Blog 1: WTF

Nope, he didn't figure it out either.

10/6/2011 4:04 AM

I’m developing neurosies that make modern Woody Allen look like classic Woody Allen and I fear that somewhere, Diane Keaton has become very worried.

It has become impossible after only a week in this sweaty, unwashed motorized-racecar-bed to take anyone at their word any further. Working in video games, you become used to missing deadlines by hours, getting emails that inform you that the thing you were expecting today might be arriving tomorrow. But the information is almost always there, and within an accuracy that would be good enough for any job shy of NASA (and even their space shuttle launches have been known to delay a day or two—you know, when NASA was a thing that launched stuff into other less dense stuff.) Tonight was a bit of the line in the sand for me.

I was informed far earlier in the day that I would be receiving my fourth (or fifth, I lost count) MRI after I went in for a deeply invasive echo-cardiogram where a tube was snaked down my throat with just enough numbing agent that I wouldn’t choke to death on it (seriously, you sign a waver promising you won’t, it’s legit!) At around 2am last night, I was told that I would be getting up in a couple of hours (aka, early in the morning) to go get the tube wiggled around shooting various sonogram pings through the wall of my throat and detecting what kinds of holes were in my heart of the literal, non-poetic variety. I woke up at 4:30am, excited, tired to be sure, but excited to begin my day of diagnosis and discovery as a golden-yeared Dick Van Dyke would do on the show of his twilight: Diagnosis Mur—oh wait, that show had murder in the title. Matlock! Pretend I brought up Matlock!

Right, so this procedure eventually took place at 5pm, even after I was told quite specifically it would be at 2pm, after it was strongly hinted at it would start at 4am. I invited some good friends over (Joel Watson of the ever-amazing Hijinks Ensue, Steven Strobel of Wookie imitation fame, Jeramy Cooke of spelling his name wrong fame, and Curry McKnight of hating the food of his namesake—sake) to play some Magic: The Gathering draft on the new Innistrad format. Cry afoul with “Nerrrrrd” all you desire, the format is amazing and the game is second to no one at passing time in a four-walled hamster cage that smells like things I’d be embarassed to tell you my butt smells like. We were having a blast playing the game, talking all kinds of trash and generally being too loud for a hospital floor at night, then again, it’s not like a hotel where they can throw me out, when it comes down to it, that’s my only goal. So we are having a good time before being interrupted that I have to go to my MRI “right now, they’re literally coming right now,” and we’ll have to post-pone the first round until after I get the procedure finished—especially since this one is supposed to be focused on why the hell I can’t actually see out of my right eye anymore. I set the cards down and tell them to draft again, they convince me to play on until they come to drag me from the room.

We play until their eyes won’t stay open.

The MRI train never pulled into hamster-butt-sweat station.

It’s currently 4:24am and I’ve been given three additional updates during the night that at some point the MRI will happen. The neighboring hospital likes to clear its patience list out before allowing its sister-hospital to clear the lingering neurology patients off. I understand and accept this totally backwards methodology as normal within the confines of hospital-rules. It’s pretty much Mad Max up in this piece. I just have trouble connecting up the idea of a well-oiled machine fighting the good fight and saving lives on the bleeding edge of technology when they cannot schedule to within a 24-hour span on anything that isn’t a meat-flavored soy burger (that arrives within 45 minutes.)

This happens every day, all day, on every issue.

You just stop trusting anything. You end up finding your 140-character outlet is no longer enough and the most carthatic means of escape is writing a blog before anyone you know in this world wakes up to start their incredibly normal day. You end up breaking down every time a doctor asks, “Do you have any questions?” when they haven’t successfully answered one yet (that isn’t me passing blame, this really is a case that all of the House jokes have wrapped back around to totally sensicle. No one has any idea what is wrong.) You end up wasting the 29-year stint you had a perfect record of never dropping an f-bomb in front of your mother only to spew off in a tyrade laden with them from the frustration seeping from your every pore. You end up losing hope, and it makes you very sad.

It’s like middle school all over again, no one knows what’s wrong with you. Maybe I didn’t get the right Jordache jeans again, or perhaps Marithe-Girbaud striped shorts aren’t the happening style anymore thanks to a poorly informed Kid N’/or Play.

So this blog is my outlet to express myself and the torrential emotions of this situation. To be fair, I hesitated writing a blog because I couldn’t title it without a diagnosis, an oversight I have rectified with a temporary solution. When they find out what’s wrong, this will be re-titled to reflect the ongoing journey of whatever I face next. Whatever I face with the help of my friends and family, the people that helped me maintain sanity in an insane world run on its own rules. I love them dearly, and owe them the world for their continued support as my life goes further and further off the rails.

In closing, I wanted to bring summation to where we are at with identifying what’s wrong with me. I’ve been living in the hospital since last Thursday, it is now Thursday again—that’s seven days of uncertainty I wouldn’t wish upon my gravest of enemies (CURRY MCKNI- I mean, Adolf… uh—Spaceman. My mortal enemy is named Adolf Spaceman.) I came in with signs of a stroke, something we have not yet been able to rule out. I have signs of Multiple Schlerosis, something we have not been not yet been able to rule out. One of the MRI’s found small “legions” on my brain, so brain tumors aren’t ruled out. They’ve brought up “Complex Migraines” on a number of occasions, something we haven’t ruled out other than the fact the symptoms are supposed to go away on their own, which they aren’t. I’m blind in my right eye, my head hurts all the time, the left side of my body has been stroked-out since last week and I have trouble walking or picking things up with my left hand. Oh, and did I mention they found that hole in my heart yesterday? Yeah, they shot two syringes full of air into my veins so they could watch bubbles move around on an ultrasound. Apparently movies just made that shit up about getting air in your vein and dying, in point-of-fact, it’s totally kosher. They do it on purpose and photograph those little bastards galavanting all the live long day through your torn Atria. At least I learned something while I was here.

5:02am, still no MRI call.

Update 5:19 Am, they came. Update in the morning on what they find in my eyes.