Aug 2013 – June 2014 was the hardest time of my life. It was a difficult year in regards to my
health and our finances. Plus it was just plain stressful for my family. God saw us through it all. Not only that, but he started working before we
knew what was coming.
My husband is a high school economics teacher and was a
football coach until July of 2013.
Before July we had never even discussed him quitting his coaching
position. After the first football
practice of that summer he came home with ice cream. He asked me to come eat it with him in the
kitchen and talk….I knew something was up!
He said “I know you’ve wanted to go to the beach. You have a couple of weeks to plan it.” By this point in the summer I knew it was too
late because of football obligations.
What about practice I asked. He
responded “I don’t have football next week, or the next, or the next….” I’m not sure how many “nexts” he went through
before I said “What?!?”
He said he had quit football. I have never been more shocked at anything in
my life. My ice cream melted as I sat
with my mouth hanging open. He said he
had felt for months that he needed to quit. He didn’t know why, but it was just
nagging at him. Why hadn’t I heard about
this? His response was again unexpected,
but was dead on. “If I had asked you if
I should quit, and you said yes You would feel responsible and guilty if I wasn’t
happy. I knew you wouldn’t have a
problem with me quitting and I didn’t want you to have that hanging over your
head.” He was right. I would have
worried that I talked him into something he didn’t want to do. I’m so grateful he listened to that nagging
because the coming year would be much more difficult if he had kept his very
busy football schedule.
A similar thing happened with my dad. He planned to retire in the summer of
2014. All of the sudden in the spring of
2013 he decided he would retire a year early.
This was essential as well, because he was able to help me recover for
many months. He took on a much more
difficult job because he spent many hours sitting with me in the hospital and
chasing my kids around the house.
In late spring of 2013 I had some very minor health
concerns. A few aches and pains as well as some swelling. Nothing major, but it gradually got worse and
worse. I went to the doctor in the
summer. She tested me for rheumatoid
arthritis and the test was inconclusive.
I went about life without worrying about it too much, but things
continued to escalate. I went to see a
rheumatologist. He diagnosed it as
rheumatoid arthritis even though his tests were negative as well. He started me on some medication. A week later things were even worse. I now had a horrible rash and was retaining
fluid throughout my feet and legs – 12lbs worth. I was taken off the medicine and given a pill
to get rid of the fluid. More problems
emerged. I developed what we thought was
a UTI and was given an antibiotic. This
lead to the first of many hospital visits.
I had a severe reaction to the antibiotic and spent a night in ICU due
to severe swelling in my throat.
This same kind of episode continued for the next 2.5 months. New diagnosis, new drug, new
problems…repeat! I was diagnosed with
more UTIs, strep throat, Lyme disease, among other things. I had more allergic reactions and hospital visits. I became the mystery case that no one could
solve. During this time I also ran a constant fever. It started very low, but gradually got
worse. By late Oct it was up to 102 –
103 every day. My daily tasks had become
too much for me and I struggled to get out of bed. I had
stumped all the doctors.
By Nov I developed a swollen lymph node in my neck. Now the doctors were worried about something
more serious. I heard a word I never wanted to hear in my life. Leukemia.
My grandmother had it so it ran in my family and I knew how terrible it
was. I had a biopsy and after a week of
waiting we finally got results. No
cancer! Everyone was so happy.
I was not overjoyed.
Leukemia was not something I wanted, but there was something terribly
wrong with me and we still had no clue what it was. The fevers continued and that week the nausea
hit as well. I could no longer hold down
any food.
By this point my Dad was coming every day to help with the
kids and to take care of me. At the
start of the second week of the vomiting he said “that’s it! We are going to a different hospital to find
out what is wrong.”
When we arrived at the ER I was dehydrated and malnourished
from the past couple of weeks. After the
doctor heard my story he said “The only thing I can do is give you fluids and
send you home.” Here we go again. After a little bit he came back and made a
statement I will never forget. He said
“I’m not going to send you home. I’m
going to admit you and run tests. I
think we owe it to you to find out what is going on.” God bless that doctor. I believe God had a hand in this, because
had I not been at that hospital the following days I’m not sure if I would
still be here.
When I was admitted they said I would be there a couple of
days, but we probably would not have any answers before I was sent home. Some of the test could take a while to get
results. They tested me for everything
under the sun and I saw about 5 different doctors. On the day I was supposed to
go home, a more serious problem occurred.
My kidneys began to fail. If I
had not been in that hospital we would not have known what was going on, and I’m
not sure I would have gotten the help I needed.
The 2 day hospital stay turned into a 17 day sentence! I had a kidney biopsy during this time. That is when we finally got the correct
diagnosis; Lupus Nephritis. This is an
autoimmune disease which means my body is attacking itself. In my case it was attacking my kidneys and
now they were shutting down. I went
through 6 dialysis treatments – the first one on Thanksgiving Day. It was a little difficult to be thankful that
day, but looking back I’m very thankful for where I was.
When I finished my six treatments my new kidney specialist
walked me through a treatment plan. It
sounded horrible! Her exact words were
“this next year is going to suck.” She
was right. I had to do 3 months of chemo
treatments. Chemo?? Yes, a lower dose than cancer patients
receive, but it was hoped to put the lupus into remission. She said I wouldn’t lose all my hair, but it
would thin a lot. She mentioned lots of
other medicines and side effects as well; including high doses of prednisone
which would make my face and stomach swell.
So I was going to be fat and bald.
Oh joy! I also would have no
immune system to fight off an illness. I
had to be very careful about where I
went and what I did.
I was discharged in early Dec and went back every 2 weeks
for the chemo treatment. It took a long
time regain strength and even do daily tasks after that long in the hospital,
but gradually I started to get back to normal.
Unfortunately the chemo did not work as they hoped. I was not seeing the needed results. They were right about one part. I did lose a lot of my hair. That’s about the only thing it did!
I was switched to an oral medication in Feb, and we slowly
started to see some results. I was
feeling better and thought things were improving. On March 1st we were knocked back
a few steps. My kids got a stomach
bug. Since I had no immune system from
the medications I of course caught it too.
The illness made me unable to hold down any of my medications. This caused my blood pressure to go through
the roof. You see, the kidneys control
your blood pressure. I had no clue about
that before my illness. On Sun March 2nd
I had missed my meds for over 24hrs due to the stomach bug and I felt
horrible. I went back to our room to
rest, but I apparently never made it into the bed.
Around lunch time Will came back to check on me. He found me in the floor, unresponsive. He says he tried everything to get me to wake
up, but I wouldn’t budge. He realized he
had to call 911. When the ambulance arrived
even the paramedics seemed to be disturbed by my state. They said I had all the signs of someone who
had a massive stroke. When I was in the
ambulance they intubated me and reported
that my blood pressure was over 250! The
hospital decided my case was too severe to stay in Smyrna and I was sent to the
neurological ICU at Centennial.
Once there I had an MRI.
Will was told that I had lots of swelling in my brain due to the high
blood pressure. Unfortunately I would
have permanent damage. They kept me
sedated until late on Monday. When they
woke me up and removed the tube I was not myself. I had hallucinations, was very paranoid and I
didn’t even sound like myself. I stayed
that way for all of Tues. During this
time word spread about my condition.
A friend heard and started an online group to pray for me. Over a 100 people joined and began to
intercede on my behalf. I had never met
many of them, but my friend knew they were people who were prayer
warriors.
Their prayers worked!
When I went to sleep on Tues I was still not myself, but when I woke up
Wed everything seemed to be back to normal.
The doctors weren’t really sure what was going on so they did another
MRI. All swelling and damage was
gone! Praise God for his touch!!
I stayed in the hospital a little over a week and was sent
home. After this things really did begin
to improve. I had a couple more minor
infections and hospital stays but nothing major. I’m also still taking around 20 pills a day,
visiting doctors every couple of weeks and have a suppressed immune
system. However, since June I have seen
a huge improvement in the way I feel. I believe it will continue to get
better. The doctors say there is no cure
for the lupus and I will have to deal with it for the rest of my life. They also said I would be brain damaged…..I
know my God is bigger than lupus.
Someday I will update this testimony to say “The lupus is gone, my
kidneys are healed. To God be the
glory!
