Sunday, November 17, 2013

The 8 Day MRI saga

 A week to remember, that I hope we forget. We went to the hospital on Wednesday for the MRI under sedation, and when we got there, we were told that they couldn't do it if my husband was having seizures.  (But they said they weren't seizures since he wasn't blacking out). After much frustration, they told us that they were speaking directly to the doctor and that he directed us to the Emergency Room since he was on call there, and could see us there, and that they could do the MRI there.

Unfortunately, they were very busy. My husband was put on a stretcher, had a bunch of calming drugs pumped into him and left in the hallway for 10 hours. Finally, after 11 hours, he was admitted into the hospital for "involuntary contractions" which weren't technically seizures, but pretty darn well looked just like them.  I timed them.  He had 19 in 1 hr. 10 minutes.  It was horrible to see.  Fortunately, I'd made arrangements for our kids after school with a friend and she just took care of everything they needed.  What a blessing!

Jeff got situated in his room for the evening and I headed home for a few hours of sleep.  Picked the girls up and got them off to school, headed back to the hospital.
I spent the day there as my husband met with many different Dr. aides, a few doctors, and had lots of tests done. After the EEG, they moved him from the 4th floor to the 9th floor, to a much nicer, spacious room.  A friend picked up my girls, and another friend picked them up and brought them AND dinner to us in the hospital.
I took the girls home when a friend came to visit my husband, and went for a quick bike ride in the morning - except that it was a really slow ride - one of my slowest ever!  The girls went to school, and I packed a bag to stay the night when my husband called and said that he'd had a horrible night, an invasion of his privacy by a nurse that was very traumatic, and that he had wished I'd stayed.

We had a great nurse, and several friends stopped in to say hello, one even brought me lunch (she's a keeper).  The Dr. group was pretty cruddy.  In the ER, we'd asked that they contact our Dr.  They never did.  They asked if we minded if they 'consulted' along with our Dr.  We thought they would put their heads together and confer.  Nothing even close to it.  They completely erased him from everything and decided to take their own direction without consulting us or him.  At one point, the neurologist was ready to send my husband home - without the MRI that he'd been waiting for!  We threw a bit of a stink, and finally the Dr. came it to speak with us (we'd never even met her - she didn't seem to have time to meet the patients, just to send them home after reading someone else's opinion and impressions of them...grrrr)

My husband went for 24 without sleep due to some medication, and started to seize everytime his body tried to sleep.  Finally, late Friday night, they came and got him and he had enough drugs in him and was tired enough that he was able to make it through the MRI without seizing.

On Saturday, after waiting for an eon. The neurologist's assistant told us that they hadn't seen anything in the MRI. As far as they could tell, everything looked great.  So, we waited for another 5 hours for the discharge Dr. to get there to sign discharge papers.  
What we know: nada
We have a couple of referrals for some doctors - including a neurologist who focuses on movement and seizures.  Guess I'll start calling tomorrow and working with our insurance to make sure everything is covered.  
We are so grateful to all of our Florida family, church, and neighbors for their support and love.  We've had dinners brought in, cookies brought in, visits, phone calls, messages and so much love.  There aren't words to describe.  
Where this will take us, we don't know, but we know all things are in the Lord's hands, and we trust that things will turn out according to His will and time frame and pray for the faith to make it through.  

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Ay, yi, yi, again! What in the World is going on with poor hubby? I am glad you have a good support system there and hope that you WILL have your big New Year's Eve bash and all will be resolved by then!

Mare said...

Thanks Caterina. We are hoping he is on the mend and thanks for the reminder that I should probably update my blog! Xox