November 2006

I had my keys in my apartment door, my arms full of bags, cold and shivering from the november air, gasping for breath after the flight of stairs. For several weeks there had been unexplained breathlessness, fatigue, headaches, and dizziness. But, like anyone who knows that all of those symptoms can be caused by a cold or a lack of sleep and an overabundance of caffeine, I shrugged it off. I asked my mom what she thought after a few weeks, and being a nurse, she figured she had the answer when she suggested I needed an iron supplement. So, six weeks later, I had found myself back at my general doctor, 4 hours from my apartment, getting a blood test. Yeah, they had me fasting for 12 hours prior, but wasn't it weird how I almost passed out? So, I drove back that day, expecting some dumb answer and maybe a prescription. Just as I had slipped my keys into the lock, the phone rang. I almost didn't pick it up. But, I grabbed it just in time. I don't even remember if the nurse on the other end said 'hello.' All I remember was, "You need a blood transfusion right away. Go to the nearest emergency room and tell them you need a blood transfusion."

After several hours in the emergency room and they had given me a bracelet and a bed, the doctor would evaluate my blood counts and tell me that they were so low that I shouldn't be able to sit up and talk. I laughed at him and said, "Well, I'm obviously not, so I guess that's a good sign!" And that was the attitude I kept for the following weeks. I mean, what else do you do? That phone call was the last time my life, my moods, my decisions were my own. From then on everything was determined by phone calls to the doctor, blood counts, infections, and drugs.

The doctor that examined my X-rays had to talk my mom down from speeding down the highway at midnight to see me. I was admitted. And it would be three more days before anyone would know why I was there in the first place. I was next introduced to Dr. Keubler (pronounce Keebler, like the elf) who informed me of his findings thus far. Mom, Stephen, and my close friend Tiesha were all there, and I was feeling pretty good after all the blood they gave me, so I was pretty confident that things were looking up. Boy, was I wrong. Keubler announced that he had narrowed things down to three diffrent diagnosis: HIV, Leukemia, and Aplastic Anemia and that the only way to tell was by bone marrow biopsy. I knew what HIV and Leukemia were and that I didn't want either. I also knew what bone marrow biopsies were, and that I definetly did NOT want one of those. His very indelicate manner included waving over the orderly to start unplugging things from me while he talked. He said that we were going for a bone marrow biopsy RIGHT THIS SECOND and the doctor had everyone leave the room as I was wheeled down to my new room. I begged for drugs, I begged to be put out, begged not to see the needle that would be piercing my hipbone, I wanted to know what was going on with THIS CRAZY DOCTOR and I started sobbing again, right in front of everybody and didn't stop until they gave me anti-anxiety drugs and held me down.

I woke up later to find Stephen, his roommate and best friend Trent in the room, with my mom laying on the couch. I had a private room now because of my white blood cell count being so low that I couldn't fight infection. They called it neutropenic precautions, and they meant that I was now bubble girl. I couldn't eat raw or undercooked foods of any kind, including fresh fruits and veggies, I had to stay in my room, and any nurse that suspected she had an infection had to wear a mask. I wasn't allowed really around anybody that had been outside much, which meant that I didn't see anybody that wasn't stephen or my mom for the rest of my stay, with only a few exceptions.