Have high blood pressure? high calcium levels?
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photo credit: pasotraspaso
This is my two week post op report card, and it’s a good one!
The first week was rough, I’m sure just due to the effects that any surgery has on your system along with hormone and blood chemicals all flying up and down, but now at two weeks post op from my parathyroidectomy I am feeling MUCH better.The symptoms that were IMMEDIATELY fixed are:
- my blood pressure is now totally normal, all the time
- normal bladder control (pre-op I ALWAYS had to pee and could barely make it in time)
- bone and muscle pain GONE!
- I have lost 7 pounds (yeah!)
- digestion MUCH improved
- Sex Drive back… (double yeah!)
Still to go:
I am currently REALLY emotional, I didn’t have the mood swings when I was pre-op like some people do, but I am having them now… I’m thinking it has to do with the parathyroid having to adjust itself.
I still get a little shakey when I don’t get my calcium. I had an appointment with my Endocrinologist on Tuesday and he has me on 1000 milligrams of calcium 4x a day along with a prescription for Vitamin D that I take once a week. I am also scheduled for a bone density scan in two weeks to see how much damage has been done to my bones during this calcium leaching period of God only knows how long. After he looks at that and determines the results he’ll redo my levels.
I am musing that perhaps my weight gain over the last two years and onset of menopause symptoms including rapid weight gain for now apparent reason may have to do with the fact I read on my synthyroid medication I picked up yesterday. (I also have Hashimoto’s Thyroid Disease) It says not to take it with calcium… so I’m wondering if that was/is part of the reason for the weight gain (Hashimoto’s is hypo thyroid) is that the synthyroid couldn’t really do it’s job to help regulate my metabolism with my calcium levels being constantly so high in my blood stream. Only time will tell.
All in all the results of the parathyroidectomy are a huge success. 
Read all my previous posts on this journey
Pt 5: 2 Days Post Operative
pt 4: Tomorrow is Surgery Day
pt 3: Consultation with the Surgeon
Definition :
“Parathyroidectomy“
Parathyroidectomy is surgery to remove parathyroid glands or parathyroid tumors. Parathyroidectomy is recommended when one or more parathyroid glands are producing excessive amounts of parathyroid hormone.
Top 10 Reasons I LOVE Twitter!
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I got introduced to Twitter about 10 months ago and at that time it was mostly techies, web peeps, & geeks. Not that there is anything wrong with that as I’m a we bit of a techie geek myself when it comes to SEO, but recently it’s started to snowball and businesses are waking up to the realization that Twitter knows things WAY before you get it from your friends email, or the newspaper or even in an online article. People in the midst of the news item are there and tweeting from their cell phones what is happening which then gets spread through the twittersphere and starts showing up on news stories.
10. I can follow famous people in various industries and get to know what they are reading, thinking, talking about before non-twits do.
9. Weather bad? Check your route from Denver to Grand Junction Co through your network of twitter followers/friends and know what is REALLY happening on the roads vs. the overly zealous meteorologist in Denver who somehow make 2 inches of snow in December sound like end times!
8. Need advice on buying a laptop, a printer, a camera, a nice restaurant? Once you’ve established a nice following, just tweet your ?’s and you’ll get a diverse set of answers from people that are only too happy to help you even though you’ve never met in person.
7. Find out about cheap and free deals.
6. Find an expert next door! The techie guy who helped me get this hosted WordPress blog I met on Twitter through another twitter follower.
5. Meet people in your industry through local tweetups.
4. Get new business by exposing your specials, sales & website offers to a whole new clientele.
3. I have met the most giving and generous people ever on Twitter. The entire web 2.0 generation all seem to have each other best interests at heart.
2. Twitter cares about the users! This application could have easily become an out of control stalking site, porn spreading site that would have ruined it but because Twitter responds immediately to complaints about rude behavior and the great feature “BLOCK” where you aren’t bothered by things you don’t want to see.
1. I get to share what I learn with other folks in the world… giving back feels great and helping other’s gives me a chance repay the folks that have helped me out.
AND
I wrote a post for Twitter Newbies Here
Humility – What’s your definition?
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I heard this quote once and it’s stuck with me… Humility isn’t thinking less of yourself… It’s thinking OF yourself LESS! (unknown)
It’s deep so say it to yourself a couple of times!
This just struck me as so true. Humbleness and humility is spoken of often in the bible but I think its one of those misinterpreted words. We all speak of Jesus as humble but He knew He was the son of God so it wasn’t that he thought less of Himself, he just thought of others first, what he could do for others, how he could help others, how he could change the lives of others. Being humble is a sign of strength not weakness and comes from a place of knowledge not ignorance.
There is also another similar quote and goes something like ” you’d worry less about what other’s think of you if you knew how little they think about you”. Most people in our society are much more obsessed with themselves and really don’t spend as much time analyzing us as we might think they do. We sometimes beat ourselves up about something we’ve done, something we’ve said and we let that story teller in our heads go on and on about it until we are afraid to show our face at work the next day when in reality no one else has been thinking about it at all.
What’s your favorite quote today? Why does it speak to you?
photo credit: André Banyai
How NOT to go to the ER after parathyroid surgery
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I woke up on day 3 post op and started having muscle cramps in my shoulder, leg, arm, my lips and finger tips were tingling… these were things my surgeon had told me to watch for. We called the surgeons office and he told me to see my regular doctor… so called my General Practitioner, not really understanding why since I haven’t seen my GP for weeks, but got in two hours later. On the ride in the car there the cramping started getting worse and worse, I was tingling and having muscle cramps & spasms all down the left side of my body and it started cramping my diaphragm which made it feel difficult to breathe. After explaining that my surgeon had said to watch for this my regular doctor didn’t know what to do, and didn’t have the ability to run lab results quickly, so she called 911 and had me go to the emergency room in an ambulance… At this point the cramping and numbness or “buzzy” feeling is getting worse and worse.. partly due to the low level of calcium in my body and the other due to me getting more and more upset and freaked about the cramping.. I got there and had to repeat everything once again to the ER staff that I’d told to the Hunky firemen that drove me to the hospital… uugggghhh..
I was sure I was having a stroke or a heart attack at this point, my fingers started cramping up like I had severe arthritis… and it felt like a huge weight was on my chest. All my vitals were normal but I was still having all these symptoms.
How to not have all of this happen? If you start feeling muscle cramps or numbness, eat another tums! Calcium with Vitamin D, etc… The surgeon should have told me that rather than just warning me to watch for these symptoms and then sending me to the doctor that was clueless. (not her fault, this isn’t her specialty and it was impressive that she caught the condition in the first place) When the doctor in the ER finally came into the room he said.. oh yeah… that’s common with this type of surgery, (Removal of an adenoma on your parathyroid gland) just take more calcium. Duh!
What’s really maddening was that I had that “womens intuition” that you’d think at this age I’d be wise enough to listen to and I thought when I first started having the muscle cramps… “I wonder if I should just take some more calcium” but I was afraid to over do the calcium and figured if it was that easy it would have been on my post op instructions.
Before the ER staff could get it together I closed my eyes and prayed… “God, help me“…. I started feeling large hands on my head, cradling it and the numbness and muscle cramping started lessening, starting at my diaphram the cramping diminished, the pressure lessened, and the tingling felt like it was being drawn out of my body to my head and out….. within 5 minutes I was almost none of the previous symptoms and just a touch of numbness in my lips and fingertips. Was it God? Did my body just re-regulate its hormone and calcium levels on it’s own? Next time… I plan on praying FIRST!
Pt 5: 2 Days Post Operative
pt 4: Tomorrow is Surgery Day
pt 3: Consultation with the Surgeon
pt 2: Appointment with the Endochronologist
pt 1: I thought it was just Menopause
Definition :
“Parathyroidectomy“
Parathyroidectomy is surgery to remove parathyroid glands or parathyroid tumors. Parathyroidectomy is recommended when one or more parathyroid glands are producing excessive amounts of parathyroid hormone.
Spring Gardening Tips – May
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Did you manage to wait until after Mother’s day to put out plants? I finally managed it but only because I’ve been in the hospital this year! I did put out a few herbs into my big tin barrel on the East side of my home. They are doing just fine! Any time after the 15th you can start to sow seeds or plant six packs of seedlings. It’s always a good idea to plant early in the day or cool afternoons and not in full sun. The most important time in a seedlings life is when you put it in the ground so spend a little extra time now and it will pay big dividends in the end.
My favorite part of this month is seeing what great surprises my efforts of the last growing season are going to give me this year. I was pleasantly surprised by my Oriental Poppies that grew from seed. They are just gorgeous bright jewel colors.
Plant annuals and herbs at the same depth as in the container. Dig the hole 2 times the size of the pot and loosen the soil in the bottom. Fill the hole around the plant with the fill dirt, tamp down and water well. Pinch off all the flowers from annuals like petunias and pansies, to direct the nutrients to the roots of the plant for more blooms and healthier growth. Gently spread out the roots at the bottom of the pot so they will grow into the new soil. Water as the plant directions indicate and pay special attention to the new transplants for the first week.
Container plants and window boxes are also due, plant shade loving plants together, sun loving plants together and place accordingly. Your combination possibilities are endless. I like to change it up every year as the plants available change or my mood does. Choose from contrasting colors together or one color scheme in mass in several pots all grouped together. Don’t just think of the flowers, also look for interesting shapes, colors and texture of plants for each pot. Taller things in the back with trailing varieties spilling out the sides of the pot will add to an informal style.
Cut back all your fall flowering plants if you haven’t done that already and clear out all dead twigs throughout your garden. Dead head your Mum’s for increased flowering come August.
I try and grow Zennias every year and they never work for me… I recently read that it’s better to plant by seed and I usually forget, so that’s my challenge for myself this summer… to get some zennia’s to grow.
