This year, March 15th marked my 26th birthday! I am always a year ahead in my mind, I've really stopped counting, but I like my birthday. Its a fun time to eat fun food, hang out with people, and be grateful for all the things I've been able to do so far, and a time to plan what else I want to do!
I honestly thought I wasn't going to make it to another birthday this year. I ended up in the hospital two weeks ago with the most excruciating back pain...
Two weeks before my little stint at the hospital, I had taken on a job as an admin assistant for a large YouTube personality. I had been praying for an opportunity to make money from home, and was very excited to see if it would be a good fit. Knowing my limitations due to auto-immune, I hoped being at home would create less stress for me.
But... with 50 emails coming at me everyday, the stress began to build up in my body. I was getting up early and staying up late (bad combo for me) just to keep up, plus all my regular day jobs. The fact that it was tedious and non-creative work made it that much more stressful for me. I'm all for pushing myself, but I have many strengths (creativity, teaching, engaging, empathy) that I like to use, and I was able to do NONE of those.
Tedious tasks stress me out, and although I felt fine mentally, I was about to learn that cortisone will take its course whether you FEEL stressed or not... I was on my way home from a dance lesson when I got into the car and pulled the door closed. Something in my back gave way, and I felt a surge of pain like my nerves were being cut with a knife. I painfully drove home, and like an idiot, did two more hours of work before succumbing to the pain and laying down.
I have only stayed up all night a handful of times in my life. But I have never stayed up all night and remembered the whole night. My spine felt like it was being sawn in half, and I yelled in pain off and on all night. I kept thinking about the people I had read about who had endured torture. I found myself so thankful that at least I wasn't in some prison camp, but at the same time, I didn't know how much more pain I could handle.
Being in such severe pain is very interesting. You feel as though you are in a pain suit, like you should be able to step out of the pain. It makes you aware that you are not your body, but that you dwell in a body. I tried to stay still all night, turning over only once. Around 4:30, I screamed for someone to come downstairs. I couldn't move, and wasn't sure what I was going to do.
My mom and siblings and roommates came running downstairs. After an initial once over from my mom, she decided to call the paramedics to try and move me to a more comfortable place. They moved me to a bench that I rest on when my back gets bad, but the pain was just too intense. I was completely locked up through my spine, and I felt like every nerve in my back was being cut and burned at the same time. So, my mom called them again this time to go to the hospital.
When they came, they saw how young I was, and I'm sure they thought I was being a drama queen. There is nothing worse than not being believed about how sick you are or how much pain you are in, especially when you're not a baby and have a pretty darn high tolerance to pain.
They heaved me onto the gurney and I screamed louder than I thought was possible. It was totally involuntary, like the pain was speaking for me. Then, I passed out. I don't remember that, but my sister told me it happened. I must have come to, and then I felt myself going again. Not gonna lie, I thought I was going to Heaven.
"Well, I had a good run of it, too bad I didn't finish my books..." was a thought that floated through my head. I also thought about the guy I loved and was no longer speaking with. True to the dramatic nature of our family, I said, "If I don't make it, tell (him) I love him!" As I floated out of conciseness, I heard my mom and sister laugh at this. I wanted to say it wasn't funny, but suddenly it was funny, but I couldn't laugh because I was passing out.
The arrival at the hospital was a nightmare. My spine needed to be perfectly straight to avoid more pain, but when they took me to the MRI, they put me in a sling which curved my back. The only way I can describe it is saying it felt like bending the area of a broken bone. I screamed again, and it wouldn't be the last time.
It took the doctors 8 hours to decide to admit me. I do not remember more than 30 min of the whole time. I was apparently transported to another hospital, but remember none of that. I have never had that happen before, where you don't remember anything. Quite a strange experience... who knew pain could do that?
My mom asked the doctor to which hospital he would take his daughter, and I'm so glad she did... When I woke up, I was in the most beautiful, clean, lovely staffed hospital I've ever seen (I've seen several). Everyone who came into my room was like an angel.
The next two days were painfully lying in bed, drifting in and out of sleep, calling for nurses to change my bedpan, and waiting for my family to visit and bring Whole Foods salads and snacks. I felt so loved and cared for... As someone who has cared for a sick person for more than half my life, I appreciated every little thing they did for me.
Each day, the nurses would come and try to get me to walk. I hated that part of the day because it was so excruciatingly painful. I've been told since that back pain is worse than childbirth. I will never be able to have my own children for health reasons, but knowing that I endured such a big pain makes me feel like a true woman in a way. As a woman, you know that bringing life into the world demands that you feel pain, its a sort of rite of passage. I don't get that rite of passage, but I got my own.
I am incredibly grateful to God for keeping me safe. I'm so thankful for my beautiful, crazy family who supported me through this whole ordeal and are being so supportive of me as I heal and try to figure out where to go from here. I am thankful for that beautiful hospital and their kind staff. And, get this, I had this little hospital trip RIGHT BEFORE I GOT BOOTED OFF MY PARENTS INSURANCE!! Had it happened just a few days later, we wouldn't have been covered. God is very good.
And I'm grateful for you readers. Thank you for reading about my journey, and I pray that it encourages you on yours.
Much love to all,
Ashley
