Hospital time once again.

I know that I have been very absent from writing, and I hope that I did not worry anyone. I know I got a few emails from people that were asking me if everything was okay. Things are not awful, but they are not ideal at this time. Last week I started to have some scary numbers from breathing tests, and then some symptoms of infection, so I was admitted into the hospital on Thursday.


What got me here, again, is what I will write about first. About a week ago, I seemed to have started to feel unwell. A cold I guess. Slight pain in my lungs, feeling tired, then a bit of a cough. It always starts this way. One night I had a mild fever. This resulted in a visit to the clinic, and some tests. Then came a very low lung function. I will not write down how low, as to not scare any other people with CF that are reading this, or for those that know these numbers. And, well, I simply cannot bring myself to write down the number. Trust me, when I say it was low. Alarmingly low. I felt defeated when I did my breathing test, since I have had such a great few months. I could not believe these were the numbers that I was getting.


This resulted in the present hospital stay. Upon being admitted, I had several tests done right off the bat. The fact that I was having this chest pain, but no other common patterns of infection, lead the doctors to believe that it could be something else. We wanted to rule everything out before we went down the trusted IV antibiotic path. The symptoms that I was lacking was a fever (I had only had a very mild one a few nights earlier, but nothing since), an increased cough, high blood sugars, or shortness of breath. Other than being tired and having that lung pain, I was not feeling what I usually do when I have an infection. It was strange. So we did all the tests. CT scan, x-ray, blood work...it went on and on. Then, when everything came back okay, even the blood work showed normal white count in my blood (showing lack of infection), we did another lung function. That was done the next day, and by then I had started to cough up more and more, a sure sign that an infection was starting. The lung function came back much better, more close to what I usually am, and my SAT's were at about 94%. I felt good about these results, as they calmed me down. But as I was feeling warn out, and tired, and my cough (especially in the morning) was quite aggressive and productive the conclusion was that I did have an infection that we simply caught early. I was then started on a nice cocktail of IV antibiotics, and that is where I am now.

Today, a walking test showed that I was unable to keep my SAT's up while walking. They were down quite a lot, unlike what they were at rest, so as it stands now it looks like I will need oxygen when not at rest. I did not expect this to be the case. I have only been on oxygen once in my life, and it was nearly 8 years ago now. It was when I had influenza and as I got well, I did not need oxygen. This time I can only hope it is the same situation. I hope that once I get better, I will not need oxygen. I can only hope.

It has been a difficult time for me. Today made me feel helpless and sad. This illness is a constant of milestones. But unlike most milestones in life, these are the ones that you do not want to reach. More meds, more IV's, more hospital stays, oxygen. Every step is hard. It's that feeling that no matter how hard you work at it, how hard you persevere and no matter how strong you stay, there is always that reminder that this will get me. It will ruin my lungs, and take away more and more from me each day. Just when I think I have somehow overcome and won the fight, I fall and get reminded of what I am living.

Today, I thought to myself, "Where is the strength for all this supposed to come from?"

Tomorrow is our special day. I will be allowed to go, and I am happy for that. I was worried that I would not be able to, but I am well enough to get a day pass from my hospital for the ultrasound appointment. Our plan is a different one, for how we will find out the sex of our baby. We have decided to have the ultrasound technician write down what we're having on a piece of paper and put it in an envelope. This will only work of course if we have a cooperative technician that wants to do this for us. I want Martin and I to get the news in private later on, and then to tell everyone. I want us to be alone during that moment. Then of course, I will tell EVERYONE!!! Beth being one of the firsts of course along with our family, friends, and the whole world via my blog. I promise to write my blog tomorrow night, since I know I have been polling and asking you guys about what you thought for weeks, so you guys all deserve to know!!

I will try to make tomorrow great, without thinking about going back to the hospital afterwards, without thinking about all that has happened during the last week. I just want to enjoy the day and think of our baby and nothing else.

Next time I write I will know if I will have a son or a daughter. What a thought?!