Yesterday I had an appointment with my general practitioner to talk about my weakness and shakiness, and I also brought up the nausea that I’m not sure is connected, even though I’m seeing a GI for it.
Brad and Tam had another appointment, so they dropped Felix and I off at the doctor’s office and picked me up when they were done. Unfortunately on the way to the doctor’s appointment, I realized that the cup holder for my wheelchair was missing. I panicked. I was SO incredibly stressed that I couldn’t think of anything else. The cupholder on my wheelchair is currently the only place I have on my wheelchair to hold my phone or anything else. There is no basket on my wheelchair, and backpacks slide off the back. So I usually put my phone in the cup holder, and balance a backpack on my footplate. So the loss of the cupholder was a major blow to me. Especially as the chair is only a month and a half old.
I must’ve lost it the other day when we went to the Renaissance Faire. It was really bumpy, and that must’ve loosened the screws and it must’ve fallen out when I folded my chair up at the end of the day.
I couldn’t think of anything else for the entire car ride over. I was so stressed I could hardly talk or even think. But yet I knew I needed to try to calm down to have my appointment. So in the waiting room I just held Felix and tried to focus on what I needed to say to my doctor instead of my missing cupholder.
I was still rather flustered and upset when it was time to see the doctor, but I think I communicated clearly my concerns. She ordered a bunch of blood tests, I think around 8 or so. Those should come back today, and then we will talk about next steps. I also told her about my upcoming trip to Ohio to help with my mom’s care. The doctor said I am not medically cleared to fly until this is figured out, as she is worried about me passing out or vomiting all over the plane and airport. She was especially concerned when I mentioned I wasn’t going to be able to take Felix as these trips to my parents house are SO stressful for him (I am usually on the go tending to my parents from about 7-8AM until about 7-8PM when normally I don’t like leaving the house more than a few days a week, for a few hours at a time). Felix just can’t work that much and stay happy and healthy.
During the appointment, Felix was great. I had to put him on the floor at one point for the doctor to examine my stomach, and while he did wander a little bit, he generally stayed in the area I placed him. Other than that, he just sat on my lap and sleepily laid on my stomach and chest.
When we were done, the doctor tried to lead me out of the room, but I ran over my backpack strap (it was on my footrest since it falls off the back of my chair), which pulled my backpack underneath my wheelchair, and my wheelchair nearly toppled over while going over my backpack. So I got that settled, and then continued. Only a minor setback.
After my appointment, the doctor walked me over to the blood draw place inside their building. I was going to leave Felix on my wheelchair while I sat in the blood draw chair, but they had to close a curtain and my wheelchair didn’t fit inside the curtain. I wanted to be able to see Felix the whole time, and the tech was cool with it, so I just held him the whole time. He was so good and still and chill while I had my blood drawn.
Then we went back out to the waiting room to wait on Brad and Tam. I watched a show on my phone a bit, and then my parents called so I went outside to talk with them. The whole time Felix was just chilling on my lap. I had planned to have him walk next to my new wheelchair for the first time at this appointment, but I was so stressed about the cupholder that I needed him on my lap and assisting me the whole time.
When I got home, I ended up taking a Valium to help me deal with the loss of the cupholder. That helped me to still be upset, but be at a distance from my panic about it. Turns out it is replaceable, but almost $40. So that’s not happening. At least anytime soon. I was still quite stressed, as I was waiting for my ultrasound results (spoiler, they never called me back and still haven’t called me today despite saying they would), and my mom kept having issues that I needed to help her with.
But by the end of the night I was finally able to relax a bit, and we enjoyed a few games of Farkle (our new favorite dice game). We each won one round! Yay! Here’s hoping today is better and I get my blood test results and ultrasound results!
If you have chronic illness, you are familiar with the old conundrum where you want nothing to be wrong so you don’t have to deal with another thing being wrong with you, but you also want the test results to find something wrong with you so that the doctors know you aren’t faking it and you can get some treatment. So I don’t really know what I want all these tests to say. I guess ideally all my symptoms would disappear and everything would go back to as normal as it usually is!