They sent me home after the surgery. Told me I was recovering well. I could not swallow properly without choking. My voice was a whisper only. I was in the kind of pain I had never experienced before. My mother fussed over me, often tiptoeing around my irritable and uncomfortable state. I needed help in supporting my neck while getting in and out of bed. A music box and a bell were my calls for help.
Daughter wanted a hug. She was scared of my bandaged neck. I could see the conflict in her eyes as she tried her hardest to understand yet wanted to get away from me. She wanted her old mommy back, but I had changed. With the tumor, they took away my normalcy.
The first 24 hours were hard. A blur of pain and medication. Nausea threatening every move, unable to speak, unable to communicate. Outside, life went on as usual. Tia went to school, the February freeze continued. Friends came home to see me and I tried my best to be a good sport about it.
In the first couple days, I just wanted to be left alone. I didn’t want to wake up. Didn’t want to meet friends and especially hated being fussed over. I absolutely hated concerned glances thrown my way, and the fragility of my situation. I was tired, irritated, voiceless, in pain and had shooting pains all down my arms.
Day 4 was much the same as the previous two. A Saturday morning. A blizzard blowing outside. A steady snow obliterating the view. I sat down to swallow my liquid breakfast of portige when all of a sudden I felt my hands going numb. Within seconds I was lightheaded and losing consciousness. Next my chest tightened up dramatically making it impossible to breathe. I lay down. It got worse. Within a matter of seconds my body was in a vice like grip avd all my muscles clenched up. My hands would not straighten. My fingers curled into a claw and the most intense pain took the breath out of my lungs. I thought I was dying. Maybe this is what a stroke feels like.
Whispering desperately to call 911, I clutched at my father, terrified at what was happening to me. Call 911 I said. I am in trouble. It took them a few minutes to register the severity of the duration as my body began to clench even tighter, making each breath an agony. My only coherent thought wat that time was that I did not want Tia to have this as the last image of her mother.
My face got distorted. My fingers clenched so tight that I could not feel my hands anymore. I begged my mother to take Tia away from me as my husband desperately called 911. The blizzard had intensified.
The fire men were the first to arrive. It took them less then 10 mins to reach. The snow by now had blanketed the path to our house. They assess the situation. Check my vitals and sternly ask me not lie down. The paramedics arrive 3 minutes later. My father gives him a quick over view of my situation. He explains to the paramedic that I was in full blown titanny: caused by a severe lack of calcium in my body.
By now I am in absolute agony. I want to scream in pain but I have no voice. The vice like grip on my hands and my chest intensified further as I struggled to breathe. My cheeks are completely contorted now. I feel the vice start to grip my even stronger. Save my hand please I beg the paramedics. I’m an artist and I need my hands, I plead.
The paramedic tries his best to reassure me. He communicates with the firemen as the bring in the stretcher and strap my contorted body onto it.
The cold seeps in through my thin sleep pajamas as they carry me down the stairs. It’s a blinding blizzard. My face is wet from the snow, my body inside aflame in agony. They lay down the stretcher on the side of the pavement as they open the ambulance door. I can’t feel the cold. The slew of snowflakes fall in a sheet dotting the red blanket they have put on my body. A thin t shirt and red blanket no match for the raging blizzard outside.
I don’t remember much after that. The pain was so intense that I kept blacking out. The hospital was less than 500 meters from home. They drive me in and take me straight to emergency.
They strip me down as my clenched body refuses to cooperate. The doctor confirmeds my fathers diagnosis. I’m in full blown Titanny from the lack of calcium in my body.
Daughter wanted a hug. She was scared of my bandaged neck. I could see the conflict in her eyes as she tried her hardest to understand yet wanted to get away from me. She wanted her old mommy back, but I had changed. With the tumor, they took away my normalcy.
The first 24 hours were hard. A blur of pain and medication. Nausea threatening every move, unable to speak, unable to communicate. Outside, life went on as usual. Tia went to school, the February freeze continued. Friends came home to see me and I tried my best to be a good sport about it.
In the first couple days, I just wanted to be left alone. I didn’t want to wake up. Didn’t want to meet friends and especially hated being fussed over. I absolutely hated concerned glances thrown my way, and the fragility of my situation. I was tired, irritated, voiceless, in pain and had shooting pains all down my arms.
Day 4 was much the same as the previous two. A Saturday morning. A blizzard blowing outside. A steady snow obliterating the view. I sat down to swallow my liquid breakfast of portige when all of a sudden I felt my hands going numb. Within seconds I was lightheaded and losing consciousness. Next my chest tightened up dramatically making it impossible to breathe. I lay down. It got worse. Within a matter of seconds my body was in a vice like grip avd all my muscles clenched up. My hands would not straighten. My fingers curled into a claw and the most intense pain took the breath out of my lungs. I thought I was dying. Maybe this is what a stroke feels like.
Whispering desperately to call 911, I clutched at my father, terrified at what was happening to me. Call 911 I said. I am in trouble. It took them a few minutes to register the severity of the duration as my body began to clench even tighter, making each breath an agony. My only coherent thought wat that time was that I did not want Tia to have this as the last image of her mother.
My face got distorted. My fingers clenched so tight that I could not feel my hands anymore. I begged my mother to take Tia away from me as my husband desperately called 911. The blizzard had intensified.
The fire men were the first to arrive. It took them less then 10 mins to reach. The snow by now had blanketed the path to our house. They assess the situation. Check my vitals and sternly ask me not lie down. The paramedics arrive 3 minutes later. My father gives him a quick over view of my situation. He explains to the paramedic that I was in full blown titanny: caused by a severe lack of calcium in my body.
By now I am in absolute agony. I want to scream in pain but I have no voice. The vice like grip on my hands and my chest intensified further as I struggled to breathe. My cheeks are completely contorted now. I feel the vice start to grip my even stronger. Save my hand please I beg the paramedics. I’m an artist and I need my hands, I plead.
The paramedic tries his best to reassure me. He communicates with the firemen as the bring in the stretcher and strap my contorted body onto it.
The cold seeps in through my thin sleep pajamas as they carry me down the stairs. It’s a blinding blizzard. My face is wet from the snow, my body inside aflame in agony. They lay down the stretcher on the side of the pavement as they open the ambulance door. I can’t feel the cold. The slew of snowflakes fall in a sheet dotting the red blanket they have put on my body. A thin t shirt and red blanket no match for the raging blizzard outside.
I don’t remember much after that. The pain was so intense that I kept blacking out. The hospital was less than 500 meters from home. They drive me in and take me straight to emergency.
They strip me down as my clenched body refuses to cooperate. The doctor confirmeds my fathers diagnosis. I’m in full blown Titanny from the lack of calcium in my body.
