Tuesday March 20, 2007

Tuesday March 20, 2007

It’s now 9:41 AM and I have recovered from the long day yesterday. Before going into yesterday morning and all, when we returned, I had some left over Chinese food and felt sooo tired afterwards that I went and got on the bed and stayed there from 3:00ish yesterday afternoon until this morning…pretty crazy tired apparently. I also slept on the way home from the Bay Area as well. It’s like when the body wants sleep, it simply takes it from you, end of story.

I have a few minutes before going to PT (Physical Therapy) at 10:30…

So yesterday we got up early, got the kids ready for school and split around 7:30 or thereabouts.
We made good time, of course simply due to the driving of my bride. She gets where she wants to go, usually in her timing as well.
My parents met us at the UCSF hospital and our appointment was across the street in their 8 story business/clinic building. The hospital itself was like 20 floors…HUGE.
We were there about 30 minutes early per their request and I had only gotten half way through the standard “who are you and what have you done to yourself” form, when Dr. Ralph came out personally and called my name and took us back to his exam room where the appointment was to take place. It is apparently their policy that the doctor comes out and retrieves the patient from the waiting room instead of the nurse. I was trippin’.
The appointment lasted about 90 minutes and he went through my family history (which is why my parents were there) and he put me through a very thorough series of nerve and muscle sensation tests, tests which I am familiar with from my surgeries back in the 90’s; same things.
End result is that he, also, does not know what I’m dealing with specifically but figures that I am dealing with a multiple diagnosis scenario. He has asked that I be available to return within he next two weeks for him to do some exhaustive muscle and nerve tests himself. He said that he would reduce the costs if it is going to simply be us paying for it, which we all know is likely to be the case because Kaiser wouldn’t pay for anything they don’t do themselves, regardless if it is in the patient’s best interest to not. Bitter? Me? Let’s move on, shall we?
So the plan is that we will be called by his staff and they will give us a return date and we will head back for those tests. I have atypical symptoms from HKPP, which we knew was the case, which includes my eyes closing and my inability to focus and see while during an attack and he feels also that the “numbness” is not par for the course but that folks who suffer HKPP still have feelings but cannot move as well as the vicious pain that follows the attacks. I need to check that out on the list to see what I learn. The spasms are also not par for everyone’s course, however, others do deal with it on-list. Time to conclude for now; it’s 10:10 AM and I need to be ready to leave in 5.

Peace- more later.