Appendicitis Blues

As I awake Sunday morning to a gut wrenching stomach ache, I thought it was Satan once again telling me "You don't want to go to church today!!" but I carried on with my usual Sunday morning.---After all, my bishop did say he would send my records back to my family ward if I didn't attend my singles ward regularly, that did have somewhat of a burner under my butt. After getting ready, the stomach ache still present, thoughts were going through my head---food poisoning?...nah, no one else from the party was complaining. Too much chocolate fondue and chocolate cake?...maybe! Was I hungry?...possibly, so I decided to eat what I could force down--a piece of bread. Church time came and I rolled on in and chatted with Jilly Babe thinking I was feeling fine until Relief Society came---and it wasn't because it was Relief Society...I was in dying pain, and the last 20 minutes, which was going ever so slowly, felt like 3 hours. I don't think it helped any that the girl giving the lesson didn't know what her lesson was about and had he driest voice ever...Piece of gum???
As soon as I got home, my bed was calling my name...I quickly answered. The rest of that I ate dinner with the fam and slept.. Towards the later evening I kept coming up to my mom telling her that I was NOT feeling well.... She just kept asking where it hurt and what I wanted her to do about it??? NOTE: My mother is not one for much sympathy. I love her to DEATH, but she is the toughest woman in the world and just expects everyone else to be too! :)
Well, around 9:30 pm, I came up to her when the pain was getting unbearable and told her I needed to go to North Orem Instacare, something is up. She told me I might as well go to the ER, because if it's abdominal, the Instacare will send me to the ER.
We were off to the ER.
I was checked in and admitted. The doctor came in and pressed around on my stomach---OUCH! Where he was pressing and the way he was pressing, he said it was my appendix. They started an IV---a student nurse, OH boy. Not only did he stink like a dirty dish rag---yes I'm sick with a sensitive stomach, you need to smell good, but when he drew my blood, and I understand he is a student nurse, but make sure the blood isn't going ALL OVER my arm and blanket. Whew. We finally got that out of the way. I went in for the CT scan, they saw the "gunk" around my appendix, so I was blessed to not have to be given the dye that makes you feel all warm like you're going to pee your pants...no I saved that for after anesthesia!
I came back to room 11, that's what I was known as in the ER "11", I had no name. My mom asks me "Do you feel any better?"...Nope, I still had felt like crap, like I had all day long.
The doctor came back with my blood results and said my white count was not high, but there is 20% that have appendicitis that that is the case. He sent the nurse in to give me some morphine to help with the pain. My mom asks the nurse "Is that normal that her white count isn't high?" I swear that the doctor had JUST gone over this... hahaha The nurse told her in some cases, yes, it is. They had called Dr. Mark Fullmer in, the on call dr. that night. He was going to do the surgery. The nurse said that once he comes in, things would happen pretty fast, so to be prepared.
We waited.....They prepped me....We waited....We talked to the nurses in the prepping room....We waited some more....FINALLY.....the nerves were there. All of a sudden, I'm breathing heavy from the oxygen mask and out I go......
I wake up to not being able to breathe. This may sound really gross, but I have all this crap in my throat that I cannot clear. They're telling me to calm down---When you wake up from anesthesia you have no idea what has just happened--let alone not being able to breathe. So, I'm trying to cough and clear my throat, my stomach is hurting from the coughing, they have just taken my catheter out and I feel myself peeing!! The nurse was not friendly about that. ---either that or my saying sorry a million times!
I don't know what my problem was this time at the hospital with student nurses, but as soon as I got into my room, up pops another one! I think even my mom wanted to strangle him. I just wanted to sleep and he just wanted to explain EVERY LITTLE detailed thing and come into my room for EVERYTHING. Plus he gave me a huge bruise on my hip from the demerol.
I measured my incision, it is 3 3/4 inches. It is pretty depressing. I don't know if Dr. Fullmer was in a hurry and did the sloppiest job he could, but it is NOT a pretty job. I don't recommend Surgeon Dr. Mark Fullmer to anyone. Everyone my mom talks to says he needs to retire. My OB Dr. Gregory Gordon---that is another post down the road, he did my C-Section SO neat and straight, double the size of this incision and hardly noticeable. I took a picture, but I'll spare everyone the nightmares hahaha

Attack of the Snails!

They're ugly, they're slimey, they're gross, and did I mention they're ugly? Snails. Ewwwww. I hate them with a passion. Living in the basement with all the spiders, I've long learned to get a huge, long roll of toilet paper and kill the buggers, but still cannot manage to grab a grotesque snail by the shell. They're eating my moms plants and flowers bare, they leave they're nasty little slime tracks on the side walk....Is it true if you leave a cup of beer on the ground they'll smell it and climb in and drown??? HMMMMM.....24 Pack anyone???

Last night as I was getting ready for bed, I had my music going in my room when I heard a noise...Which is freaky because i'm in the basement all by myself. I turned my music down, but couldn't tell if it was my mom upstairs or the water from me getting in the shower earlier on. I turned my music back on and continued back to what I was doing. Later on, as I got into bed and was reading my book I heard something outside my window. --Do note, I am in the basement and outside my window is the window well, so I was a little freaked. I thought at first it was the wind blowing the bush against my window, but then I realized, the wind wasn't blowing.. It was a scratching and almost moaning noise, but don't leave it up to me to describe it haha I was a little freaked. I didn't dare open my blinds, so I called on my cell phone upstairs---hearing my mom's feet race to get the phone, I have her come down to hear the noise. Of course it's 10:30 p.m. and dark outside so we are unable to see outside my blinds, but as my eyes adjust to the dark I can see something dark dripping down the window well and and object right above it. Of course the worst of the worst of thoughts come through my head---Was that blood dripping down the well? Was that object an animal? My mom and I both didn't know what was outside my window, I wasn't going to go out there and I wasn't going to let my mom go out there alone, so we decided to call Todd Fischio, our neighbor. He came over bravely with his flashlight, my mom and I followed him hesitantly over by my window.. As we looked we could see nothing at first.. Come to find out, the object I thought was an animal, was a rock. The dark stuff dripping down the well, that was just mud. It's amazing what your imagination can do to you. BUT, as far as the noise, we found the culprit.. The attack of the Killer Snail! That ugly, gross, slimey thing was simply trying to get across my window, vibrating it and scratching it, only to get to my mom's plants to get some dinner. Unfortunately, he didn't make it. Todd did us a little favor, thank you, Todd.. He sent him to a little place called Snail Hell.
So, in the end, there was no foaming at the mouth animal outside my window trying to kill me and I was able to sleep peacefully through the night. :)

I still hate snails with a passion.

The Four Seasons of Utah

There isn't much construction UDOT can do in the winter time because it's just too dang cold. When they do try to patch up holes in the road, they bounce right back out and it's just the same a week later. I came to conclusion, the four seasons of Utah are no longer Winter, Spring, Summer, and Fall--it is Winter, Road Construction, Road Construction, and Road Construction. No matter where you go, what city you go to, what interstate you take, there is going to be some kind of road construction. I know it's not just Utah, I believe it to be other states as well, but I have just lived in Utah my entire life, so it's the seasons I've grown up with :P Do you ever wonder what was going through their heads once they have finished the construction??? Sometimes the roads are completely retarded and you just wonder who the PM was on that job??? In Springville, as you exit onto the interstate off exit 261, they are always painting and repainting arrows, the roads are so confusing to one who has never been on that exit--I can see where road rage comes in to play. 

Yesterday (Saturday) was our yearly McKinnon reunion...YAY!!!! (if you could only hear the sarcasm in my typing.) We get to see cousins that we don't know, drive to a place that we don't know how to get to, and spend all day saturday there!! Surprisingly it turned out to be OK. My grandma is the only one left of all her sisters, so she was the bell of the ball :) I sat with my mom and her sister Geri and her husband Galyn and brother George and his wife Elaine and her cousins Mary Anne and Mary Lou--they have a great time when they're all together which made it fun. It was a challenge getting there, that's for sure. It was up in Providence, Utah at my mom's cousin, Mary Anne's . It was there about 4 years ago, but how are we suppose to remember how to get there from 4 years ago??? The address wasn't numbers, it was a number and Hillsboro Dr. with no map. My aunt Geri said Mapquest was no help at all, so I'm glad we didn't use that. But we did end up in Hyrum instead up Providence and were driving around for about 20 minutes then decided to call then drove around trying to find it after we got directions and ended up in Logan for another 20 minutes. Whew. It's quite an exiting drive up there also... I'll bring up the topic of road construction back up. (North Salt Lake) I don't think I've ever seen so many orange cones in my life...where do they store all of those???? 

Oh WOW...

The days are coming. There are only 35 days left. I can't watch A Baby Story anymore...way too freaky. I look at the women on there after they get the epidural and they are still screaming their guts out!!! UMM, excuse me.. I thought the epidural was to help so you're NOT screaming. My caseworker at LDSFS was telling me that sometimes it works and sometimes it takes awhile---well, mine better work...quick...or no one is going to want to be standing next to me. I feel the Braxton Hicks, but to be honest.. I don't know if I have felt a real contraction? Last night I woke up and was doubled over in a pain for about under a minute. It wasn't awful, but it wasn't comfortable. I guess I will know in a few weeks what a contraction feels like and can say or not if that was a true contraction.

My mom is gone once again. She is off to Ohio for my niece, Bella's baptism for one week. At least this time we can keep in touch and she isn't on the other side of the world. :) This morning as I was leaving for work and saying goodbye to her, she patted my tummy and said "You stay in there kiddo until I get back!" I don't think she has anything to worry about, but that would be awful to go into labor without my mom by my side. She has been my #1! If you don't know my mom, you should. She is the sweetest woman you'll ever meet...she's so bubbly and friendly and would do anything for anyone. She works at an IHC Instacare so she knows a lot of people, so when I say my last name, people ask if i'm her daughter and just go on about her how wonderful she is.. Yep, that's my mom :) haha I have to brag because she is my best friend has been nothing but supportive throughout my pregnancy.

She is a wonderful mother of 6 daughters and 2 sons and a loving grandma of 24 grandkids who love her so much!! That was so fun to get together with all the family on Easter, if you want to see more pictures you can visit my sister JanaRae's blog. It includes pictures of when they all went down to Zion's! (which sadly I wasn't able to go--I wasn't up to the hiking at 7 1/2 mo pregnant ;) ) But they are fun pictures to see of the fam all together!!

*Sigh*

I've done it and I know people are now doing it to me. "She looks like she's going to pop!" Well, today at work, it was finally said to me for the first time. An anonymous guy came in today wanting information about our company. He was a very nice guy--very good looking as well. As I stood up to go get someone to help him "more thoroughly", he says to me "Oh, I'm sorry to make you get up". Nah, I get up all day to run errands so I wasn't bothered. As he was leaving, he told me "Congratulations!" as I said "Thank you!" and of course he shot back with "You look as though you're going to pop!" I gave a polite "ha ha, have a nice day.".....It was finally said out loud to me. Sad.

Cruelty To Animals

This is so sad! I am such an animal lover and to watch this made tears come to my eyes! Even those commercials on pet adoption make me sad to see the dogs in the kennels being walked past... But seriously, think about all the animal cruelty that goes on in the world. I remember when my sister's dog came wandering around their yard 13 years ago and wouldn't leave, he had no tags so, they decided to keep him. He was so afraid of men, especially bearded men... They figured he had been abused by his previous owners. He got over it eventually and was very loving!

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