Warp Speed ahead...

     For the second time in less than a week, this wee little pixie found herself commuting back into NYC to meet for yet another consultation appointment on my resident alien in my gut. This would be a first for me though. Instead of meeting again with my GI Doctor George, I would be meeting my surgeon face to face. 

     So feeling like a seasoned commuter, I hopped onto NJ Mass Transit with my Kindle in hand to start my long travels into NYC. Surprisingly, after just a few stops, a familiar face boarded the train. It was an old co-worker named Veronica. We hadn't seen each other in years since the company we both worked for went bankrupt. We spent the rest of the ride talking away happily like two little school girls. Most likely annoying those around us as we talked way too much.

    When we arrived in Penn Station, we hugged good-bye and wished each other luck on our day's adventures. I am truly grateful for running into Veronica that day. She was able to take my mind off of my looming appointment by providing a much needed distraction. Thank you sweet Veronica. You were just the angel I needed.

     On my way again, I found my needed subway station and rode across town. Proud of myself that I didn't ended up in the Bronx, I emerged nearby to my appointment on 69th Street and Madison Avenue. Despite the misty weather I had about an hour before my appointment. So I decided to walk off my nervous energy and do some window shopping with all of the amazing expensive Madison Avenue shops in the area. 

     As I wandered around. I found to my delight a french bakery with the most divine croissants and delightful macarons that I could not resist. Each and every sinfully delicious bite in my mouth tasted like a little bit of heavenly sunshine. It was well worth the price.

    With my stomach now full of french treats, I made my way into the waiting room of my surgeon's office. Although the wait wasn't rather long, the minutes seemed to tick by slowly. I tried to read my book but found that I just kept reading the same page over and over. Finally my name was announced and I was on my way into the inner sanctum of the man will change my life hopefully. 

     Doctor Chessin was quite cordial and friendly with a firm and steady handshake. ( Steady is very important ) After a few pleasantries, he jumped right into my medical records and posed a lot of the same questions that Doctor George did. Once we were all the same page, we got down to the details of my surgery.

        Doctor Chessin explained again that despite all the medicines available now to treat Crohn's Disease, no medication would be able to rid me of my scar tissue and strictures in my gut that have been causing me pain. The only option at this point, is surgical intervention. This type of surgical intervention is of course much preferred as I am the one making the choice to do it. I'd rather it this way, in the hands of surgeon that I trust whole heartedly than an emergency situation with my local hospital.

     Luckily this procedure ( a resection of the terminal ileum ) can be done laparoscopically with a minimal amount of cuts needing to be made in the abdomen.  The surgery is supposed to be about 90 minutes long and there will be three incisions made.  I'll have a small incision on my pelvic bone that will barely be visible and than a second slighter larger one on my hip that will be about 5mm. The last incision by my belly button will be around 1-3 inches long. The length of this one, will be determined by how dilated my gut is when he removes the one section of my bowel. 

     For such a short surgery, Doctor Chessin will be doing quite a bit while I'm under in dreamland. He will remove the diseased section of my gut and than reattach my small intestine to my large intestine. At the same time he will also remove my cecum and appendix since the blood flow will be cut off from these two appendages. 

    The only unknown with the surgery is what type of adhesions the surgeon may find that my alien has caused. I feel I am in good hands though with Doctor Chessin. He assured me just like Doctor George, that no matter what happened during the surgery, he's seen it all and I would be ok. 

    Feeling scared but confident that I was making the right choice, my surgeon walked me up to his scheduling department to get me scheduled for my surgery. To my utter surprise, his assistant penciled me in for October 9th at Mount Sinai Hospital in New York City !!!

    Come back tomorrow as I continue my tale and discuss what I'm packing to make my stay in the hospital more comfortable. 

    Warp Speed Ahead !

    

Cat scans sadly don't involve cats

 

     Cat scans, other wise known in the medical world as CT scans, sadly, do not involve any sort of cats. I mean, it would be quite amusing to just swipe a cat over your body in mid air a few times but it's probably not going to give doctors the answers they were after either.

    What they do involve though is something that looks a bit like a whirling time machine. This whirling and chunking machine takes a whole lotta x-rays from multiple angles and combines them into a cross sectional picture of your soft tissue and bones inside your body.

Why I Need To Get Scanned

    For me, this test was to look at my intestinal system for abscesses, fistulas or blockages currently going on as well as scar tissue from inflammation. I've been having a lot of localized pain and the doctor wanted to see if there had been any changes since my last scan about a year ago.

Outpatient Care Rocks !

   The scan, as mentioned above is one that I've had several times before. Luckily this one was by appointment at the hospital rather than me coming into the ER with extreme pain. I was pleasantly surprised that, this time around I had many "fun" flavors of barium to pick from instead of the nasty gunk I've had in the ER. I voiced my choice of banana and waited for my medical milkshake to appear.

  Since, I had an appointment it all moved pretty swiftly. I got one of those nifty hospital bands with all my impertinent patient info and than was escorted back to the waiting room to drink my "banana" shake.

   I drank both bottles rather quickly. I've found with previous experiences, its just best to chug the stuff down and get it over with. The longer you wait, the more it tastes like warm eggnog. Once you've ingested the lovely concoction that will make your insides visible on the scan, there is nothing left to do but wait. The drink has to make it's way through your system before you can actually go in for the test.

So you wait.  Sadly, you will not glow in the dark after consumption. I checked when I flicked the lights off in the bathroom. No glow. No super powers. Darn.

    Fortunately, when you are an outpatient at a hospital though, they actually allow you to wander away. You just need to promise to be back in time for the allotted scan. I promised like a 100 times because there was no way I was gonna drink that concoction again.

At least not that day.

In the Vortex 

    Forty-five minutes later, I was back from sitting in the hospital's lovely garden reading my kindle and ready to rock this test. Just like before, things moved swiftly. I was ushered into a back room where the machine was with a technician and nurse. They helped me up onto the machine bed and set up an IV line to run the contrast.

    Within a few minutes they had everything ready and the very kind nurse started the machine and warned me that she was about to run the contrast.

Why did she warn me ?

    Well, the contrast that is pushed through your veins just as the test starts gives you this sudden intense warm sensation throughout your body. It also makes you feel like you're peeing your pants. No, really. You don't actually pee your pants. But it's a really good imitation of the same sensation.

     After that though, the test isn't so bad. The machine hums and whirls around your mid section while you lay on a metal bed that gives off the sensation of floating in air. Its rather quick and not very loud but you can't bring music in with you like an mp3 player. So you are left there with just your thoughts and the sound of the machine working it's magic.

   I just closed my eyes while it went on and pretended that I was in the TARDIS swirling around in a time vortex. Sadly when it was over, no Time Lord Doctor Who's appeared.

( I wanted Tennant or Troughton to appear but would have accepted Smith )
The staff though that helped that day were all fabulous.

Results :

  I have an appointment in September to discuss the next step of my care.

  For me, the scans showed that I have scar tissue and that's probably the cause of my daily pain.
My doctor wants to refer my case to Mount Sinai Hospital where they are more able to deal with difficult cases of crohn's disease. I am sad that my doctor can't help me further but hope that perhaps I can find a treatment that does not require surgery at this time.

Until than I ponder the possibilities and do my usual tricks to keep my alien at bay and happy within me. My next post will delve into these ways.