Hyperemesis, Hospitals & Home Care

It's been a long time since my last post. So much has happened but I'll try to give an overview of the "highlights" of the last couple of months:


Jul. 19th thru 22nd - Jeff took me to the ER at Summit Hospital in Hermitage because I had been throwing up nonstop for days and was extremely dehydrated. Too many needle sticks and several hours later, we wound up at Dr. Vasquez's office where he immediately diagnosed me with hyperemesis gravidarum (think morning sickness on crack 24/7) and had me admitted to Centennial Women's Hospital (more IV's and needle sticks) in Nashville where I stayed for a few days to get some meds and fluids in...my first overnight hospital stay.


Jul. 27th thru Aug. 3rd - After an unsuccessful few days of trying to be at home with a low-dose subcutaneous medicine pump (meds pumped through a needle inserted into my abdomen) I would up in the same condition and had to be re-admitted to the hospital again, this time for a week. Dr. Vasquez upped the dosage of meds and tried different types of meds to see what would be most effective with me. I have never been so sick or felt worse in all my life.


Aug. 4th thru 13th - After getting released from the hospital, I went home with the same medicine pump but a much higher dosage of meds and the infusion through IV instead of subcutaneously. The IV felt much better as the needle in the abdomen thing stung and made my belly really sore. The downside is that my veins didn't hold up for more than 48 hours so every other day, my home care nurse Brenda (God bless her!) had to come and put in a new IV. I had hard lumps all over my arms and eventually ran out of places to insert a new IV.


Sometime around Aug. 10th - Jeff wasn't feeling well and had a bad headache and blurred vision. He called our regular doctor and was told to go to the ER to get checked out because he might have a TIA (not sure what that stands for). Turns out they discovered through a scan that he had a blood clot behind an eye leading to his brain and that he had had a mini-stroke. They think it may have been the result of a past injury. The ER doc wanted to admit him to the hospital but he begged not to be since I was so sick at home. So the doc agreed to let him to home and put him on blood thinning meds. Thankfully there hasn't been any signs of lasting damage and the clot broke up with the meds. Jeff is now done with the meds and none the worse for the wear. He'll have to go back on occasion for check ups. I'm so thankful he is okay. Blood clots have been a problem in my family and they are nothing to mess with!


Aug. 14th - Back we went to Centennial to have a PICC line inserted. This basically consisted of the doctor giving me an injection to numb a small area in my upper arm and then cutting a small hole in that spot and threading a tube through a deep vein running through my upper arm, across the chest and ending near my heart with the help of a small ultrasound machine. Isn't technology crazy?


Aug. 14th thru Present - I still have my PICC line in. Though it's rather annoying to have tubes and valves coming out of my arm, it is so much better than constantly changing out IV's. Brenda comes once a week to change the PICC line dressing. Jeff manages it the rest of the time. He has been so great with dealing with the doctor, insurance, Coram Infusion Services (the company that provides my medicine & all of the accessories for the pump and PICC line), Continuous Care Services (home care nursing), filing for work disability, communicating with my HR dept., etc. He's been taking great care of me...I'm totally spoiled now. He's even become a nurse of sorts as he flushes out my PICC line with saline and Heparin every night.


I'm now 15 weeks along. Still pretty weak and and tire very quickly but definitely better than how I was feeling during the hospital stays. I'm slowly weaning off of the PICC line meds so I'm hoping that I won't need the pump in another week or so. I've found so much to be thankful for during this time. I have had so much outpouring of love and prayer from family and friends. My short term disability has covered me at work so my income is still rolling in and everyone there has been so supportive. Our insurance coverage has been amazing, without which we would be tens of thousands of dollars in debt. We've had the best health care people to work with. There is so much to be thankful for.


Most of all, we have a healthy baby so far despite everything! Here's an ultrasound pic from last week.