The Life and Times of the Miller Clan

Sore back?...I don't think so! Chapter One

Well...where do I start. I think it all began as long ago as the 17th of June, the day that Jess and I graded to Shodan (1st Dan Black Belts). I was beginning to suffer from back pain. Not alot at that stage but enough to think it was just a muscle strain. For the next 4 weeks the pain gradually got worse. The right hand side of my lower back was continously aching. I tried a few things to try and get some pain relief. I went to a sports massuse and then to my chiropractor (both who seemed to think it was a muscle problem) but it didn't get any better. I started to think it might be a kidney stone as I have had one of those before and the pain and position of the pain was very similar. I decided to go to the doctor and had some xrays but they didn't find anything. My doctor said it was a muscle strain and told me to take nurofen and rest. I had be taking nurofen by the handful for the previous 3 weeks so I knew that wasn't going to help.

It finally came to this. Tuesday morning the 11th of July I woke up in a huge amount of pain. Rang school to say I can't come in (which wasn't good as it was the first day of Term 3). Managed to drive Madi to school, came home and started throwing up. I knew then that things were out of control so ended up getting to the hospital. I was in emergency at 9.30am and they had no idea what was causing the pain. I got morphin (thank god for drugs) and was pain free for the first time in weeks. Hours passed with numerous doctors poking and prodding me, asking a million questions over and over again. They eventually called in a surgeon and she started all the questions over again. She started talking about my appendix but didn't seem to think that that was the problem.None of them had any idea what was wrong with me. She said she would admit me and get her boss (Dr Miller would you believe) to have a look at me the next day. I eventually was admitted as a sugical patient and ended up in the ward at about 5pm that night.

The next morning I was sent for a CT scan. That afternoon Dr Miller came to see me, spent 5 minutes talking to me, feeling my stomach and back and decided to put me on the 'board' which meant surgery. He seemed to be convinced that it was my appendix so they would start with a laporoscopy (a small incision and a camera having a look) and see what they could find. He warned me that if it was the appendix they would have to make a bigger incision (belly button to bikini line) to get it out. At this stage I didn't care, I just wanted the pain to stop.

Thursday the 13th of July at 10.30am I was prepped and ready to go. Dr Miller said to John that the operation would only be a couple of hours. FIVE hours later I was back in the ward with a very relieved John who had been stressing big time all the time I was away. I woke to find that I had had the big operation and was now missing my appendix. I was stitched up and had a drain in. Dr Miller came to see me and said that my appendix had burst, probably about 3 weeks ago and the fact that I was still here was pretty amazing. Apparently an abcess had formed around the appendix so they had left a drain in to drain any extra fluid that was still there. All in all I was going to be ok, a week or so in hospital and i would be able to go home....so of course with everything looking good...something had to go wrong!

As soon as they started talking about me going home, I started leaking bowel material out of the wound that had previously had the drain in. Of course it did.....I was destined to stay in that damn hospital forever! Anyway, this happened at night so it took hours for them to get a surgeon in to have a look. Finally one came and told me the worst news I had heard so far. She said that I would have to go on a tube fed diet for 6 weeks so the fistular (a hole in the small bowel) healed itself. I wouldn't be able to eat anything and would have to stay in hospital for the entire 6 weeks. As you can imagine I was devestated. There was NO WAY that I was staying in there for that long. The next morning Dr Miller came and kind of put my mind at rest. He seemed to think that the fistular would heal itself with me on a low fibre diet and I would be able to go home with a bag stuck to the outside of my body collecting the waste that was still coming out. He said it would probably take about 2 weeks for it to close up and the leakage to stop. Although I was disgusted at having to have a bag on all the time I was happy to go home and deal with it there.

BUT...as you can now guess....with my luck or my BAD luck it didn't end up with a happy ending...see chapter 2 for the rest of this neverending saga.

posted by rochelleandthegirls @ 9/08/2006 09:08:00 AM