#2611 the sick day

Today was a sick day from work. I’m not sick - I feel fine! - but I had two doctor’s appointments that would have kept me from doing good work because of the time commitments. It was kind of strange that  both appointments were on the same day, really.

My first appointment was with my GP. It was follow up to talk about some medication he recently prescribed. I almost met with him via Zoom, but I’m glad I went in person because some good things happened. First, I was able to talk with my doctor about the meds and the blood test results. I’m doing okay! Second, I got a flu shot. Third, while I was getting the flu shot and chatting with the doc’s assistant, I mentioned I was going on vacation next week and she asked if I needed to have a COVID test, then she offered to set it all up for me, which was really cool. On Tuesday, I’ll go in, spit in a test tube, and the results will be sent to me in 24 to 48 hours. Perfect! I had kind of a plan for getting the test, but now I have a solid plan. Excellent!

My second appointment was to get an MRI on my left shoulder. Back in February, I was taking the doggos for a walk. I saw a woman with a dog coming toward us, so I took my dogs off the trail, crouched down (sort of) and held the puppers on a short leash. When the lady with the dog came by, my creatures lunged, pulling me to the ground and yanking my left shoulder in the most unpleasant way. It was stupid of me to crouch because it lowered my center of gravity and since I’m a bit top-heavy, it was easy for me to go down. 

At first, I thought the shoulder would heal and get better on it’s own. It is weak and can be painful if I raise it or twist it certain ways. I try to be mindful of how I move it, but I still forget sometimes. Who wants to baby a body part forever, anyway? When I met with my GP a few weeks ago, I told him about the shoulder pain. He ordered an x-ray, which showed there was arthritis in the joint (of course), then he ordered the MRI to check the tendons, muscles, and connective tissues. 

I was pretty nervous about the MRI. The procedure itself isn’t painful, of course. It’s a mental thing:  the claustrophobia of being in that small space, the noise, and the being really still part. I told myself that it would be okay and I practiced deep, meditative breathing and visualizations that I could use while I was being scanned. Still, I was nervous enough that I forgot to put gas in the car and was driving around with the gas light on, indicating that I had under 70 miles left of fuel. The hospital wasn’t 70 miles away, but I HATE having only one bar on my fuel gauge. I also forgot my insurance card. How nervous do you have to be to forget your insurance card when you are going to the hospital? Fortunately, the woman who did my registration was very kind and looked up my insurance and everything was fine. I was just rattled.

The tech who did the scan was very nice, also. I didn’t have to get undressed, or even take off my sweatshirt. He gave me noise cancelling headphones playing “spa music” which dulled the cacophonous noise of the MRI. He also put a cloth over my eyes to help keep them closed. I did my yoga breathing. I pictured various places I have been in my mind: Angkor Wat, Barcelona, various Caribbean beaches, and pretty much any beach I’ve ever been too, really. Whenever I felt my breathing become shallow, I called myself back to the breath, paying attention to the cool breath going in to my nose on the inhale and the warm breath on the exhale. Same thing when I felt a little tickle on the side of my face or that I wanted to move. I just breathed through it. It really helped. Thank goodness for all that meditating I’ve been doing!

17 and a half minutes later, that felt like about 100 minutes, the scan was over, and Matt the tech was helping me up off the bed thingy. I should have the results tomorrow, I hope. My best case scenario is that the should will be fine with some physical therapy and maybe some immobilization.  I’ll let you know!