Patience, hard to come by...

Well, I know you've been expecting to hear about my back injections BUT, it's been postponed for a month.

On January 8th. I woke up with my right foot/ankle stiff and hurting. I figured I had slept on it wrong and it would eventually get better. I drove off to the yarn shop to knit with the girls (and guys). By 4 pm I was in such pain I couldn't hardly bear any weight on the foot. I had one errand to run to the pharmacy for Paul's prescription so I made the great Herculean effort. When the pharmacist said it would be an additional 25 minutes, I bolted for home. I told Paul he MUST take me to an urgent care or emergency room.

I was admitted to Desert Springs Hospital over night with cellulitis in my right ankle. There was no break in the skin and no one seems to know how it got there. I took morphine and duladid (It turns out that I'm allergic to this pain med also) for pain and by noon Sunday I could walk on it again. They released me by 3pm with 10 days of oral antibiotics.

Interesting side note here: The hospital doctor said I had pneumonia, noted in my chest x-ray. I didn't have a chest x-ray, she was looking at the wrong patients paper work. Then she said she was releasing me with amoxicillan (which I'm allergic to) and I asked her "Have you read my chart?". To that she said "No" and left my room. I don't have much confidence in her.

My ankle seems to be fine and the pain and redness are completely gone. Unfortunately, when I saw the doctor for my back injections, she said NOT for a MONTH because of the antibiotics.

Boo-hoo, see what I mean about learning patience?

Another interesting development: I "yelled" at Paul about being bored and depressed. I told him to find something to do to keep busy and interested. The next day, when I got home from the market, he announced that he was flying back to Alaska. That wasn't exactly what I had in mind when I told him to find something to do, lol.

He got a call from the Camper repair people and they wanted the camper ASAP, the rest is history. He and Ben are driving down Wednesday through Sunday this week.

I did get a consultation with the hand doctor about the numbness and pain in my hands. He said the carpal tunnel wasn't bad enough for surgery but he could inject the arthritis in my right thumb and left wrist. It helped and maybe one more injection will complete the relief ( Feb. 28th).

Life is good even if 'she' is a tough teacher, lol.

Karen's Continuing Saga

I went to the pain specialist today. I had such great expectations and now I have great depression.

Yes, they think they can help with the pain in my back and feet with injections in the spine but they expect it to take 3 to 4 months of treatments. Apparently there are 5 or 6 vertebra that are deteriorated and are causing the pain. The insurance will only allow them to inject 2 spots and they want to do 10 to 13 (that is on both left and right side of each vertebra). They wait a couple weeks to a month before re-injecting the same area and they can do up to 3 injections per area...I think? In 2 weeks I'm scheduled for the first injection and a week later for the follow-up visit to determine the success.

I'm still waiting on the diagnosis of the neck and possible treatment for that. I guess it could end up the same as the low back, oh mercy me. I wish I had a crystal ball and could tell you when I'll be home.