My apologies, both now and in advance.

Mike Jones

Google Master
I first want to apologize for any incoherency in my posts that I may post in the next few days, or posted already. I can explain some of it.

Here's how my story goes...

Wednesday, I did not work, so my friends and I went to play laser tag, which is sort of like paintball, but with infrared lasers to count points instead of painful paintballs. It was really fun.

Thursday was a normal day. School's out for the summer so I was playing some video games or whatever for some hours. I also was not called in to go to work, because they were well staffed for the day. I had steak for dinner, and all was well. Late in the evening, I had an upset stomach, and some diarrhea. I didn't think anything of it... just maybe something didn't digest right.

Friday morning, I wake up at around 10:00. No school, so it's normal. I'm supposed to go to work at 4. Plenty of time. As I fully wake up, I realize that I am in horrible pain in my abdominal region. I have some more diarrhea but I don't think much of it still. I eat some frosted flakes for breakfast and by noon, I vomit. I call in to work and say that I can't go in, because I have the flu. I must have got it when I played laser tag on Wednesday. So over the next few hours, I have diarrhea two or three more times, so I take some imodium. My abdomen still hurts really bad at this point. So my diarrhea stops at around 3:30, because that's when I took the imodium, but I vomited in the evening. I rarely get the flu where I vomit, so I thought "maybe its catching up to me and this is making up for previous lesser flu times" so I am convinced it's the flu. I start feeling pretty dehydrated and still in pain, so we called the hospital to ask what I should do. They have had a few people around my age come in in the past day or so with the stomach flu who were dehydrated. They suggested I drink a tsp of heavy syrup (from fruit cocktail) every half hour. I try it for a while, but it's not helping to hydrate me at all. I fail to stick with it for more than two or three hours so I grabbed a gatorade. I start drinking it and when I start getting ready for bed (extra early, around 8:00 pm), I puke again. there goes my gatorade I drank, so I still am dehydrated. I figure, I could go to the ER, but I can probably tough it out for a night and maybe it will pass. I decided to keep a gatorade next to my bed so if I did puke again, I'd have something to help replenish myself. I woke up every one or two hours, puking five more times during the night.

Saturday: The last two times I woke up to puke were 3:30 and 5:30. At 3:30, I drank the last of my gatorade bottle and I didn't feel like grabbing a new one. At 5:30, I puked the last of it. So now I know I'm very dehydrated, not being able to drink at all. I call the hospital again, and they say I need to go in and maybe be put on an IV. So I go in, and the doctor asks me my story, so I tell her pretty much what I wrote up there. She is concerned about my abdominal pain, which is still pretty severe, and thinks I may have appendicitis. The weird thing is that it's a lower abdominal pain, but not on my right side like appendicitis would give. So she orders a CBC (white blood cell count) for me to have, checks my urine for signs of dehydration, and prescribes me some anti-nausea medications to help me so I rehydrate myself. I am also ordered to drink 2 oz of flat (remove the carbonation) ginger ale every 30 minutes. So my dad takes me to go to Meijer for my prescription and the ale. We wait about an hour for the prescription, so I still haven't drank anything since 3:30 in the morning (so I wouldn't puke again) and I am not feeling well at all. It's about noon when we finally get home and I can have some ginger ale to drink. The anti-nausea pills made me drowsy, so I fell asleep on the couch for a while, having to be woken up to drink some more every half hour. The doctor said she would call and check up on me to make sure I was following the schedule.

She calls a little before 4:00, so I last had some ale to drink at around 3:30. The meds are working, as I haven't vomited yet again since when I was trying to sleep. She continues to say that the CBC count was high, meaning there was an infection somewhere, and she really wants me to go in to the hospital and stay overnight to help stay hydrated. So I grab my shoes and we're out the door to the hospital. I arrive at the hospital and am shown to my room after registration. It's not yet 5:00 when we are in my room, and the nurse walks in right around 5, noticing we were there. She explains a little bit about what is going to happen, that I am going to have an IV (yuck) and have a CT scan of my abdomen to see if appendicitis is a possible cause. So she sticks me with the needle, checks my blood for dehydration levels (which are better than earlier) and sends me off for a CT scan. My scan was quick and turned up that my appendix is a little inflamed. So guess who is getting their appendix cut out! Mike is! so I'm wheeled back to my room (they don't want you to walk with an IV?) and I am bid farewell by my nurse and greeted by the night nurses who start their shift at 7. They check my vitals and all, and then I am wheeled down to Pre Op. I am there for ten or so minutes and then the surgeon and anesthesiologist talk to me about the procedure about to be done. So I go in to surgery at about 7:45 and I wake up from surgery ending at about 8:45. Visiting hours ended shortly after, but my parents were allowed to be there. I am wheeled back to my room, get onto my bed, and watch some tv until I start getting tired. My parents left at around 10:20, and I was falling asleep at around 10:30. The nurses woke me up at 12:30 (midnight 30) to check my vitals and make sure nothing horrible had happened during surgery. I fall back asleep shortly after.

At 5:30, I am woken up again to check my vitals. My IV clotted up during the night, so there was some mess on my bed and floor, but other than that... Everything looks like it had been perfect. I can't fall asleep again this late, so I just watch some Sunday morning cartoons. Dr. Jones (no relation) stopped by to ask about how I was doing and explain a little bit about what had happened during my operation. Apparently, my appendix was not in its normal spot. It was tucked behind my intestines down into my pelvis. That explains both the diarrhea and not having the typical pain in the lower right side. He leaves, and I continue to watch cartoons until my dad arrives at 8:00. We talk for a while, and then the nurses bring both of us some breakfast. Eggs, bacon, toast, orange juice, etc. It felt SOOOOOO good to be able to eat again. I hadn't eaten anything and kept it down since Thursday dinner. It's now Sunday breakfast (two and a half days for those of you trying to count). The nurse lets me use some bathing towels to freshen up some before I have to do anything else. She also said I had to get up and walk around, and make sure I release the air buildup in my intestines from the operation. Basically she said to leave, I had to prove I can walk and I can fart. So I had already been releasing the gas since I started eating, and it was time to walk. It hurt to walk, but I was on painkillers so it wasn't too bad. I walked a few laps around the floor before I decided it was a little too tiring and painful to continue. My surgeon was on the floor and he and the nurse saw me doing this; they were both very impressed. So they told me because I had been doing so well, they took out my IV and I was free to go. I left at about 10:30 am Sunday morning. That was about 15 hours being in the hospital, including surgery.

So they gave me a prescription for some lortabs, which are a narcotic. So pretty much since I left, I have been high on lortabs to ease the pain. One effect that lortabs have shown to cause on me is that I tend to type long messages, adding excessive details. And, I'm also a little loopy and dazed sometimes from them. That is why I am apologizing for not necessarily making sense. It's the painkillers that I'm on for a while. Hope you enjoyed the long and detailed story that the lortabs added to ;)
 
The internet police are now going to issue a citation for PUI (Posting Under the Influence). I would refrain from doing any "Stoned Dialing". When I was younger and a morr active consumer of alcoholic beverages, I was told I had a bad habbit of doing it. It can suase extremely embarassing situations when you sober up.

Glad to hear you are recovering quickly. Keep up with your rest and hope you're back to 100% soon.
 
Thanks for the smile, Murph. The lortabs don't make me like whacked out, but they do make me a little loopy. I have to be careful what I do say though, because if I don't think it through or concentrate long enough it doesn't make sense :p


Les, that'd be terrible! But hilarious :D

Here's the pics from the operation:
30334_1357302170452_1168410917_31075477_1623200_n.jpg
 
you should have loaned them a knife to use..

What makes you think I'd have any knives!? ;) I thought about it as I was posting that. Would have been pretty funny.

Man, I can't wait until I can start grinding some steel again... or at least go back to work. I'm not allowed to lift anything over 10 pounds for a few weeks... At least that means less chores!:rolleyes:
 
Thanks for the smile, Murph. The lortabs don't make me like whacked out, but they do make me a little loopy. I have to be careful what I do say though, because if I don't think it through or concentrate long enough it doesn't make sense :p

Lil Mikey, you been more than a little loopy since I known you. HEHEHEHEHEHE!!!
 
Just as an update, yesterday I only took one lortab, in the morning, and I made it through the day without any pain. Today, I think I'll just be taking a bit of tylenol this morning, but that's probably going to be it.
 
I had a followup with the surgeon today and he said it looks like I've (already) had a full recovery!

I've been able to lift 50 pound bags of salt, and move around without any issues. 2thumbs
 
Mike just take it easy and slow. You don't want to hurt yourself. I went back too early from hernia surgury and got an other for it. Glad you are feeling better.
 
James, I sure hope I don't go too fast and get another appendix!!! :eek:

Lil Mikey , are you still on drugs???? If not, I liked you better when you were. HEHEHEHEHEHE!!!

No, IG, not anymore. Well, at least not any of THOSE drugs. I still can't figure out what that funny taste is in all of my food, or why my meals are always cooked separately...
 
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