Quote of the Day: On Heroes

Real heroes are men who fall and fail and are flawed, but win out in the end because they’ve stayed true to their ideals and beliefs and commitments.
– Kevin Costner

Tags: Quote of the Day

My Brain Is Normal.

I have that on the best authority.  Honest.

The Rheumy’s nurse called and said the MRI came back that my brain looks to be functioning normal. –  So, no, BJ, no “Brain Cloud”. :P  (Kudo’s to anyone who gets the movie reference and posts it in the comments.)

That doesn’t explain the “brainfog” of course, but it does at least eliminate things like tumors and brain injuries and big brain malfunctions.

In the meantime, today is a particularly difficult day for me.  I woke up with my legs hurting like I’d been running all night.  My arms ached too.  As the day has
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Tags: MRI of the brain, fatigue, muscle pain

Wanted: One Nag

Okie…I feel like I’ve been through the ringer the last 36 hours, but I at least have a final-ish schedule for all of those tests and procedures that seemed jumbled up into one week or as my boss put it — “Looks like your taking a full sampling of all that [our hospital] has to offer…” (I’m going to be visiting all three of the big complexes.)

Anyway, for those who are keeping track (and I hope someone is for me :P), the brain MRI is on Monday morning, the CT of the lung/chest is next Friday afternoon, and they
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Tags: wellness, kidney biopsy, CT Scan of the Lung w/ contrast, MRI of the brain, Nag, personal assistant, diagnosis

Malfunctioning

I have just spent 10 days with family, which means that pretty much except when I was asleep, I was interacting with people without a break.

What that really means is that there were witnesses to my increasing “brainfog” as I call it.

It’s been kind of easy to hide it at work by simply staying mostly in my cubicle and since I don’t actually have a social life, I haven’t really had to face it outside of work.

But the final straw for me came yesterday when I nearly started crying in frustration when it took me a few minutes to describe
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Tags: MRI of the brain, brainfog, wellness

It’s All About The Kidneys

Well, my latest lab work came back still showing something abnormal with my kidneys. I’m going back over to the hospital this afternoon to get stuck some more; all of these tests have to do with autoimmune illnesses related to the kidneys apparently and most of these results won’t be back for a few weeks.

The Rheumy wants me to see a Kidney specialist and I’ve asked him to consult with my GP as she was also discussing this — I’d like to have one Kidney specialist and not two in the mix. Since he’s not in today, that
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Tags: wellness, autoimmune kidney disease, rheumatologist, CT Scan, lung cancer

More Tests, More Specialists

So, I saw my GP yesterday afternoon. We went over the concerns of the Rheumy with the blood in the urine; plus I got a copy of the results of some of my lab work that the Rheumy did at his office. I don’t understand much of it, but I have a copy of it now. (By the way, it says I have 16 of 18 of the trigger points for myalgia but my alarming Sed rate is what keeps me from the fibromyalgia diagnosis…that’s what’s written on the paperwork.)

Anyway, one of the things that the Rheumy
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Tags: wellness, Takayasu's Arteritis, fibromyalgia, autoimmune kidney disease, IgA Nephropathy, chest cold

Something’s Gone Wrong Already

Those lab tests I did yesterday came back funny so my CTs for tomorrow are cancelled while I have some more lab tests scheduled. I think I’m going to cry.

The real irony is that they are finding blood where they aren’t supposed to find any — something my GP’s office should have followed up with last week when I was there doing labwork with them.

Meanwhile, is it possible to get a cold from your dog?

Tags: CT Scan, wellness

Oh, THAT Angiogram

After a terribly stressful day involving about 100 phone calls concerning an incorrect Radiology order, an out of town doctor, and some necessary emergency blood work and other lab work (re: pee in cup), I actually have some good news.

While I am still having an angiogram, they are going to be doing a CT angiogram as opposed to a catheter angiogram; the CT angiogram is less invasive and is less likely to have complications.  In fact, they don’t even put you “under” for the CT angiogram and you can even drive yourself home.  Whole thing should take like 20
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Tags: Takayasu's Arteritis, CT angiogram

Takayasu’s Arteritis & Impending Angiogram

So, it turns out that I’m going to be having an angiogram to see if I have Takayasu’s Arteritis. I just found out. There was some sort of miscommunication between the doctor and myself. He told me “CAT scan with injected dye”. I think I would have taken it a bit more seriously if he had said “angiogram.”

This comes a day after I got an email from my mother saying that she read that Takayasu requires an angiogram for the final diagnosis and that basically worries her or somesuch.

So now I’m a little freaked
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Tags: Takayasu's Arteritis, angiogram, CAT Scan

Takayasu’s Arthritis, Cancer, & Cat Scans

I just got back from the rheumatologist follow up visit (after having had to sit through 2 hours of a budget meeting this morning).

Apparently, the Lupus blood test came back negative, but my Sed rate is still high at 90. He also doesn’t think it’s Sjögren’s Syndrome based on the blood work and my tear generation test.

So, now he wants to do some studies of my blood vessels to see if I have Takayasu’s Arthritis, which is a really rare disease where your blood vessels shrink. Apparently normally it shows up in Asian women, but he
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Tags: Takayasu's Arteritis, rheumatologist, CAT Scan, Lupus, Sjögren's Syndrome, ESR, cancer, emphysema