Almost two weeks ago, as I was leaving a coffee shop with my Mom, I had a sort of bizarre health event… while we were having coffee and chatting, my Mom said that I was acting very strange, falling asleep at the table, speaking very slowly. She said that she kept asking me if I was ok. I do not remember any of that, but, I do remember telling her as we left, that my latte must not have settled because I was feeling a bit nauseous. Somehow, I drove us home, although by Mom’s account, I was weaving all over the road. I don’t remember any of that drive, either. Luckily we were only a few miles away from my house and we made it safely. When we arrived I was very confused and would not get out of the car, so Mom ran into the house to get Tom, yelling for him to come quickly because ‘something wasn’t right with Linda’. They weren’t sure what was happening to me, but, they knew I was definitely not acting like myself. Tom called for an ambulance, and, even though it was there within minutes, I have absolutely no recollection of that, nor the ride to the UW Hospital East. From the moment I got into my car to leave Grace Coffee about 10:00 am, until about 1:00 pm, when I woke up on a hospital gurney as someone was attaching a HUGE oxygen mask to my face; I have absolutely no memory.
I was still very confused, and didn’t realize what was happening to me, nor where I was…but, I did hear people around me talking about how high my CO2 level was, and, they were very concerned. Tom told me later that the nurses and doctors were asking me questions and I was answering them, like, “What kind of coffee drink did you have, and what is your Social Security Number? Which is so bizarre because my mind was not working in so many other ways, but I knew my social security number!
Later that afternoon, after all the blood tests, X-rays, a CT scan, and an MRI, the doctors began to put together the puzzle of what was going on: I had something infectious inside my brain. At that point, they decided to transfer me to the UW Hospital downtown, where the Neurosurgeons could work alongside The Infectious Disease Team there to determine exactly what it was, and how best to treat it.
That night while I rested in the ICU, my Neurosurgeon came to introduce himself, and to tell me that the team of doctors working my case had determined I had a tiny abscess in the frontal temporal lobe of my brain, and that he was going to open up my brain and take it out as soon as he could fit me into his surgery schedule. Finally, after anxiously waiting another full day, (two days total without any food or water) I was taken into surgery to have the offending abscess removed.
I don’t remember much about the ride to surgery, but I do remember asking my surgeon once I got there, to please not shave off all my hair. (He assured me that he would give me ‘a rad’ haircut!) Somehow that eased my fear as I fell off to sleep, mumbling a prayer to the higher powers that be, to please let me live. When I woke up and saw the kindly face of my surgeon, I was so relieved, I was giddy! (Looking back now, that giddiness might have been because of the meds!)
I learned that the surgeon had successfully removed the abscess, which was tiny, but, deep within my brain. I also learned that the Infectious Disease Team already had the infectious material, and had immediately begun growing cultures from it, in hopes that they would soon know what the bacterium or fungus was.
Three days later, they had the answers they were waiting for. I had a bacterial infection that was rare, but, treatable, so I was able to be transferred home under their ‘Home Hospital’ program, where the nurses and doctors would come to me, closely monitor me for several more days, and administer my twice daily antibiotic infusions.
The nurses who came to our home to administer the infusions eventually taught Tom how to administer them, so that once I was officially released from their program, I could continue to get my infusions at home by nurse Tom.
It is still early in my recovery, but, I am feeling good, slowly fighting my way back to ‘normal’; (although I suspect life will never be the old normal again). I already feel different in a myriad of ways. Everything makes me weepy, and everything makes me profoundly grateful to be alive.
I suspect that as some more time passes, and I am able to look back and realize how critically ill I truly was, that my life will change even more.
In an alternate Universe none of this has happened, and I like that concept. Unfortunately, my big, beautiful scar, reminds me that it definitely did.
And, I survived.
