Thursday's Nightmare and Recovery

I would have lumped this post in with the weekend wrap up but I decided to keep it separate. 

Thursday morning I woke up, made some calls for bills, got the boys up and ready to go out the  door and then at 8:30 the boys and I were out the door and off to my in-laws. 9 am rolled around and Pam and I were on the road to Chesterfield for my 11 am appointment at Dr. Ahmed's Office. We left so early because when I looked up the directions it showed road construction in three spots on the computer so we thought we better leave early. It was a good thing that we did! Thanks to the lovely mapquest we got lost. It told us to take exit 20 when we needed exit 22 it turns out. When I exited off of 20 the roads that it listed below to take were similar to the roads I had taken the last time two - three months ago when I was up that way. Anyway we drove around trying to figure things out for a little bit and then came to the conclusion that we should just call into the specialist office and ask. You see you do not want to be late for those appointments because you still have to pay the co-pay, which for us is 60.00 and then you have to reschedule and wait longer to get in.  Once we called the guy said we were only a couple of miles from the office and he pointed us in the right direction.  Needless to say praise God we left so early because we got there with ten minutes to spare and that's it. 

Once we got there and signed in it was time to wait. I still was not nervous or anything. I had read online that the procedure would be painless if you had the right doctor who knew what they were doing. Pam and I waited for about fifteen minutes and were called back. We were taken to a consultation room first to talk with the doctor before we moved to the procedure room. Once in the consult room the nurse came in and ask if I was ready with a pained look on her face. I was like, I guess, as ready as you can be. She leaves and then the doctor comes in. He proceeds to tell me with my case of Chiari I may not notice anything until the second round of shots and that with my pain  he wants to keep me on the pain meds I'm on, which have stopped working I might add and are being substituted with around 6-800 mil of Ibuprofen a day. So he decides to up my dose on my current pain meds, add another pain med for at night and keep me on the migraine meds with a nauseous med.  I have  a damn drugstore. lol. He proceeds to tell Pam and I that she can be in the room with me when he does the shots and I will be getting 28 shots from my forehead back to my neck and into my shoulders, total. At this point I am starting to get nervous and am already kind of depressed from hearing the above news. Anyway after all of that he stands and takes us to the procedure room where I walk  in and see four of the below photo.

Meet my new friend every three months for two more rounds or more 

Let me tell you a little about this friend. It has the power to hurt like heck and break you into a billion pieces. 

Read on

I am still not freaking. I have five tattoos, I am thinking in my head, you got this, it is just a poke or as the doctor says a little poke that feels like a pinch.  Pinch my ass!! 

I wish I could have looked like this. That doctor must be taking it easy on this woman. 

Here is a photo for the backside look. 

 The doctor had me get up on the table and lay down on my back. He then starts to tell me how many shots and where as far as each place on my head. Gets that all done and then he starts injecting. It hurt so bad!! He did not inject from the side or even take his time. What should have been a forty minute procedure and more like a twenty minute all together. He was on a mission. I was holding my mother-in-laws hand, and squeezing hard core. At one point she was even in tears. It sucked!!! The worse ones were in the forehead, very back of the neck and the one shoulder where he hit my damn muscle with the needle. The ones by the ear I got to hear the sloshing of the botox going in. Ugh gave me the chills. Instead of going at the shots slow and taking it easy he opted for the straight up and down fast approach.  Me and him are going to have a heart to heart for the next round before hand.

Needless to say I was a hot mess. Once he was done I sat up and the tears just flowed. Like I said that needle has the power to break you into a billion pieces. The human body can only take so much and I was at my point. I can endure alot and smile and act like everything is cool for so long and then I'm done and to think that this might not even work. Ugh I was fed up and tired of this illness. 

He is hoping along with  me that this works but on the other hand to do this every three months if this works, holy crap! I am just tired of pain day after day and being exhausted at the end of the day. Its hard and draining dealing with this. I am so thankful that Pam was able to go with me and be there. I needed her support that day more then even I knew at the time. Praise God for family! 

When I was done in the procedure room and talking with the doctor, I headed out to schedule the next round of shots and the receptionist tells Pam and I that people actually have botox parties. Really? People are nuts!! 

The weekend I still did stuff as you seen from my previous post but I was not much excitement. I am not sure if I was adjusting to the new meds, higher dose of meds or the affects of the botox/procedure in general. It took alot out of me. My husband was awesome!!! He went over and beyond to help around the house and with the kids this past weekend. I am not sure if I looked like crap or what but he insisted on me resting and taking it easy. Fine by me I will take it. If we did anything I pretty much sat around. I visited but did not push myself. My head was sore as heck all weekend. It hurt to even wash my hair, no joke. Come Tuesday of this week though I started to feel back to normal and get my energy back thankfully. Now to see if it works or not. I do not notice anything yet and am still having pain in my head and neck. Monday I did not have any but Tuesday it was back with a vengeance.. Time will tell right. Now to wait until the next round of shots.