Honestly, I was hoping he would just move on and forget about me. I felt like I was more trouble than I was worth and he needed to find someone else that wasn’t sick. I should have known better. As soon as he could, Jesus was at my parent’s house, visiting me and spending time with me. He even quit working with his father and started working at an oil changing shop. He tried his best to save money and his friend let him work part time at their computer shop. Even with all that, I was slipping deeper into depression the more my sickness took over. I couldn’t eat anymore and if I did it wouldn’t stay down. I had my mom cut off all my hair because I could feel knots all over my head. They felt like spikes poking through my scalp. Finally I couldn’t take the pain anymore and my mom took me to the hospital. We waited there for hours and hours. I was starting to dry heave because I had nothing in my stomach. Jesus came to the emergency room and we decided to try the Express Med but they didn’t have the proper equipment to help me but the doctor there mentioned something I may have and sent requests for me to see the Rheumatology department at the University Hospital. Eventually I was admitted and they put me on fluids and checked me for all sorts of things but still they didn’t know what was wrong.
I was sent home feeling just a little better than I did before but I was still in pain. Trying to sleep at night was the worse because I was alone with my thoughts. I would try to find things to do to keep my mind off these aches in every joint of my body they wouldn’t go away. I remembered riding with our friends in their cars and they would always have the radio on KLOVE and I started listening every night. That really helped and gave me a lot of comfort. I even tried to read passages from the bible that my friends suggested. I didn’t have much of myself to pull through but these little bits of hope and knowledge made the way for God to pull me the rest of the way.
Finally I got an appointment to see the doctor in the Rheumatology Department downtown. As soon as she saw me, she knew what was going on with my body. She said it was Scleroderma, a word I had never heard before. I was immediately put through all sorts of tests and scans, I could sympathize with a lab rat! Jesus was there for me the whole way through. When he could he was taking me to all my appointments and trying his best to save money for us to move on our own. Learning what this disease was put a scare in all of us, especially Jesus and my mother. I even had the dumb idea to Google it and I saw what could happen to me. Basically it means “hardening of the skin” and my hands turning blue is called Reynaud’s, knowing this much was like a double-edged sword. At least I finally knew what was going on but reading about what this disease was capable of was really scary. Aside from the chronic joint pains and ulcers in my fingers, my doctors said the main concern was my lungs. Since it is a Mixed Connective Tissue Disease, Scleroderma can also affect my organs as well. So any soft tissue in my body could harden like my lungs, heart, etc. Fortunately, I have a strong heart but my lungs were starting to show signs of being affected by this disease.
I was put in the hospital again but this time I was admitted and I didn’t have to wait in the emergency. I had to have a colonoscopy and endoscopy in one day. I had to spend the night to prepare for all that and Jesus came to the hospital to be with me for a little while. By this time he managed to save up enough money to move us into an apartment with the help of his good friend Marlon. Everything checked out fine and my anemia wasn’t due to internal bleeding. I was put on monthly injections of Celcept and over a year I was making a lot of progress. In the beginning Jesus would take me to the hospital before work and push me in a wheelchair to get my injections. He even had to push me around the grocery store but he didn’t mind. I had to be on oxygen and sleep with it on at night. He had to pack my portable tank in my Jeep and set it up for me. Jesus was able to pick up more hours at the computer shop and the apartment he got us was right down the street from the shop and the hospital. Every day he would come home for lunch and made sure I ate. He was still able to take me to all my appointments and I even got to hang out at the shop so I didn’t have to stay home alone too much. We were so happy to finally have our own place together and that my health was starting to get a lot better.
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