All the Praise goes to God

oh goodness, where do I even begin? I'm sure most of you already know most of this story from updates on facebook and through email, but I feel I need to document whatever I can, which actually isn't much more than hearsay.

Basically, I guess you could say, I almost died. From my last post, you know I was in the hospital with a blood clot and fluid in my lungs. Well, I actually only remember about 3 days of that (dec 16-18) and then waking up in the ICU getting a bone marrow biopsy with a breathing and feeding tube keeping me alive (which I believe was about dec 28).

I guess that everything hit the fan on dec 20. My parents came up to the hospital to see me and it's a good thing they arrived when they did. My mom walked in with a little christmas tree and apparently I was trying to find the nurse button, completely soaked, eyes rolling back in my head, turning blue, couldn't breath, so she threw the tree on the floor ran in the hall yelling for help and about 20 drs poured into the room and shoved them out and called a code blue. They intubated me, did a ct scan that showed a 'huge' blood clot that had traveled to my heart and was keeping it from actually pumping. The drs told my parents and tony that they could use a really dangerous drug to try and break up the clot which would probably cause other internal bleeding or basically my heart wouldn't be able to pump. Then apparently I stabilized enough to not need the drug. They moved me to ICU on life supports and found blood clots in my legs, pelvis, lungs, and heart...also pneumonia and fluid around my kidneys/liver. My bp was sky high (210's/120's) and my platelet count was extremely low (30's and spos to be in the 200's) even with multiple platelet transfusions.

Eventually I guess I started to stabilize enough for them to start lowering the sedation. This is when I started waking up. It took a few days of me being 'awake' to get the breathing/feeding tube out. Being awake with that in was extremely horrible and I couldn't talk to ask any questions of what happened, so I just kinda had to wonder what was going on. I kept gagging on the tube and blowin chunks because of it, it was really horrible. When I woke up, I had no idea where I was, or what happened, it was like 2 weeks of my life was just missing. I do remember a few things while under sedation, it's very surreal. One really good 'memory' was swirling around in a shopping cart at Target with my brother getting after Christmas sales and a very bad 'memory' was going to a group home hospital setting where I was in a wheelchair, doing a bell craft and then people started fighting outside and I couldn't reach the phone to call tony no matter how hard I tried. I was aware of there being the possibility of seeing a white light and I was determined that if I did see something of that sort that I was going the opposite direction. I somehow knew my time on earth wasn't up yet. These 2 'memories' seem so real I would swear they actually happened and they were the first 2 questions I asked tony once I got the feeding/breathing tube out.

Apparently a lot of people came by while I was in icu and I don't remember one bit of it and for that I am very sorry. I feel so horrible that I can't remember all of the love and prayers that poured over me during that time. I also feel extremely overwhelmed with all the help and just giving and caring that people have done for me, my family, my husband, and the girls while all this has been going down. I mean, there's no possible way I could ever express my thankfulness, it would literally be impossible.

As of today, the news is that God has restored me completely. The dr's said there was no way my heart could ever repair itself and it is 'back to normal'. My lungs are 'back to normal'. All clots are completely gone. All fluid in my lungs is completely gone. All of my blood counts are in normal range and my body is completely restored. The dr's are basically baffled. They're saying it was a lupus flare and really have no idea why any of it happened or how it has been completely fixed. God is so amazing, I can't ever begin to explain the amazement that fills my heart through this whole experience. I'm just in awe. I'm so thankful to be alive and vow to not waste one second ever, ever again. Life is just too precious.

The main thing now is doing rehab and getting strength back. My legs look pretty funny. Where there would normally be my pretty large calf muscle (I'm no spring chicken) there is a skinny, flimsy, jello like piece of flab. So, I'm now able to stand and walk with a walker, but still need some assistance actually standing up. Seems like this is going to take a lot of work and humility, but I sure am motivated to get home to my kids and resume living. Life is just too short to be hanging out in a hospital bed waiting around to move. Let's do this!