Leg Cramposaurus

This is a continuing saga from the Golden birthday post of yesterday.

The night of the party, I assumed I would sleep well after cooking 27 million street tacos, three large pans of creamy chicken enchiladas and cutting 75 pieces of chocolate cake. But no. Realization hit… more like burned… that this agony may be more than a muscle cramp in my thigh. There was no possible sleeping position that didn’t produce pain. For three nights I sat in my green birthday chair in my room praying to fall into unconsciousness.

One of those three nights, I had forgotten my earplugs and once again I assumed I would be able to sleep without them because that was a less pain-filled decision then walking across the room to get the earplugs. Wrong again. I love earplugs. The end.

Still, on Monday, DAY #4, I assumed the pain would eventually go away. Nada. On Tuesday morning, firmly poised in my green birthday chair after a fitful night of cat naps, I phoned the doctor’s office for an immediate appointment.

My son delivered me to the physician’s office at 9:00 a.m. As you may have anticipated, I was not looking my best with possibly 15 hours of sleep in four days. In my experience, the worse you look going to the doctor, the better your chances are of getting action and results. The nurse practitioner acted like this was so ordinary… a thigh cramp… no big deal… “It’s your sciatic nerve. We will give you pain meds and also steroids to reduce the swelling.” Again, I assumed I would be down and out for a few more day.

Two minimal hours later, I was singing the praises of modern medicine and was relatively pain free for the first time in five days. I love meds. The end.

The end of my expressions of love. Not the end of the story.

Two days later, at the family Thanksgiving dinner table, someone suggested that we go around the table and spew forth our thankfulness. I started. I yelled, “I am thankful for drugs!” And it was true from the depths of my being. My soul sang of unquenchable passion for pain medication. My new love.

I assumed I was home free in the pain area. Then the inevitable struck… the other result of taking pain medication…. my belly and bowels full of three days of food not wanting to leave me without a painful, tear-filled fight. I cursed the meds I had previously been in love with just shy of two days ago. I cursed modern medicine. How come they can’t invent non-constipating pain pills??? What’s so hard about that? No pun intended. I cursed the non-plush toilet paper. I cursed the cold, hard toilet seat.

My son-in-law is in med school currently and was visiting for Thanksgiving, so quite naturally I inquired why pain medicine also causes bowel issues. My youngest son chimed in, “Are you asking for a friend?” Mr. Med School explained the corresponding effects and I replied, “I’ll let her know.”

Like the clouds parting after a storm, glee hit my soul when I remembered stool softeners. (I apologize if you are eating, or were eating while reading.) (I probably should have put a gross-out, middle-aged warning on this post.) (Sorry!) To my sheer delight I found a jar of expired stool softeners in the medicine cabinet. Glory be! I believe I heard angels singing as I tossed back three of those little red and white glistening darlings.

You guessed it. The next morning I was singing the praises of modern medicine again. Call me fickle, or delusional, or temperamental, or easily swayed, but this is my story and I’m sticking to it. True love. Pain free true love.

I assume I am not the only one on Earth to have gone through these conflicting emotions with modern medicine. My sincerest hope is that this post will allow a pain-free existence to someone else on the planet currently cursing modern medicine, and rough toilet paper and chilly toilet seats.

 

?#17 from My Sister’s Jar – 1st Morning Thoughts

What was the first thing you thought about when you woke up this morning?

I appreciate straight-up questions with easy answers… especially after the weaknesses question yesterday.  Brother. Last night bedtime was 12:15… so I’m still working at it.  0 for 2.

Tapping woke me up this morning.  LOUD tapping.  My first thought was, “What in the world is Austin building?”  He is our early riser and also our BUSY, almost-12-year-old son.  He could’ve been building a birdhouse on the table in the loft right outside our bedroom door.  He’s made bike ramps, chicken coops, a dog house and various shelves and boxes.  I assumed he was hammering something… which is also not unusual for him.  He has more power tools and projects going than Ty Pennington.  He’s currently building a walk-in shed for his tools.

As I lay there listening to the tapping I slowly realized it was coming from the window.  OK, our bedroom is on the second floor…  and in Arizona there are retarded woodpeckers that for some unknown reason like to peck the METAL frames of our windows.  So it wasn’t Austin, although he was already up.

Not part of the question, but my second thought of the morning was… “Oh yeah, the toilet!”  Which is also a retarded Arizona problem of a different sort.  We have lived in this house for three years.  It was brand spankin’ new upon our arrival.  I’m not sure if it is Arizona’s unnatural heat, the dryness, the lack of clear water, cheap deteriorating rubber rings, or what, but our toilet in the master bedroom started having issues about a month ago.  The magic flusher was becoming increasingly more difficult to use.  It got to the point where I was bracing one arm on the wall, using the heel of my hand and using force usually reserved for administering the Heimlich maneuver. 

My husband is a busy man. (Could be where we got the busy boy?!?) Since he also uses said commode, he was WELL aware of the need to be bionic to flush the toilet.  However, I, being the kind and supportive wife that I am, would remind him often of said commode’s issues….. silently.  Why state the obvious?  I would come out of the bathroom holding my flushing hand as if it were wounded… which could have easily happened.  I also started doing these made-up exercises with my hands and wrists… telling him that I was in training to flush the toilet.  Hubby did make a trip to the hardware store and purchased an “Easy to Install” toilet tank apparatus… that is still in a tidy green box on his dresser.

So two nights ago, the water in the toilet started running continuously.  Rick got up in the middle of the night and turned off the water line to the toilet… but did he TELL ME?  No.  So the next morning I am in bracing position to flush the toilet, arm on the opposite wall, knees bent, back straight, heel of my hand resting on the lever and I almost dove into the toilet as the handle flipped down with remarkable ease.  That’s when I discovered the water was missing from the tank. 

I’ve been in third world countries so I was prepared for this situation.  I emptied the powder room garbage into the bathroom sink garbage and filled it with tub water to manually flush without force.  Then being trained for this scenario in Kathmandu, Nepal in 1986, I again filled up the garbage can and set it in the bathroom for next time.  I’m hoping busy husband has time between 11:30 p.m. and 1:30 a.m. to install the easily installable dealie on his dresser.

All THAT from my first morning thoughts.  Wow.