Created with Weekly Write Ups 2 Templates by Miss Fish


Birthday Girl kit by Dandelion Dust Designs


Title by Word Art World


JOURNALING:


My birthday started out like a typical January day. There was a light dusting of snow as I got up to go to work. Since Randy’s court date was delayed due to COVID, I went to work to get a few hours in. On my way to work, my window fluid stopped working, so I went straight to the dealership to have them fix it while I was at my office. I picked up my vehicle later that morning and had an hour before my dentist appointment. Who schedules a dentist appointment on their birthday? Apparently, I do. So I went to the ghost-town of the Topeka mall and walked a couple of miles. Then I stopped at Starbucks to get my free birthday drink. When I arrived for my appointment, the dental staff knew it was my birthday and they cleaned my teeth with cake-flavored polish. Little did I know, that would be the extent of my birthday celebration that day. They also told me that I probably needed to schedule a root canal. Oh joy. I decided to head home.


Randy was resting when I arrived, so I continued to work from home. About 4 p.m., he came out of the bedroom to tell me that I needed to take him to the ER. He hadn’t been feeling right for weeks, and he had pain in his lower abdomen. Knowing to be prepare for any ER visit, I grabbed my electronics, a book, some drinks, and some protein bars. Randy took off all of his jewelry and left his valuables at home. And we were off.


The ER staff were wonderful. When Randy couldn’t tell them exactly what was wrong, they started doing a battery of tests to eliminate the most likely causes of his pain. Around 10 p.m., they did a CT scan of his abdomen and found the problem… a gastric leak. When I looked it up on my phone, I found a list of symptoms… and it read just like a check list of all of Randy’s aches and pains… nausea, dizziness, shoulder pain, etc. So everything that we thought was due to the car accident was actually caused by this.


The ER staff decided to refer Randy back to his RNY surgeon, Dr. Hoehn, in Lenexa. Thankfully, Dr. Hoehn was on call that night and they started to transfer him. Around midnight, I ran home, packed overnight bags for both Randy and I, and drove straight to the Advent Health. Randy traveled via ambulance and arrived about 10 minutes after I did. The staff there were also fantastic and they got Randy hooked up on good meds. I was allowed to sleep in his room on a sofa that pretended to be a bed. Not quite the way I had planned to celebrate my birthday.


I had teased Randy after all of the medical visits in 2020 that my New Year’s Resolution for 2021 was to NOT meet our medical deductible…. We made it 27 days. Oh my.


As far as my birthday celebration, I cancelled all of our weekend plans with Kerri and Morgan, and I left the present that Randy wrapped for me on the kitchen island. I did get a cute card from my Dad, and hundreds of messages and texts from friends across the country. We’ll just pick a different day to celebrate my birthday this year. The best present was the fact that after Randy’s surgery on Jan. 28, he already feels so much better. I was able to bring him home on Jan. 30, and it was the first time he slept through the night in months. Here’s to his continued recovery! I feel like a very lucky person! Jan. 27, 2021