"Strange things are happening to me, ain't no doubt about it"--read at your discretion

Well, our wedding is coming up quick: just 5 more days! Then I'll be Carissa Barron! Mrs. Andrew Barron! : ) That makes me very excited!
With it being so close, we were trying to make sure I was all caught up with doctor's visits and such so that my parents could feel ok about pawning me off on someone while I was well. That didn't end up happening as easily as it sounded. . . .
I went in for a physical, among other things, and told my physician (Dr. Singh) about a vision issue I had been having- black clouded vision every time I changed positions (sitting to standing, etc.). She referred me to an opthamologist. About two weeks later, I went in to see this opthamologist, Dr. Safran. He dilated my eyes and took pictures of the back of my eyes. He showed us the results: extremely swollen optic nerves and hemorraging (sp?) vessels. YIKES! He also did some side sight tests on me. I'm losing my periferal vision from this already!
So Dr. Safran wanted this to be taken care of as soon as he could, so he called ahead to the ER, then sent us downtown. Boy, that was quite a day. That wonderful Tuesday (almost 2 weeks ago) when I thought I'd just have my eyes checked and then be able to work that afternoon at Blockbuster. NOPE.
So we get to the stinkin' ER and we go through the motions, check in, wait, wait some more... what if I were dying?! Finally we got in. A16 was waiting for me; it wasn't even a room... it was a "room" with curtains between us for privacy from the other "rooms". I guess that's an ER though. My first visit.
I'm sitting there freaking out because I can't move my neck (another symptom that crept up slowly) and my throat was hurting. The nurses go through their duties: taking vitals (my heart rate was way too high that whole day-more to come about that), checking if I had a stroke (totally didn't), and prepping for an IV. Yay, my first! I was... SO not enthused about it. Finally my Doctor comes in... a Resident (oh this was going to be good) and his Attending. He also checked to see if I had a stroke (annoying really... they did it 3 or 4 times in 20 minutes). No stroke. So here goes, he asks me my symptoms. Stiff neck, black clouds in my vision when I change positions and sometimes when I'm just staring at something. They didn't quite get the whole vision thing. I had to explain in detail. Annoying. I know it's so they can properly take care of me, but why can't they just stick to the one explanation. I must have repeated myself about 26 times in different wording. So they take a sonogram of my eyes, on top of my eyelids. It actually felt pretty cool. The resident had no idea what he was doing; I was his learning board. UGH. They showed me the pictures they took with the machine and my optic nerves were really bulging. Perfect...
So they gave me an IV and put in some morphine for the pain. That was amazing. I felt all goofy. Then I got a CT scan. They had decided that I have a condition called pseudotumor cerebri, or idiopathic intracranial hypertension. All of my symptoms had been caused by an intense pressure of the cerebro spinal fluid up around my brain, which I have an over-production of (hense the crazy high pressure). They decided to drain some of that fluid by doing a spinal tap; a lumbar puncture, but they needed to make sure they weren't messing with any tumors in the brain first, so they put me through the CT scan. It was cold in there, and very loud. It was over quickly though, so I didn't mind. Afterward, we waited around for awhile while they prepped for the lumbar puncture. In between each of these procedures we waited quite a long time. They're important people. So they gave me more morphine. They started in on the puncture. 3 needles. Two on either side of the spine to numb with novacaine and one BIGGY to stick into the spine to drain the fluid. It was weird, I felt the first two needles (which didn't turn out to be just 2 I think because the resident was doing it), but then I didn't feel the middle one until they knicked my spine. It felt like someone flicked it. Haha it was... odd. After about 3 pokes they got the spot they needed to get into. They drained lots of spinal fluid, and found that the spinal fluid pressure (which is normally supposed to be around 14) was 53; the highest any of them had heard of. Crazy!
After the lumbar puncture, we waited for a long while, about 4 hours, for an MRI. They needed to check to see that everything up top was ok. While waiting, my mom noticed how stinking high my heart rate was. It was in the 130-140s! She didn't want to wait around for a nurse to come in and check my temperature, so she did it herself, and I had a fever. Woohoo. Great. Amazingly perfect timing. Completely unrelated to ANY of the stuff that had been going on in the ER, I had a fever and a sore throat.
Eventually I got an MRI, which was, like the CT scan, cold and loud. It wasn't quick though, so I fell asleep. Then I was finally discharged. HOME! They prescribed me something that would drain the excess spinal fluid and regulate the production a little better, wrote me an "out of work" note for 3 days out, and sent me on my way. I was starving, so before I left, they gave me some orange juice and graham crackers. They tasted so good after not eating for 13 hours! Yes, all in all, we spent 11 hours in that ER. Ew.
I guess I was a bit nauseated, so when we got home, I ran inside and... yeah, I was sick. I went straight to bed after that.
Oh yeah, and they sent me to a neuro-opthamologist, Dr. Ko, the next day. That was fun.
You'd think that after all of that, I'd be on my way to getting... better. EH wrong!
I've been so frustrated with all of this. A week ago Sunday, I started to get an ear ache. I thought it was just going along with my sore throat and fever. Then my ear drum ruptured the morning Drew flew into Syracuse. I got a Dr.'s appointment and they prescribed me with a 5-day antibiotic. After 3 days on it, I started breaking out in hives on my chest and neck. A drug rash. AHHH!!
Apparently it never ends. Then about 5 days ago I had another follow-up with Dr. Ko, the neuro-opthamologist, then another follow-up the same day with Dr. Singh, my family doctor. Dr. Ko said that I have the most swollen optic nerves she has ever seen in a person my age, so she increased my dosage on my prescription. Dr. Singh is glad that the rupture in my ear has healed but is concerned because now it is infected. The bone right behind my ear has been so sore and tender. It shouldn't be. So she prescribed me with another antibiotic, one that won't make me break out in a rash, but one that is for 10 days and will interfere with my birth control. Dang it. So my last dose of that is ON our wedding day. We'll see how that goes.
So, we'll be back in Rexburg, Idaho, after the wedding but before the winter semester begins (on September 7th). We've got a few busy weeks coming up! It'll be good.
I'm excited to be marrying an amazing man. He loves me and is being very sensitive to these issues I'm having. I love him so much!
So, next time I write, I'll be a married woman, and it will be on a different blog: thebarronbanner.blogspot.com. Enjoy!

We have our first apartment!!

It's so wonderful, we finally have our own apartment! It's in a complex called Appletree Apartments and it is my dream place!
Here's a little more about it:
$550/month, we pay gas and electric
2 bedrooms
washer/dryer
brand new appliances
lots of kitchen cupboards
pantry
extra storage space right outside our front door
2nd floor
2 blocks from campus

It's a dream! We were looking at this complex in the first place, but realized that they didn't have any openings until April. We needed a place starting in January, so that was no good. We started looking elsewhere and were about to settle with something more expensive and farther from campus. I had been checking the school bulletin board to see if anyone needed their contract sold, and I stumbled across an add for a guy trying to sell his Appletree contract! I jumped on it! I emailed him straight away and he called me back in 2 minutes! We got it settled and then Drew went in the next day to sign the transfer agreement and get a new resident contract to fill out. So now the apartment is ours! I'm so excited! More details to come as well as pictures of our new place! Look for our new blog once we're married: thebarronbanner.blogspot.com!

Until another day NOT in Rexburg...