Could I have written something earlier? Of course.
Should I have written something earlier? Possibly.
Am I writing something now? … Pretty sure, yes.
Yesterday, I arrived at Abbott Northwestern Hospital at 5:30 in the morning. Fast forward about seven hours and I was awake and ready to be rolled up to my new hospital room where I’ll be residing for… for as long as it takes.
That’s the unfortunate thing about this process: I don’t know how long it’s going to last. I’m here, they’re reducing my medication levels, I’ll start having seizures, then they’ll eventually decide they have the data they need and I’ll be done. What’ll happen during that time and how long it lasts will be known when it happens.
In the meantime, my head is mostly covered in gauze—they inserted 12 electrodes into the left side of my head and 3 in the right side. (I don’t remember if I mentioned it earlier, but during my MSI testing, they did some language testing that normally only causes brain activity in the left side of the brain, but part of the right side of my brain was activated as well. Since the part of my brain that’s responsible for language is where these seizures are starting… juuuuuust in case, check and see if things might be starting on the right side as well.)
Aside from the gauze, there’s some discomfort from having things inserted into my skull and some swelling caused by foreign objects being inserted in places they technically don’t belong, all of which will go away over time. For right now, though, one of the sensors in my left temple doesn’t like it when I eat really solid or crunchy food, so my diet consists of things like pudding, ice cream, cottage cheese, sandwiches without eating the crust… all I need is to be maybe four feet shorter to become a toddler again.
Especially since I’m spending most of my time in bed with the exception of getting help to sit down on a toilet that they can roll up next to my bed. I opted to sit on my plastic throne for 10-15 minutes earlier tonight both to be somewhere besides my bed and also to appreciate a slightly different view. I’m fully aware that all of this is temporary: eventually, I’ll be able to eat whatever’s on the menu and walk to an actual bathroom under my own power, in which cause I’ll feel like a new boy! Or at least someone who can order a hamburger instead of pudding for each meal. When? Like everything else here in the hospital during seizure monitoring, it’s all just a matter of time.