And God Laughs
I told God my plans and He laughed. So now I am living, laughing, and loving according to His Plans.

The Wired Blogger

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What happened to my head?
    a) The aliens returned and placed a probe inside
    b) The barber cur it a little too close on top
    c) I am a star in a local reenactment of a great battle in which the cripple always gets shot first
     d) I am having a 72 hour AEEG to try and catch my brain hiccups to figure out if they are seizures

When asked by an annoying woman in the elevator who just stared at me and asked "Oh My God What Happened to You?" I was tempted to go with A. Instead until noon on Thursday I am wired for sound. I wonder if I can tweak these things to get a decent radio station since we live in the last thing to pass as a city before God Forsaken nowheresville. We hit the event button twice, so hopefully we caught something already. Although it would be my luck to wear this darn thing for 3 long days and have a big episode as we are taking the electrodes off. I loved the instuctions that came with the hook up - don't shower while having 28 electrodes attached to you and a battery box recording them. Um, duh! If it itches (if? if? it started itching before she was done putting the leads on!) don't scratch. Right, cause in my sleep I can control that. That is why for sleeping purposes I get to add a snug knit winter hat over top of the ensemble. Do not stick anything sharp under the bandage to scratch your head. No chewing gum because it makes a nifty pattern on the EEG.
The one direction that has me a little perplexed is the fact that I am not supposed to use my cell phone except on speaker phone or text. Apparently the phones can interphere with the wires and electricity. Now I thought cell phones and their electromagnatism were deemed safe, yet I am being told not to put them near my head because they will scramble my brain's electric signals. I may rethink how often I use my cell phone!
The ditz who hooked me up yesterday had a philosophy that tighter was better for wrapping my head. I have deep red marks under my chin from where she put the chin straps. However, like a winter hat that is a size or two too small the bandage slowly crept upward trying to pop off my head. The suggestion from their office of sticking a nylon over it did not seem like a good idea as I have no bank robberies scheduled this week, so my poor mom had the job of carefully removing what was still on my head and then rewrapping the whole thing. Her chin straps are not gagging me so right there is a huge improvement. All the leads are covered and attached, and I have my trusty hat.
Thursday morning my mom has a DR appointment at the same office building where I need to go get fasting labwork done, so I may venture out in my new look to get labs done and then go out for breakfast. Breakfast is the easiest meal to find a vegetarian option in most restaurants. For fun I could decorate my head with stickers, because at this point dignity is a mute point. Thursday afternoon is dedicated to removing the leads (I have a solution to remove the adhesive that is holding them in place) and then washing my hair 3-4 times to get out all of the sticky conductive goop. Thank God I cut off the 11 inches when I did to donate!! I will be using the cheap shampoo to wash that many times and not my fancy organic expensive shampoo.
Until then I am wired for sound and my head is nice and warm!!
Posted by Bethany at 10:07 PM
2 comments:
Barbara
February 8, 2012 at 9:23 AM

Just imagine all those rude comments as coming from a child - which will be somewhat accurate as an adult who blurts out what happened to you is really working with an impulsive mind of a child.

Bless you and hope you are more comfortable soon. Oh, dear, seizures. More prayer ensuing!


Stacey,momof 2
February 9, 2012 at 1:35 AM

I concur with Barbara. prayers.


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Job 8:21

"He will fill your mouth with laughter and your lips with shouts of joy."



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Wild Olive

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This is Me

I am a thirty year old enigma who has defied every expectation ever placed upon me and refused every definition created for me. My greatest passion in life is to make a difference in the lives of children with special needs and their families. As a special education teacher I broke all of the unwritten rules to make sure that my kids received the services they needed and had a right to receive. I have never been so proud to be reprimanded before in my life. Now, due to unpredictable twists in life, I am learning first hand what life is like when you rely upon a wheelchair for mobility. I am a medical puzzle with the pieces slowly being identified and put together, and my medical bills alone could fund a small nation. It takes a village to keep me alive. :) However, I am not defined by the genetic misspellings. I am a teacher, a daughter, an aunt, a friend, a dreamer, a reader, an amateur photographer, a writer, an advocate, a star gazer, a world changer. I am stubborn, situationally shy, quick to use humor and wit to make others laugh or cope with a situation, sarcastic, fiercely independent, giving, compassionate (sometimes to a fault), protective of those I love, defiant of arbitrary boundaries, perfectionistic, self conscious, self assured (yes you can be both!), articulate and occasionally dramatic. And that is just what I could fit in two sentences! :)

Who's On First, What's On Second, I Don't Know! (Third Base!!)*

Simple Vocabulary Definitions for those who may not speak fluent medical :)

Undiagnosed Progressive Neurological Disorder- This is the diagnosis that is believed to make everything else fit together. It explains my frequent infections, my muscle weakness and dystonia, my dysautonomia, my cardiac issues, my inability to regulate blood pressure, my dysphagia, my ataxia, my severe fatigue, my extreme nausea, my gastrointestinal dysmotility and IBS like syndrome, my unbelievable migraines, my sensory changes in my arms and legs, my vision issues, my hearing loss (so much for blaming medication), and so much more. Going back to infancy and childhood, this would explain the severe apnea, the significantly delayed motor skills, the reason why I could never keep up with my peers in physical activities, the neurogenic bladder, the malfunctioning thyroid, and my frequent illnesses and vomiting. This is the diagnosis now being used since the DNA testing for Mitochondrial Disease came back odd and I can not afford the expenses of a workup at the Mayo Clinic. We are treating symptomatically.

Pan-Dysautonomia- "Pan" means that it impacts many different systems of my body, "dysautonomia" is a failure of my autonomic nervous system or the part of my brain that does all of the automatic things that do not require conscious thought like telling your heart to beat, regulating your blood pressure, adjusting your body temperature, maintaining balance in space, digesting food, hunger and thirst, etc. It is believed that I have had this from birth based upon my history of symptoms, including severe life threatening apnea as an infant, but the cause remains elusive at this time

Dystonia- abnormal muscle tone and spasticity, including painful spasms, that primarily impacts my feet and lower legs and is now starting to be a problem in my back

Ataxia- difficulty maintaining balance and coordinating/executing movements

Dysphagia- difficulty swallowing due to any number of causes including muscle weakness and poor muscle coordination

Adipsia- the absence of a sense of thirst



Other Medical Issues- Lupus Anticoagulant (autoimmune disease that causes me to tend to form blood clots and has already caused two deep vein blood clots and one mild stroke), Migraines, unknown connective tissue disorder, abnormal gastric motility, allergies, history of v-tach and severe sinus tachycardia, changes to my echocardiagram that include leaking valves and a new murmur, low blood pressure, ataxia, untreated PFO (small hole in my heart that increases the risk of stroke), chronic lymphadema in my left arm, Hashimoto's Thyroiditis, Narcolepsy/Idiopathic CNS Hypersomnolance (believed to be a result of the dysautonomia and my brain's inability to regulate the sleep/wake cycle), mild hearing loss, malformed optic nerves, polycystic ovarian syndrome, pernicious anemia, vitamin deficiencies


* Title comes from an old Abbot and Costello routine that I chose to memorize in 6th grade and absolutely love.

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