Part 2. Details.

Part 2.  The beginning.  (according to my memory).

I wake up.  I look around and have no idea where I am.  No idea.  My throat hurts.  Dang I'm thirsty.  Where am I?  Everything looks fuzzy.  I can't see, am I blind??  I see my mom.  "Mom, I can't see!!!  Where are my contacts?  Why did you take my contacts out?  Where am I?  What are you doing to me??"  I'm yelling but nothing will come out.  My voice is mangled and tiny from a 4 week stint on the ventilator.  Mom rushes over and grabs my hand.  "Amy, you're in the hospital, honey.  You're okay, you're okay." 

 I don't know what is going on, but I'm thirsty.  And I can't see.  "We had to take your contacts out, honey," Mom says.  "Dad is getting your glasses.  You're okay."  "Mom!!" I yell/whisper.  "I stink!  Where is my stuff?  Where is my bag?!  What did you do with my bag??"  I'm frantic at this point.  

"Mom!  Get me some deodorant STAT!"  My mom stifles a laugh.  "Okay, honey.. what else can I bring you?"  "Deodorant, body spray, tic-tacs..orange.. and a diet coke!"  No smile on my end.  I'm serious.  

_    __   _   ___  __  ___ 

According to my parents, this is the conversation that occurred when I woke up from the induced coma.   It is also one of the first things I remember from my BIG.  Little did I know at the time, the BIG had started about 4 weeks earlier.  I don't remember being admitted to the ER on that fateful night in November.  I don't remember going through 5 surgeries in 2 different hospitals.  I don't even remember most of the week before I was hospitalized.  I was so incredibly sick that my brain and memory were affected.  So I have to tell you.... most of what I'm going to tell you next is what I've been told from my parents, fiancé, family, co-workers, and physicians.  I've pieced it together in my mind as best I can and that's how I'll tell it to you.   

It began 5 weeks earlier.  I woke up one morning and felt like I'd pulled a muscle in my quad.  I was running crazy distances at the time and working to bring down my minute-per-mile speed from 7 minutes to 6 minutes for distances of 8+ miles, so I attributed the pain in my leg to a sore muscle or maybe a muscle strain.  It hurt, but wasn't unbearable.  The next night at work, I noticed that the quad was beginning to swell and redden.  I also didn't feel that great that night.  I was shivering cold, then hot.  I took my temp at work and it was normal, so I kept working.  The leg swole more and more that night and I started to feel sicker and sicker.  By around 5:30 in the morning (I work night shift), I could barely get up.  I was drastically limping by then and felt like I had the flu.  I vomited several times in the bathroom and rechecked my temp-- 101 now.  My charge nurse Laura saw how sick I was becoming and insisted that I go home.  Day shift was starting to come on, so she grabbed the first nurse she saw and had her take my patient so I could get out of there.  I crawled home.  Once home, I took some tylenol and then rechecked my temp-- 103.  I went to bed and slept for about 18 hours on/off.  I don't remember the next few days, but J (my fiancé) tells me I didn't do much except go from the bathtub, to the couch, to the bed, to the bathtub.  He tried to get me to go to the doctor, but without health insurance (due to a new job and miscommunication about what open enrollment means) I didn't want to pay out of pocket for a doctor's visit.  My sister told me later that when she went to my apartment to check on the dog (a week later, when I was in the hospital), the apartment was littered with heating pads, tubes of Icy Hot, tylenol, advil, and ice packs.  J finally convinced me to  go to the doctor on Wednesday, as I could barely walk by then.  I remember trying to walk through the parking lot into the office and crying in pain.  The physician's assistant thought it was cellulitis maybe from an ingrown hair or bug bite....nothing resembling a point of entry was really visible on the leg, so she wasn't sure.  She prescribed me some painkillers and antibiotics and sent me home.  I don't remember anything after that. For the next four days, according to J, I continued my rotation....bathtub, couch, bed, bathtub, couch bed.  I was sick, and I knew it.... but I had no idea that my kidneys were starting to shut down... the infection was spreading...I was septic...and I was dying.  On Saturday, apparently J begged me to take me to the ER.  I refused, telling him I'd promise I'd go on Sunday when my parents drove in from Virginia.  Saturday night was the first miracle God performed on me.  

I had called in sick to work on both Friday and Saturday nights.  (again, I don't remember doing this).  On Saturday night, my close friend from work Vanessa started to really worry about me and decided to call and see how I was doing.  Something told her that she needed to call.  That something turned out to be a whisper from God.  Because we soon found out that if Vanessa hadn't made that call, forcing me to finally cave and let J take me to the hospital, I would've died that night.  The physician told me later that I was severely septic and in multi-system organ failure by that point....and I wouldn't have lived had I waited any longer.  Vanessa told me that when I answered the phone, something didn't sound right.  She told me my voice sounded weak, almost a whisper.  I stubbornly told her I wasn't going in to the ER that night and God bless her, she didn't listen to me and called J on his phone.  "Take her in NOW," she told him.  That was somehow enough for me, so I let J carry me to the car and take me to the hospital.  

The girls from my unit met me in the ER when I arrived.  Vanessa tells me it was horrifying.  I was gray.  I could barely muster a sentence.  My leg was triple the normal size.  I was dying.  Vanessa told me later with tears in her eyes, "Amy... you looked dead." 

 I was quickly admitted and put on a strong cocktail of antibiotics and pain meds.  Again, let me stress, I remember none of this.  Because when you're septic, and your kidneys are failing, your brain is affected.  After labs were drawn, the doctors were even more terrified.  My platelet count was 24. 20 freaking 4.  Liver enzymes were insanely high.  Kidney function was disgusting.  Temp was around 104.  My poor fiancé was there by himself...in a little room holding the hand of his dying wife-to-be when the doctors came in and told him that my life was in danger.  They feared I wouldn't make it through the night.  And if I did survive....I'd be surviving without a leg.  Amputation would be necessary to cut the infection out of my system.  How my fiancé lived through those moments and didn't absolutely lose his mind is beyond me.  He called my parents and told them the news.  "It's not good.  There's three things it could be and none of them are good.  She's going into surgery now.  They're planning on making a 14 inch incision in her quad to figure out whether it's cellulitis, muscle compartmentalization, or the worst... necrotizing fasciitis.  Absolutely freaked and terrified, my parents jumped in the car and raced towards Illinois.  I asked my mom what they were doing and talking about during that car ride.  First, they called my brother and sisters, grandma and grandpa, aunts and uncles and started a prayer chain.  A chain that would eventually include hundreds of thousands of people praying for me.  The rest of the car ride, they prayed.  Over and over again they cried out to their Father and begged for his help.  I am so insanely blessed to have parents like mine.  Their faith in God is FIRST in their lives.  He is FIRST.  And so, when they pray, He is faithful.  He listens.  And He did.  A few short minutes into their drive, God performed his next miracle.  Apparently there was an accident on one of the main highways and the back-up was hours and hours upon hours.  God put a police officer there for my parents.  My dad explained the situation and that police officer was able to give them a backwoods way to get around the traffic.  It was basically a turn onto the dirt road- past- the- third- barn- on- the- left type of situation.  They were able to get around the traffic.  And miracle #3....God was able to get my parents to me in 8-9 hours---a drive that normally takes at least 12.  

In the meantime, J was wheeling me off to surgery.  I was crying and told him "I'm scared."  He said leaving me at that OR was the worst moment of his life.  He went back down the hall and sat alone for hours, not knowing whether he'd ever see me alive again.  

Shortly after, my brother, sisters, and sister's boyfriend Mike arrived.  J pieced the story together for them, and immediately, he had an ally.  My brother is brave.  He's strong.  And his faith is HUGE.  The two of them together met with doctors and nurses and anesthesiologists.  While my sisters and Mike made phone calls and prayed, my fiancé and my brother asked questions, signed documents, and kept my parents informed.  I can't tell you how many prayers were said that night. 

I came out of my first surgery okay.  My leg had been cut open and muscles dissected, and necrotized tissue removed.  The surgeon was in over her head.  She was a ortho and had never dealt with necrotizing fasciitis before.  She kept telling my family, I don't know if we can save her.  I'm not sure what we're dealing with.  I think we need to amputate.  Matt and J became more and more concerned that she didn't know what she was doing.  What was terrifying was just become even scarier.  

Shortly after the first surgery, a doctor palpated my abdomen and noted that I was feeling pain there too.  Fearing that the infection was spreading to the abdomen, they took me back into surgery.  Sure enough, the infection was now in my abdomen and pelvis.  More muscle and fascia and tissue was removed.  When I came out of that surgery, my body was in trouble.  The trauma of it all and the pain and my weakening systems caused me to breathe rapidly....for HOURS.  For 8 hours, I panted...respirations in the 60s.  My heartbeat was around 160 and J said he could see my jugular vein palpating disgustingly fast.  It was as if I was running a marathon in a dead sprint...a marathon that went on for hours upon hours.  At one point, J yelled to the nurse, "Why aren't you doing anything?!!  She should be vented!  She can't breathe like this, she's going to die!! DO something!"  The doctors were worried that I was too weak to handle the sedation, so I continued my marathon to stay alive.  

The next morning, I was taken in for my third surgery.  This time, the anesthesiologist told my family... "She's going in with the vent and when she comes out, the vent stays in."  I remember the minutes before this surgery...one of the only things I remember at all for the first four weeks.  I remember being SO THIRSTY.  I begged for something to drink, or just ONE FREAKING ICE CHIP.  I was sobbing and begging everyone there.  I remember the nurse crying...it physically pained her that she couldn't help me.  My mom lost it then.  Seeing me that way, so scared, in so much pain and begging for mercy...she walked away sobbing.  My family held each other and sobbed during that surgery.  

God kept me alive, and what do you know, I came out of that surgery.  The physician who wanted to amputate and somehow decided that she was in over her head and didn't want to cut anymore.  She was ready to send me off to someone who knew what to do.  And that night, God performed another miracle.  To be continued...

something BIG. Part One.

A few days ago, I vented in my blog about my something BIG.  I called it "little blog post" because to me, it was just a few scattered thoughts complaining about a physician who had crushed my spirit about my BIG.  She told me that I'd never run a marathon again, and I should give up on that dream.  When she told me that, I felt my heart physically ache.  I felt like I had gotten punched in the stomach.  And then I wanted to punch her in the stomach.  I left her office in tears, and jotted down my thoughts later that day.  Turns out my little blog post about my BIG wasn't so small....in fact, it became quite BIG.  4,142 readers BIG within the first few days.  Then God spoke to me....Amy, look at who you can reach.  You write your words and I'll make them BIG, He said.  It was like the story of the bread and fish.... God took such a small meal of loaves and fish and stretched it to feed the thousands.  All of a sudden it became clear to me that what I tell you about my BIG can really be made BIG once God gets ahold of it.  In fact, God took ahold of my BIG long before it was BIG.  He was there from the beginning, and to this very minute, He is taking care of me and allowing me to be a part of His miracle.  And I'm pretty damn lucky for that.  How can something so horrible and tragic be a miracle?  I know, I know.  Trust me, most days the last thing I'd call my BIG is a miracle.  Then again, I don't see things  as BIG as God does.  I'm going to tell you this story, my story, my BIG... and you decide.

Part 1.

Heaven wasn't what I thought it would look like.  I pictured a bright, bright white palace.  A palace made of gold and diamonds and precious stones more beautiful than we ever could imagine in our little people minds.  I imagined a HUGE GOD sitting on a throne....and I imagined tiny ol' me sitting in His hand.  That's my favorite image of God.  And when the pain in my legs is crushing and tears form in my eyes and my teeth clench, that's the image of God I picture.  You are holding me God, I tell him.  Take this pain away.  Please Lord, take this pain away.

What Heaven was...what I remember, or dream, is brilliant, bright, amazing colors.  What I remember, or dream, is walking towards those colors knowing Jesus is behind them.  What I remember, or dream, is being gently pushed away.  What I remember, or dream is a whisper....go back. It's not time yet. Open your eyes.  Open your eyes.  And I try to open my eyes, but I can't.  I try harder to open my eyes, and I think they're open and I'm awake, but then I realize that they aren't.  It's a battle....me trying to open my eyes, thinking they're open, then realizing they're not.  Getting closer to death and trying to open my eyes, trying SO hard to open my eyes.  I open my eyes.  It was just a dream.  Or was it?   Dr. M. asks about my dreams.  I tell him this dream that I have over and over.  He looks at me and tells me, Amy, those are flashbacks.  That was really happening to you.  You were dying.  You were dying for weeks.... you were fighting the strongest battle you've ever fought to stay alive.  So Amy, those dreams.... those are real.

I'm getting ahead of myself.  That was the most intense part of my BIG, but there's much more to the story.  If I'm going by memory, however, this part is first.  When I try to remember everything about my  BIG, the first thing I can remember looking back is this glimpse of Heaven.  In the general timeline of the BIG, I can't tell you when exactly it took place, but to me, it was the most important part....right?  The life or death part.

There's a lot that happened before that.  And a lot that happened after that.  But before I tell you those things, I thought I should tell you what I consider to be the BIGGEST part. What will come next is the BEFORE part of the BIG.  It's interesting and terrifying and sad and happy.  I'm going to take you on this journey because I want you to see how God carried me through this BIG....and He was there for the before part.  Are you ready?

Something BIG.

I have to tell you what happened today.  What hurt today.  I haven't written since November, and when I looked back at my last post, it was haunting.  My last post asked for prayers for a "health scare."  Little did I know, I would need all the prayers I could get over the next four months.  Because that last post was written right before something BIG happened.  Before that post, I wasn't a person that had ever experienced something BIG.  Now I'm a person with a BIG.  I could go on American Idol and have a sob story and describe how I got through it and how it changed me.  Before that, I could never have been on American Idol.  Now I can... So, there's that.

But I digress.  I'm not writing today to tell you about my something BIG.  I promise you, it will come.  I'm not sure yet how to write about my something BIG, because it deserves such BIG words and I can't find them yet.  I've been asking God how I should go about telling you about my BIG, but He hasn't told me yet.  I know that He chose me to go through this for a reason.  And it's not so I can go on American Idol (honestly I can't sing, so it wouldn't work anyways).  There's a purpose and I'm looking for it.  When God gives me the words and the strength to write the words as BIG as they should be, I promise you I'll tell you about my BIG.  Today I'm writing to tell you about something else.

My BIG hurt me in many ways.  I'm forever changed because of my BIG.  But one thing that my BIG can't change is my heart, and what is in my heart is my running.  I'm a runner, a marathoner.  It's who I am.  It's part of me.  It's part of me that I wouldn't recognize myself without.  When I first got sick, my fiancé and my parents were told that I wasn't going to live.  They were also told if I did live, I would definitely lose my leg.
                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                 
My fiancé went through 48 hours realizing that if he was lucky enough to keep me at all, he was going to forever have a wife with one leg.  I have a special hubs-to-be.....because my love wasn't worried about having a wife with one leg and how it would affect him....He doesn't think that way.  My love is selfless.  He'd love his wheelchair wife just the same.  He was worried that if he was lucky enough to keep his wife alive, he would have a wife with one leg that also didn't have a heart anymore....because running is her heart and without a leg, she couldn't run, and therefore, she'd lose her heart.

You know what?  God kept me alive.  I could see him, you guys, I could.  He turned my little butt right back around and put me back on earth.  And guess what else?  A million people prayed.  And all of their friends prayed.  And He listened.  And He let me keep my leg.  It's a different leg now.  It's scars will forever remind me that I was insanely close to Jesus but He gave me more time.  And I got to keep my heart too.  My doctors at Loyola told my fiancé, family, and myself that if I work hard, I'll make a full recovery.  I'll run.  Dr. G told me he's coming to my next marathon.  I told him it might be in Hawaii, because my leg deserves to run a marathon in a pretty place.  That marathon will be hard on my scarred leg.  Those 26.2 miles will hurt her, and she'll deserve something pretty to run on, like white sand.  Dr. G said, that's ok.  I'll come to Hawaii.  Dr. G is pretty damn fabulous.

Today I saw a different doctor.  One of the first surgeons that took care of my BIG.  She tried to tell me that I need to dream smaller.  She told me my leg won't be able to run a marathon.  It hurt, you guys.  My leg was pretty upset too.  She knows deep inside, she's the same leg, she's just a little different now.  She just looks a little different, and she's not quite so strong, but she's working so hard to get there.  She knows, and I know, I'll run a marathon again.  I'm the hardest worker there ever was.  God kept me here, and He knows what's in my heart.  He would never take that away from me.  My other doctors and physical therapists tell me of course I'll run, and heck yeah I'll run a marathon.  This doctor told me I shouldn't have such big goals.  I left the office in tears.

I just wanted to write this down, because someday I'll be running a marathon on that leg that that doctor cut into and didn't believe in, and I want to print out this story and show it to that doctor.  And tell her that she should never tell a girl with so much heart to dream smaller.  I'll run that marathon....and I'll send her my race bib number in the mail to hang in her office.  That way, she'll learn.

health scare.

I'm going through somewhat of a health crisis right now. and I really could use some prayers.

it started on Saturday.  My right quad was a little sore, but I attributed it to running and tried to stop thing about it.  I was still able to walk on it at that point.  I did notice a little zit looking spot on my thigh, and I kinda picked at it to see if it was an ingrown hair, and it looked liked it was.  Nothing to worrisome.  Sunday morning i woke up and couldn't get out of bed.  My leg hurt so bad i couldn't bend it, bare weigh on it, straighten it.  I noticed it was starting to swell too.  felt kinda hard underneath the skin too.  I went along my day, but was starting to feel pretty crappy.  By the time i went to work Sun night, I was shivering cold, and could not get warm.  I was covered in blankets camped out at the nurses station only to get up to go into my patient's rooms when they needed something, and that was a struggle.  I was fatigued, nauseous and had a headache.  I forced myself to finish out the shift, but by 5:30 am, I was puking in the bathroom, had a 101 fever and the swelling was double the size.  Luckily, my lovely charge nurse Laura grabbed the first nurse who walked through to door on day shift and forced her to take my patient quickly so I could get out of there.  I crawled home, shivering and wanting to die.  I rechecked my temp at home and it was now 103.  I started taking ibuprofen and aleve every few hours, pushed fluids, tried to sleep.  I did sleep on/off for about 18 hours.

Since Monday, I"m still bedridden.  Takes everything in me to stand up so that mady can go out.  I've been in and out of the bathtub about a million times.  I've ice'd it, heated it, killed my poor stomach with ibuprofen and aleve.

I finally called my doctor this morning and said that I needed to be seen right now, so they were able to fit me in at 6 tonight.  I'm praying that they'll give me a bag of antibiotics and let me go ,because I cannot afford a self-pay hospital visit.  I am uninsured right now by accident.  Last year I started a new job, and I signed up for insurance.  2 months after  I started, open enrollment started, which I thought meant making changes to insurance, not re-signing up for insurance.  (that's how it was at my other job and this was not explained to me in orientation).  So I didn't re-sign up for insurance and lost my benefits.  Although I wrote letters to HR and the insurance company explaining the misunderstanding and the fact that I cannot afford insurance on my own and would therefore be uninsured, they refused to allow me to sign up for benefits.  So basically I'm uninsured until January 1st.  Please pray for healing and quick recovery, relief from the pain and swelling.  i'll keep you updated.

updates.

I really need to get better about posting.  I started this blog as a kind of online diary, where I could look back for years and read exactly what I was feeling at each of those moments.

Lately, life seems to be consumed by wedding.  Dresses, flowers, music, church, candles, mason jars (so many FREAKING mason Jars).  Engagement pics are this weekend.  Getting closer to deciding what we're going to wear, but still trying to nail all of that down.  I looked at the forecast and I was not particularly pleased....it says it will rain in the a.m. but then hopefully clear up by the afternoon.   Which will leave for a big muddy mess for Jon and I to play in and try to look cute doing.  eeeeek.  i'll just keep praying on that one.

Our marriage classes finish up this week-- cannot believe it's already been 8 long grueling weeks of therapy.  We really have learned a lot.  We learned that we have different love languages, and completely different personalities, but we also learned the tools to make it work.  We really, really love each other.  I never go a day without being told how much he loves me, how beautiful I am, and how he can't wait to marry me.  I mean what more can you ask for??

Now, onto the fitness portion of the update.

I've been doing myfitnesspal for 34 days now and I'm finally seeing big results.  i still refuse to weigh myself-- but all of my clothes are loose and my SKINNY skinny jeans are too big.  My scrub pants are falling off at work.  I feel great--- it's been a lot of hard work, a lot of crazy running and learning how to eat just enough, but it's working.  I want to look beautiful for my husband on our wedding day.  Coincidentally, Jon loves me the way I am and tells me everyday to not lose another pound, i'm too skinny already, but really, I want to feel good for ME.  When a woman FEELS good, she looks that much better to her man.  I'm getting there.  I have a dress appointment next week, which I'm actually going to KEEP this time.  I'm fierce and ready to get at it.  Bring them on!

Brutiful.

I have to share something with you.  Lately, I have found a new blog.  It's called Momastery.  People, I'm obsessed with this blog.  This women, Glennon, is the most beautiful writer I've ever read.  Her heart is bigger than anyone I know.  She FEELS things.  She FEELS things like me.  I've never related to someone so much in my life, and I don't even know this woman.

Anyways, lately I've been saying that I feel like things are harder for me than for other people.  I was born a little broken, maybe.  So I was reading her post from today and it hit me, and it all made sense.  here is a modified exerpt...

Some of us are born with an otherness that we feel right away . . . awareness of our otherness is often our first memory. We have this feeling that maybe we were dropped off in the wrong place, because nothing seems familiar. The people in this strange and harsh and  require us to play role after exhausting role. We are afraid of things that don’t seem to scare other people. Friendship, love, commitment . . . these things seem so big, so important, so murky and confusing and dangerous…how could we dare enter into them? We decide it would safer not to. We see that other people seem comfortable taking these risks, but we feel different. We feel more aware, and less capable. We rationalize that maybe others take all of these risks because they don’t foresee the pitfalls that we see. We decide, subconsciously or not, that we are different. And we are so full of this knowledge of our difference that we must find a way to relieve our fullness. We are like volcanoes with no exit for our hot lava.

OMG.  That is brilliant.   I remember as a little girl, thinking I was different.  I felt a certain awareness, even as a tiny blonde perfectionist.  I felt like I knew things about the world, about people, about myself....and I wondered- do other people feel this same awareness?  As I've gotten older, a little anxiety has crept in and there is a fear that comes with this awareness.  I now WORRY.  I worry about  others....loved ones and ones I don't know.  I worry about myself.  

I'm working on it.  J is so bothered by it that I have to work on it.  He hates to see me worry.  He hates to see me look at the world in all of its brokenness and only see dark, forgetting the light.  He accepts me for who I am, but I know it bothers him to see me worry so much.  And God doesn't want me to worry so much.  Sometimes I think I take the verse "break my heart for what breaks yours" too literally.  After all, He also told us, "Be anxious about nothing..." 

Just had to share that today.

29.

I turned 29 yesterday.

Next year, I'll be 30.  That's insane.  Ew.

Needless to say, it wasn't THAT happy of a birthday.  I finally understand what people meant when they said birthdays aren't fun anymore when you're old.  I'm old.  I may or may not have scanned my entire head for gray hairs yesterday.  (Thank you, Jesus, I did not find any).  I would've totally lost it if I had.

I don't like getting old... and honestly, it's not really the vanity.  I feel my body getting older.  When I do a double digit run, I feel more sore the next day than I used to.  My back bothers me most days.  It's harder to get my body out of bed in the morning.  Granted, I should be happy I can still do double digit runs.  My back pain has never bothered me enough to have to take meds....and I HAVE a bed.  I'm pretty damn lucky.  But still...

I feel like I'm a little behind the 8-ball.  I'm 29 and not married yet (...8 more months!)  I'm not preggo.  I don't have little ones running around.  I don't yet own a house.

Lucky for me, my fiancé is amazing.  He puts everything into perspective.  Who cares that we aren't the youngest out of our friends to get married, he says... we'll have a better marriage (not better than them, just better for us) because we waited until it was right for US.  We got to enjoy our twenties without much responsibility.  We're happy.... Amy, you're more beautiful now than you were 5 years ago.  We can still have a bunch of little ones....heck, we'll start on our honeymoon if you want.

 He really is wonderful.

So, I'll stop my whining and embrace my 29th year.  It's likely going to be the biggest year of my life, so I'm going to try to enjoy every minute of it.  I'm going to have a beautiful wedding to the love of my life.  I'm going to get to see my little adopted girl Dashi grow a year older, start preschool, and drink clean water.  I'm going to travel to Hawaii, Virginia, Houston, and California.  I'm going to run more miles this year than I ever have before.  And next year, when I'm celebrating #30, I might be celebrating with a third little Nilles in tow.  (you never know :) )

Happy 29th to me.  It's going to be a brutiful year.