...be healed...

SERIOUSLY.

October 31st I woke up and my back hurt. November 1st I woke up and my back hurt a little worse. November 2nd, Macy turned 3 and I didn't have time to think about my back. November 3rd I woke up and my back hurt like a MOTHER. November 4th I was in the ER bawling hysterically asking the doctor to shoot me due to the excruciating non stop pain in my back pain that was radiating into the right side of my abdomen, kidney, stomach area. He gave me liquid bliss through my IV and in a matter of seconds I was stoned out of my mind, alternating between laughing hysterics and telling everyone from Rich, to the nurses, to the doctor to "shush" complete with hand gestures, and then I peed my pants because I was laughing so hard from realizing that I kept telling everyone to shush complete with hand gestures. Oh boy.

3 visits to the chiropractor, 4 days, 2 blood draws, 1 ultrasound, 4 xrays, and 2 MRI's later it was determined that I had a pretty bad thoracic herniated disc. 4% of herniated discs happen in the thoracic (middle) region of your back. 10% of that 3% happen in the T-10 which is the area of the back where mine was. Must have been my lucky day. P.S. I STILL don't know how it happened. Fabulous.

I was high on percocet and flat on my back, completely unable to do anything for myself from November 4th to November 11th. Walking hurt, sitting hurt even more, but laying flat on my back with ice was tolerable. From November 11th to the 15th I was able to do limited walking and sitting, but mostly laying, still high on percocet. On the 15th I had a X-ray guided spinal injection of steroids into my nerve to try and block the pain. I'm sure you can imagine how fun that was. Now it's the 17th and I'm 85 percent better. I can walk, run ( only in case of emergency such as being chased by a bear) and sit until my hearts content. I even got CPR certified last night! I made cookies! I can carry Luke! It's not a FIX it's numb and see if it gets better kind of thing. There are SEVERAL schools of thought on how to fix it. There's a chiropractic route and and and orthopedic route. There's big discussion at my house on how to go about it and I think there is going to be a combination of both in I get my way :) Rich is pretty medically inclined, I'm pretty chiropractically inclined... so we are reaching a compromise :) More on that in the upcoming months.

I seriously have a whole new appreciation for walking. About 100 million thing went through my head while on my back. I seriously have prayed 100 times this past two days thanking Heavenly Father that I have legs and a back that don't hurt, that I'm not in wheel chair, that I don't have to live with that kind of pain. The orthopedic doctor said there are several degrees of disc herniation and that mine was hitting a nerve that is connected to my stomach and right side of my abdomen. I still have a good amount of burning in those areas, that makes me a little uncomfortable and not that hungry, (hallelujah, maybe a blessing?!) but I will take it over that back pain any day. I was in more pain than I've ever been in my life! I would have five natural labors in a row over this. It was AWFUL. AWFUL. AWFUL. OK maybe 4 natural labors :)

I'm literally two weeks behind on EVERYTHING. I was totally out of commission and depended on everyone to do everything for me. People took SUCH GREAT care of me. It turns out Rich is a better mom than me :) He is SO much better at staying on top of the laundry, dishes, and cleaning. He ROCKS at getting the kids to bed and even has them in bed a whole hour earlier than I do!!! He cleaned, cooked, played with the kids, read them billions of books, took care of me emotionally, physically, spiritually and was seriously just AMAZING. Sometimes I cannot believe I was blessed with such a PHENOMENAL person to married to. My sister Kacie spent days over here, cooking amazing dinners, taking great care of the kids, playing with Macy, and waiting on me hand and foot! She was SUCH a great blessing and help to us. We had insanely generous, helpful, wonderful  friends and ward members calling constantly to check on us, bring us treats, offer meals, babysit our kids, and even just sit on the phone while I bawled hysterics them. :) 

My best friend ever,  Mrs Stephanie Henry Jones had been planning a trip here for about 2 months and it just happened to fall on this not so fabulous time in my life. I was COMPLETELY depressed that we couldn't run around and paint the town, but it turned about being SO fun to just sit around and laugh and talk all day and night, and she was also an AMAZING help to us by cooking/cleaning/driving/taking care of the kids. It was SO FUN to see her. I'll have to blog more about that later.

ANYWAYS. That's where I've been. If I haven't text you, emailed you, or called you back in the last 16 days, this is why. I WILL GET AROUND TO IT! We are leaving for Vegas for Thanksgiving on Friday night, SO I will be busy trying to ease back into things and take it slowly, but also get 5 million things done in two days :) Wish me Luck. 

THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU to everyone who helped me and my family through this tough time. I LOVE YOU ALL!!!!

P.S please remind me to blog about Macy's birthday and Steph's visit to Whitefish... Also here's a little picture one of my friends took of downtown Whitefish yesterday. I still can't believe I live in a place like this. SO CRAZY!