Spring Break Trip Part 2

I get to the Iowa Clinic Urgent Care and get in fairly quickly. The doctor says I don't have an ear infection and the steroids shouldn't be causing the headache issue I am describing. We test for the flu (up the nose), strep (back of the throat) and mono (the ever dreaded blood draw). They all come back normal. At this point I am exhausted. Two sick kids at home and very little sleep since Tuesday morning. The doctor says he can give me an IV of stronger pain medicine. I start crying. Taking blood from me is a challenge to say the least. No real viable veins in either of my arms, which usually means it comes from my hands or my wrists. The number of times they have been able to get it on the first try... I don't recall a time. Not to mention I get light headed having blood drawn.  Oh yes, and with that medicine I would need someone to drive me home. Nick of course is at home with two sick girls (one of which I would rather not have in the car given what she was sick with). I may have cried some more (the poor doctor probably had no idea what to do with me and just wanted to move onto the next patient). The doctor mentions a CT or an MRI. He doesn't think I have a brain bleed (which the CT would show) and by doing an MRI we could both sleep easy that night knowing it wasn't anything like a blood clot or tumor. It was up to me and I had no idea what to do. Did I really need an MRI? I really did not want an IV of pain medicine and I knew it was more than just a normal headache (and I don't get headaches very often as it is). It could be my first migraine, but that seemed off since sound and light had no impact on the pain. Given my indecisiveness, crying in pain and pure exhaustion, the doctor said he would recommend the MRI. So to the medical imaging area I went (same building and just around the corner from Urgent Care; and they could get me in right away). Good thing he didn't mention the MRI would involve having to inject my veins with a fluid for a color enhancement or something like that- not sure I would have been so willing if he had. I go back to Urgent Care to wait for my results. Back at home Ellie is half way better (cranberry juice seemed to be working but the banana hadn't fixed that issue) and Neve is running a pretty high temp. Nick has a call into her doctor to see if it could be a reaction to the antibiotics she is on.




Then the doctor calls me into one of the rooms (it is around 11:30 a.m. at this point). The MRI did show something. All I heard out of his explanation was there was a blood clot in my sinus'. The doctor was trying to get me in to see a neurologist (I guess blood clots are not the norm for Urgent Care doctors to deal with). I messaged Nick to have someone watch the girls so he could come be with me (I wasn't taking in much of what the doctor was saying with the headache and ear issues anyway and I wanted someone there with me). Of course the girls were sick, so the neighbors were out and my sister (who was home on spring break with her kiddos) was out. My dad didn't answer the home-line when I called, but I got a hold of my mom at my grandma's, who then called my dad and explained the situation. My dad came down and took over watching the girls. Thank goodness for parents who will drop everything to help out when needed! We are very lucky and super grandpa was on the job. I would later find out that during this time Nick was dealing with Neve and her temp of 104.8. My mom left my grandma's and headed towards our house as well (Neve had a doctor appointment scheduled for 4:45 because the doctor thought she might have the flu in addition to strep). While my dad was making his way down from Ames, the doctor informed me that the neurologists in Des Moines refer this specific type of case to doctors in Iowa City, so I may be heading to Iowa City that afternoon.




Nick arrived at the Urgent Care. Shortly after the doctor who had been working with me tells us that he was having trouble getting a hold of Iowa City to confirm they would accept my case, but that this was out of his realm of being able to treat and I needed to get to the hospital where they could start me on blood thinners. He directed us to Methodist West across the street, he thought we would be OK having Nick drive me and we didn't need an ambulance, but that most likely I would be transported by ambulance to Iowa City for further treatment. This was around 2 p.m. now. Off to the Methodist West Emergency Room we went.




To be continued...