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Re: How surgery went/ Linda, (long)From: anonymous@obgyn.netSun Nov 29 11:37:35 1998
Dear Yenta, Well, not exactly a higher plane. I believe in medical treatment, but my lift has been a history of having to find ways to fight pain myself. Doctors didn't like to treat me because I "looked" healthy. As a child and young woman I took dance lessons for about 16 years. If dance teaches one thing, it is to use the larger muscles so that the little muscles or organs don't hurt, and to push any other pain away. I had terrible cramps in high school, but my doctor (they often make girls see Pediatricians until 18, which is entirely unappropriate) gave me tranquilizers which I didn't like. Then, seeing the first gyn, he said that is "normal," that cramps meant that you could have babies later! My grandmother had a traditional pain remedy: gin, but although the juniper berries act as a muscle relaxant, it didn't do much. I stopped dancing because pain near my left colon caused me to favor that leg, and I came down on the leg and pulled a tendon and couldn't do anything, in fact, I limped for a couple years. (I looked "healthy" so doctors didn't do anything about that, either.) I did have my tonsils out around that time, but I had to BEG for strong enough antibiotics and for refills, even when my entire throat looked like cottage cheese and every lymph node in my body was swollen. This kind of great medical care continued in every area of my life: I gave birth to a 10 lb. 2 oz. baby naturally with only an episiotomy and no other pain killers. The doctor had said, up to delivery, that the baby would be very small and I should have been eating more. My doctor was gentle, but at the delivery she was assisted by a go-get-em resident who practically jumped on my abdomen to push the baby out, and that really hurt for a long time. I had also had periods for the first few months of pregnancy, so I didn't know when she was due. I nursed my baby, and when the periods stopped, instead of feeling better, after about a year I got horrible symptoms. I had gotten used to dealing with pain by pushing it away in my mind, but my body played a trick on me: it started to go into shock from pain. For me this meant skipped heartbeats, fast heartbeats, difficulty breathing, dizzyness, inability to digest food (it would exit the same color as it entered), numbness and itching, pains all over the place. It couldn't have been active endo because I didn't have my periods for awhile, but it was a hormone problem caused by this breastfeeding time. I went to all kinds of doctors in one of the best hospitals in New York City: the cardiologist said I was O.K., they took blood tests for diseases and I was fine, the neurologist said that I had slow responses but that was probably due to "a virus." Nobody mentioned hormone imbalance due to breastfeeding. I was glad when my periods started again, but they were heavier than ever, and the pain was really bad. I could fill an overnight size pad in an hour. I started praying about then, because every day I was just thankful that my heart hadn't stopped. The prayer did calm me a little, but it also led me to discover that I had allergies such as to foods like corn, and also to any kind of insect: allergies I hadn't had before. I took Panothenic Acid (a B vitamin) which helped a lot, and Benedryl for immediate symptoms. I had done all sorts of alternative meditation before that time but it didn't help, because I had to find a source of strength outside of myself. I began to feel awful in my back, and went to another gyn in Brooklyn who said that that wasn't so bad, but I did have erosion in my cervix, possibly because of the large baby I delivered, and I should have cryosurgery, which he did. It did help my cramps a little, but my back pain increased until I couldn't stand up for more than a few minutes. I asked if I had endometriosis, but he said I probably didn't. (No lap.) I stopped drinking coffee, which helped, but it still was bad. I shyed away from doctors as much as possible. Often, they tried to put me on birth control pills, but that only made me feel worse, and made my feet swell up almost double, which is funny because although I have big hips, I have thin lower legs and ankles. They also made me feel bloated and congested, and increased the pain of periods. One doctor sent me to a urologist because of this and difficulty urinating, and he catheterized me, but found no problems in my urine. Again... I look healthy, and no doctor other than a gyn has ever heard of endo. I also have varicose veins and veins near the temples of my head which hurt, but my family doctor thinks I am just worried about the way I might look in a bikini (really!), even though I haven't gone swimming in years because of back pain in the cold water. This same guy gave my husband all kinds of blood tests (he doesn't look "healthy") and found a liver problem, but the same doctor hasn't even given me a cholesterol test! (A former doctor found I had high cholesterol.) Don't get me started on the choice of doctors on insurance plans... So, this year I finally went to a gyn who gave me my first laparoscopy (October 28th). My entire left side of my abdomen was one large mass of adhesions, including my bowel and other organs. On my right, I had endo on several organs. I saw the glossy pictures and there were these large red spots on almost everything. I had cysts on ovaries. In my uterus (which was overly large) I had a large polyp and fibroids. None of this was malignant, luckily. The doctor tried to get everything, and unstick the adhesions, but my body is still very sensitive. This was Dr. Marchetta in Akron (I now live in Ohio), and he actually was on my insurance plan! He is a very busy doctor here. If I get adhesions again, I'm sure it isn't because he wasn't careful; I've also had skin problems all my life such as excema and callouses, and I can have sticky stuff stick all my hair together in the winter caused by scalp excema; sometimes I think I'm made of glue. (We should get the best dermatologists to work on this adhesion problem, shouldn't we! If they don't understand membranes, nobody does.) Yesterday I worked for half a day, and I ended up on my feet for at least 3 hours. As I said, sometimes I do not feel pain, but that is more dangerous. When I left work, I was beginning to feel really bad. I had a lot of trouble concentrating driving home. When I got into bed, I began to feel the pain, and I began to feel more awake, and realized that I almost had gone into shock again. Last night when I went to sleep I hurt, and this morning when I woke up I hurt. When I feel the pain, it is less bad. I know that this is strange, that I don't always feel it directly, but I can really wear myself out this way, because I don't know my limits. Also, I think that I wasn't treated for years because of this. Sometimes I do have pain, such as when I go to the bathroom (because of my bowel involvement), and it is so bad that I start to faint. This isn't when I have my periods, because then I have diarrhea, which is horrible, but not as painful. I stuff a towel into my mouth and bite down really hard just to keep from fainting. One doctor checked the insides of my colon (again... I looked healthy). Sometimes painkillers don't work for me: ibuprofen does nothing, not for pain or fever. Others such as tylenol don't work either. Tylenol-codene (Percocet) works a tiny little bit, but I have trouble breathing, and it makes me dizzy. I could go on and on. I am now 45 years old, and wish I could get back a lot of days of my life that I just spent at home. Elizabeth
At 11:29 PM 11/28/98 -0600, you wrote:
>Dear Elizabeth,
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