Saturday, April 28, 2018

The Humor of Near death Experiences?

This might sound strange to you but often there is some humor to feeling you are almost dying in some situations after the fact. At the time you are just trying to keep in one piece and hopefully out of the hospital. But, as you age if you cannot laugh at these sorts of things it is likely one of them is going to take you out permanently.

Recently, I found out that what I thought was wrong with me wasn't what was really wrong with me healthwise.

So, after a month of being sick I finally found out what was really almost killing me. I was relieved and my wife was terrified by this diagnosis. So, everyone reacts differently to these kinds of things.

So, the doctor said I should go on Lasix to reduce water weight (of at least a pound a day of water) for about 15 days or so so I didn't drown in my lungs from it. I had stopped taking Spironolactone but my heart specialist wasn't available. And I hadn't had the kinds of side effects before that I was now experiencing which meant to me that my muscle pain had increased from spironolactone to where it was no longer useful to take as a diuretic. But, no one told me that if I stopped taking spironolactone I might eventually die if I didn't switch to another strong enough diuretic by downing in my lungs with fluid. So, this wasn't really anyone's fault, it just happened and then we had a near emergency to deal with so I didn't die or have to go into the hospital.

So, the solution was to go on Lasix which is a very strong diuretic and to weigh myself so I could lose (at Least) 1 pound a day for the next week or two so I wouldn't die.

This is an example, of "You don't know what you know until you know it!"

or "What you don't know CAN kill you."

So, that was Wednesday and I haven't slept much since then or before ( not more than 1 to 4 hours a night) because if I lay down anywhere I just start coughing.

So, after about 2 weeks so far of 1 to 4 hours a night sleep I'm not yet to complete sleep deprivation but it isn't good for someone 70 necessarily to be going through this.

But, what happened last night to me now is downright funny.

First, because I have a hernia near my belly button from a laparoscopic burst appendix surgery
coughing makes this worse unless I'm wearing some kind of weight belt to give my hernia some support. (otherwise the coughing is just going to make my hernia grow in size.)

So, yesterday I was practicing (not eating much or anything) because eating anything also makes me cough more. So, then the gas one gets from not eating and the problem this causes when your intestines come past your stomach wall in a hernia caused the worst gas pains I have ever experienced which were so bad I knew I was going to pass out soon from the pain. Then I started coughing which made everything worse.

So, in desperation I tried to lay on my stomach (which I don't do ever anymore) but in this case I found by laying on my stomach it pushed my intestines back through the stomach muscle wall into my intestinal cavity in my body and then the gas could move easier this way. So now, on my stomach I could also cough without damaging my hernia anymore either.


Then on top of all this craziness I knew I was going to throw up. My wife being nearby I said, "Get me a bowl to throw up in!" and she did.

Then I said, "Get my son who is trained as a nurse!" who was in the other room visiting.

And she did.

So, now I'm throwing up into a bowl on the carpeted floor of my bedroom while I'm coughing while I haven't had enough sleep for over 2 weeks now and my gas pain is still so bad I'm going to pass out.

But, right now having survived all this is pretty funny that I could come so close to passing out, my wife calling an ambulance, but then I was able to learn to lay on my stomach which lessened the gas Pain but also caused me to throw up.

There aren't many days when life gets this insane or Funny!

And if I hadn't learned I could lay on my stomach to lessen the gas pains of my hernia I would have passed out and my wife would have called an ambulance and I would be in the hospital now.

How funny is that! :)

Then when I told this story to my friend he recounted an experience that to him was really crazy too.

He was in his recording studio which is about 100 yards from his home and had a cramp in his hamstring so bad he couldn't walk. Since he couldn't walk he had to drag his body down the loose rock driveway to his home because he had forgotten to bring his phone to his studio so he couldn't call his girlfriend to come get him.

We both laughed about the craziness of these experiences.

Once again "Truth is much stranger than fiction" (And Crazier too)

:)

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