birfday barfs

OMG, so first, let me just tell you how my life has just changed forever!!  On a whim I decided to look in the App Store for a blogger app and ya know they have one and now I can update from my phone.  Do you know what this MEANS????  I can write posts from the BUS!!!  The BUS people!  During my 20 hour commute!!!!  Can you beleive it? I can't beleive it took blogger so long to plant that search idea into my head.  Someone over there is NOT doing their job very well.  

But so much has happened, even from that visit with my boyfriend Dan Hugo.  

I was going to use his water bottle the other day for one if our group bike rides, it was going to be like we were making out, but it rained and the workout was canceled so no making out.  Sad.

But let's discuss my birthday and the barfs.

So as some might recall, April 30 2012 was an interesting birthday because I was busy turning 28 but I was also being concerned (and at that point hiding from my kids) that I couldn't see out of my left eye and that I might have a potato in my head.  Had they known, they might have said, tots taste good, but instead, we had cake and I tried to be all happy.  Eric did make a fabulous cake of course, but there was impending doom.  The next day I found out about tha tuma.

So this year, as the day approached, not only was the royal baby NOT born, but I got a lesson on how to inject myself with growth hormone.  

This was Wednesday.  The interesting thing about that Wednesday, well one of them, is that my new job is in down town, hence #thebus.  It's also right in the thick of the action, and the prescribed action for Wednesday was a protest with potential for riots and violence becauSe the protest was having to do with the man in Baltimore who recently died in police custody.  Long story short, they sent us home early. 

So the nurse came over to show me what was what.  The medication arrived the previous week when I was in LONDON when the total baby wasn't being born.  

It came in this incredibly wasteful container, of which we will receive every 25 days for the rest of my life.  I imagine maybe we will make an igloo or something out of them.  What a waste.  But the meds had been residing in the fridge since they arrived, the cooler has been sitting by the 100% organic lump charcoal ever since.   While the charcoal knows it's fate, the coolers is still TBD.

The nurse arrived at 645, we sat at the table.  She showed me the demo pens full of water, we practiced prepping them, I felt all cool, just like TV flicking them so the air bubble rose to the top. She assured me they are safe and that one tiny air bubble would not kill me like in the movies.  She said it take more like a foot long of air bubbles, but still better to inject medicine rather than air.

We practiced injecting into a thing that looked like this:

I asked her first if we were going to check it for breast cancer. She kinda laughed.  Then i opened the alcohol swabs, cleaned the real medicine pen, attached one of the real needles, prepped it for reals, set the real dosage, rolled up my shirt to expose my fat roll, cleaned that roll with a new alcohol swab, too a break and poked. What?  OMG, couldn't even feel it.  Nothing at all.  Once poked, I pushed the button and the meds go in, wait 5 second and take it out.  I've got my own biohazard container for the used needles, so took care of that, cleaned up and done.  I looked at the injection site and saw a tiny spot of red and exclaimed that I was gushing blood!!! The nurse looked alarmed and quickly came to inspect.  She didn't think that was too funny, but did say on occasion I might knock a capillary or something. During the whole process I did get quite sad and I almost started crying.  Taking new pills is like no big deal.  Everyone takes pills.  This seemed more extreme and made me feel like a sick person.  But I am so hopeful that it will do it's job and I'll get some energy back, my concentration will come back and quality of life will improve.  Fingers crossed.

So then Thursday was my birthday!  Horray! So many people sent wonderful messages and cards and packages, I am truly lucky to have such wonderful people in my life!  My workmates surprised me with flowers, too, and there was an alredy planned April 30 Cinco de Mayo party happening, so we celebrated with some jicama slaw and other tasty treats.

A little after 5, I packed up my computer becauSe we were encouraged to work from home on Friday due to the May Day protests and marching that were scheduled for Friday and gain the potential for riots and violence.  

I got on the bus.  Not too long after on the bus I started to not feel very well.  My stomach was hurting. And it was getting worse.  By the time I got home I was in quite a bit of pain.  But Eric and the kids had made dinner so I tried a few bites but had to lay on the couch.  Then I tried to have some birthday cake and open presents but I was miserable, I had never had this type of stomach pain, I couldn't identify it, it was awful.  The kids went to bed, and I asked Eric if he wanted to see how the injections were done.  So i got everything ready, did the injection and then everything went black and I almost passed out.  I laid on the floor, writhing in pain.  I asked Eric to clean up the medicine stuff and I got up, and hurried to bed, also passing out again.  A few minutes later the birfday barfing began.

Nothing is easy any more.  Was this a bug? Was this a reaction to medication? Was this a tumor thing?  Who the hell knows. We called the nurse line for the medication but they closed about an hour earlier.  We contemplated calling my endocrinologist but Eric convinced me they were going to tell me to go to the ER and the ER would just tell me they had no idea. Since the kids were in bed already and it was late, we decided to just wait it out and hope I didn't die.  I didn't, so that's a plus.  By morning I felt better.  WTF.