the debilitating pain I felt every time I ate, or moved, or breathed. 

But...

The rate of Crohn's recurrence after this type of surgery is 50% within 5 years. I expected that I'd probably have problems again. But not so soon. Not this soon. Not within 10 months of the surgery. And I'm just so disappointed. 

I wanted 5 years to not be sick. To drink caffeinated coffee and good wine. To have a baby. To live life without constantly having a shadow of something that I don't want with me. 

Grumble Grumble

My stomach is completely barren of anything but grumbles today. 

I have to go to the doctor for a colonoscopy this afternoon and as such had the pleasure of purging everything from my system yesterday. Couldn't eat anything, couldn't drink anything but clear liquids. And then, joy of all joys, I had to drink the nastiest prep drink over the course of two hours. It was two hours of hell - slightly sweet lemon ginger flavor, thicker than juice, but not quite eggnog consistency, making me gag with every sip.

The joys of having Crohn's means that at the ripe age of 31, this will be my third colonoscopy. At least I'm getting knocked out for this one. I was awake for one and no matter what they say about it not hurting it is terribly uncomfortable, and no matter how awesome the staff is (especially the nurses) at making the situation seem like it isn't an embarrassing deal, it is awkward. 

But when I get knocked out, I don't remember any of it. And apparently my short-term memory sucks once I come out of the "under". The last "procedure" was when they were trying to diagnose me with Crohn's. Will was there when the doc came out to talk to us about the findings. 

I asked the doctor, "So, do I have Crohn's?" 

And the doctor said, "Yes." 

And then after a few minutes of going over the treatment options, I piped up again, "So, do I have Crohn's?" 

And again, the doctor said, "Yes."

Apparently I asked the same question every few minutes. I was useless with remembering stuff. I need to figure out a code word to give Will so he can say, "bananas" and I'll know to shut up because I'm not making sense and repeating the same question over and over. But with my luck, I won't remember the code word and Will will just be stuck repeating the same nonsense over and over this time trying to give me the code word. And he won't have the excuse of having been knocked out.

Also, the spellchecker wants to change "colonoscopy" to "cloudscape." A cloudscape sounds much more pleasant today.

UPDATE:

So, as per usual, I couldn't remember a thing once I woke up. Apparently I repeatedly freaked out about them putting me on Prednisone because I really, really, really don't want to get moon face. Call me vain.

The weird thing is, I don't remember ANYTHING in between the nurse explaining the "happy juice" (her words) that she was putting into my IV and then BAM, I'm in my kitchen eating a Good Times hamburger with Will. Seriously, I don't remember waking up, I don't remember visiting the pharmacy to get the dreaded prednisone, I don't remember going to Good Times or even driving home. This is totally messing with my mind!

A Weekend in Review

Friday - SNOW!

I was home for the first snowfall of the season! Every time I left town on a work trip I was worried that I'd miss the first snowfall, that it would come without me. I'm not sure why seeing the snow for the first time felt like such a big deal. But there's something magic about waking up to a snow scape outside, feeling all warm snugly inside. And the first snowfall came later than usual this year (it usually happens on Halloween). So maybe the anticipation was being built up. 

It just seemed like something that would be tragic to miss. And I didn't miss it. I got to enjoy the dusting of snow that we got. Snow means that skiing is coming soon. And Christmas! And also the usual scrape-your-car-off for death defying drives to work too... but that only affects me if I have to drive to the airport.

Saturday - Adventures in Babysitting

Will and I babysat our friends' little girl, Malia, for a few hours on Saturday night. I used to be a babysitting champ when I was in middle school. What else did I have to do on the weekends, right? But as soon as high school came along, that gravy train gave out because it turned out I liked kids my own age a whole lot more than little kids.

So it has been awhile since I've been hanging out with a kid sans a responsible adult. And no, I don't qualify as a responsible adult. But, I had Will for reinforcements. So off we went.

It was actually fun. Malia is 2 and getting her molars in. So her mom was worried that she might be a little bit off. She threw a few puzzle pieces at Will, but I don't know if that qualifies as "off" or "playing." 

We went out to eat and had a little bit of an adventure with the car seat. You see, Will let Malia pick out her own jacket and she picked out the biggest, fluffiest red snow parka to wear. And Malia and her jacket didn't both fit into the car seat. So, we took off the jacket, strapped the kid in the car seat and used the parka as a blanket. I know, we're brilliant. But I think Malia thought we were pretty dumb due to the whole 10 minutes of figuring out the car seat part.

All in all, the night was a roaring success - as Will said, Malia still had all 10 fingers and all 10 toes. So we'd done a good job.

Sunday - Pain

I woke up in pain on Sunday. The throbbing, knife searing pain that comes and goes with my Crohn's. I haven't had it since surgery in January. But there it was, ruining my day. 

Usually, when I get this kind of pain, I end up in the ER throwing up all over the place. It was really fun to do that on a work trip where my boss had to take me into the ER. Fortunately, she was awesome and a half and even though I loved working for her before that, I really loved working for her after. She stayed in the ER with me chatting about all kinds of silliness until I got discharged at 3 am.

And then a few months before our wedding, I had another case where I ended up in the ER. Fortunately, I was in Boulder and Will could take me. And he hung out with me in the ER until almost 5 am. We put the whole "in sickness and in health" stuff to test well before getting married - and lucky for me Will was still up for the job.

So yesterday, I was determined not to end up throwing up in the Boulder ER. I found some remaining pain meds from my surgery and took them. Which knocked me out - my brain and body were worthless yesterday. But I got a chance to watch some movies and sleep off the pain meds. It wasn't the way I planned to spend my day, but it also didn't end up with throwing up in the ER. So, I'd call it a draw.