Tuesday, April 24, 2012

It all happened so fast

It's amazing how quickly your day can change. It's amazing to me how fast one little thing can happen so fast and unravel your plans.

Yesterday morning, I woke up feeling completely refreshed. Chris and I had the most amazing weekend in Vacaville with his uncle and cousin. They took us out to a concert (I'll tell you about that in another post) and we spent the rest of the weekend shopping at an outlet mall and found some really great deals. It was a beautiful weekend; sunny and in the 70s. It was perfect.

My morning routine went as planned and I rode my bike to work just like I've been doing for the past few months. It was a really smooth ride and I made it to work in great time. I hauled my bike into the building and put it away and made my way to the kitchen to get some water.

I was feeling really thirsty and regretting that I would have to wait for the slow water filter to fill up my bottle. I waited . . . but then I started to feel a little hot and light headed. I leaned over the sink and closed my eyes, trying to catch my breath.

The next thing I know, I am laying on the floor in excruciating pain and I can't see. My head was throbbing and my back hurt pretty bad. As I lay there, trying to figure out where I was and what had happened, I heard the water running. I quickly got up to turn off the water fearing it was overflowing (it wasn't) and realized that something was very wrong. I yelled for help, "Can somebody help me!" and two people cam running in. One told me to sit down and breathe. The other asking if he should call 9-1-1. I think I told them that wasn't necessary but I also remember saying, "I don't know what to do." I asked for help finding my glasses which had apparently been thrown across the room.

I put my hand to my head and was terrified to feel a bump the size of a golf ball. I've never had a bump that large before. My head hurt so bad! A few more other people arrived to see what the fuss was about and helped me to the couch where I was given an ice pack. From there I called my husband to see if he could come pick me up to take me to the hospital. Thankfully, he wasn't working and was there in less than 15 minutes.

I tried to get an appointment with my normal doctor but she wasn't available so we ended up going to the emergency room. The waiting room was empty so it didn't take long to be admitted. I was actually very surprised by how nice everyone was. And how quickly they did everything. Overall, I was really impressed with how I was taken care of.

I had some blood drawn for tests, an EKG to make sure nothing was up with my heart and a few X-rays of my lower back. All came back normal. They gave me some fluids and some pain medication and let me rest for a bit. Before discharging me they gave me a list of things to watch out for in case my head injury was more severe than they thought. Their diagnosis was dehydration and lack of oxygen, which made sense since I hadn't had very much water all weekend and then rode my bike for three miles.

Chris was very comforting through the whole ordeal; just having him there put me at ease. I'm also glad he was there to hear what the doctors were saying so he knew what I knew. Once we got home, he made me lunch and watched a movie with me. I slept for the rest of the day.

Although I did go to work today, I feel far from "better." Please pray for me: healing for my head and tail bone; pray for sharper focus in thinking. Pray against nausea and other symptoms that might mean it is a more severe head injury. Also pray for protection so that this doesn't happen again. And praise God that I'm okay and it didn't look as serious as it might have been.

1 comment:

Sarah said...

Definitely will be praying!