Morphine in the Morning

Around 7:30 last night I decided to start the last of office painting I've yet to do. Approximately 7:45 my body let me know there was no way in HELL I was going to do that.

Apparently the 5 hours on my butt Saturday aggravated my sciatica. Even though, I wasn't sitting crosslegged. Boy do I have a lot to learn!

Well, around 8pm it was bad, and it only got worse. 1500mg of tylenol-like generic didn't touch the pain. I called a couple of friends, left messages, hoping they'd come over and could massage the ache out. No dice. I used a cold pack, I took a hot shower. I did a few Dr. recommended stretches.

By 11pm it was excruciating. Normal things I took for granted like... oh, I don't know... standing up straight, turning over in bed, squatting on the pot... was now like twisting a knife in my lower back. I literally cried and had to brace myself to stand the pain anytime I did one of the above.

Somewhere around Midnight I fell asleep, woke up at 1:36am. I know this cause I checked my phone, just in case one friend had texted me and I didn't see. My last text to him had been "I need your help". I lay there, trying to see if I could go back to sleep. But I couldn't get comfy... I couldn't get to a point where the pain was dull enough to ignore. Finally at 2:30 I knew I needed medical attention. This was not normal and could not wait till morning when the chiropractor's office opened.

I debated taking a cab, but gritted my teeth and actually drove myself to Dekalb Medical Center. Ahh the joys of living alone now bear testimony to the real practical reason to get married... to have someone to take you to the hospital in the middle of the night. Luckily for me, the emergency room was deserted. I filled out papers and got right in at 2:55. The attendant took my stats and story and escorted me to a room.

They have these machines that take your blood pressure... only for some reason, my bp was too high and the stupid thing would restart. That machine should be in a horror movie it hurt so much, squeezing my arm off. What happened to human beings taking blood pressure??

At 3:55 am the nurse came into my lil room to see me. Then she left saying the doc would be with me shortly. I thought about the Circle of Trust at the Y and what would they think of me not being there.

At 4:15 (yes, I'm a clock watcher when in agony) the doc came in, and at that point I was crying. He asked about someone to take me home, cause he was going to order me a shot of morphine and toradol. I said I thought there'd be someone I could call, but that I'd brought myself. (I couldn't see calling 911 for an ambulance ride of 1.5 miles). At 4:40am, I could no longer wait for a nurse to help me to the restroom, so I attempted to get up out of the "bed" I was in. Talk about pain! I got as far as my feet on the floor, gritting my teeth and yelling at each effort, still bent over when the nurse came in. She told me to hold it right there, and she'd give me the shots for some relief. By 5:10 it was starting to take effect and I felt calmer, although I could still feel the pain. As time went by, the pain diminished, and my feeling of relaxed wobbliness increased. This was the morphine.

I got x-rays, doc said it all looked good. He was going to prescribe ibuprofen and skelaxin (sp?) and vicodin for me, but I had to call someone to pick me up. At 6:40 in the morning, all the people I know are asleep and don't answer their phones, so I ended up waiting till the morphine wore off (mostly). I probably shouldn't have driven at 7am. Luckily nothing happened though and I sat in the Publix parking lot for 20 minutes with my eyes closed listening to morning radio DJs. I still had that slight floating/disconnected feeling, different from being drunk.

Imagine my chargrin when I got into Publix only to find that the pharmacy doesn't open till 9am! Heck if I'd known that, I'd have gone straight home to bed and chanced the pain later in a drive back to it. As it was, I knew I shouldn't go anywhere, so I spent an hour and half in the store with my mushy thoughts contemplating impulse buys.

I'm finally home safe and sound though. Geez I never want to go through that again.