Saturday, December 16, 2006

let the morning bring me word of your unfailing love

Yesterday's Itinerary:

5:00 a.m. Get up.
6:00 a.m. Depart for University of Michigan in Ann Arbor.
9:00 a.m. Check in to U of M ER.
8:00 p.m. Leave the U of M ER (having had bloodwork, multiple IVs, steroids, examinations by the neurological team which gave my eyes an Olympic workout, and an MRI)
9:00 p.m. Eat a huge steak and mashed potatoes meal at T.G.I. Friday's.
12:15 p.m. Arrive home.
1:00 a.m. Fall exhausted in bed.

Last night I went to sleep with eyes so sore my whole head was aching. This morning I woke up and except for a few faint twinges, the headache is finally almost gone.

I can't decide what the best part of yesterday was. The crazy drug addict on the other side of the curtain during the morning, who wouldn't stay in her bed and kept wandering around demanding Vicodin and whining at the doctors, "What did my urine show?" I nicknamed her Narcotica. She was a heavyset woman with a face like a wet sack of flour and stringy hair. My dad wanted to chain her to her stretcher. I thought it was funny.

Or was it the feeling of blood gushing over my arm while the nurse stuck my vein for the IV? No, that wasn't the best thing about yesterday. Taking a nap during the MRI, using Thich Nacht Hahn's conscious breathing technique to calm myself down? That was interesting, but not the best thing.

The best thing about yesterday was definitely having my parents right next to me all day. They kept talking and laughing and telling stories, getting angry about how long it was taking for my MRI results to be read, and making me feel taken care of and loved. Going up there would have been impossible to do alone. As it was, it was bearable.

And I think my headache is finally (finally!) going away. The good doctors diagnosed me with a migraine. (Still don't know why that was so hard. I'd like to ask the doctors at Memorial in South Bend why they didn't diagnose a migraine to begin with, since that hospital is about two blocks from my house.)

Thank you, Jesus.

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