April Otwell
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The Long Haul...

12/19/2022

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Hey guys,
There hasn’t been a whole lot going on this week around my house. I’m just staying in bed as much as possible so that the sore can heal and not get any worse. I’m so ready for this thing to be healed already. I do have to say that I do not just hate the bed after this. I’ll most likely start sleeping in my bed again once I’m healed. I’ve been doing it in my chair for about ten years without having any problems.
Friday I went to wound care to get the results of my blood test and to check on the wound. The night before I ended up going to bed around four am and then had to get up at seven to leave the house on time. I was a little tired but I have had less sleep than that and been fine. I was fine in bed but once I got in the chair everything started adding up and I cried. I couldn’t get comfortable, my right hand was hurting extremely bad and to top it all off my whole ostomy had to be changed too while we were running late.
Once we finally got there, we had to wait for about forty-five minutes to an hour. Last week wasn’t nearly as busy and we got in the back extremely fast. While we were in the waiting room an older lady in a wheelchair would not get still. The waiting room is very small considering that most patients are in a wheelchair so there wasn’t a whole lot of room. She kept making me nervous because she wouldn’t stop moving in the room full of people.
My name is called finally and the nurse leads us to a room, immediately get started on getting the wound prepped for the doctor. I showed this wound care clinic that it’s much easier and faster to do everything from my chair. When the wound was measured it was 0.4 cm by 0.5 cm and had a depth of 7.9 cm. That’s about the same as it was last week so there wasn’t any change. The doctor took forever to come in the room once the prep was done. The room was freezing! The clinic is attached to the hospital's air conditioning so it stays extremely cold. He came in with some good news; my kidney function is good and there’s no infection in the wound. He was a little concerned about my white blood cell count being elevated but I explained that I usually keep a urinary tract infection because of the in and out catheters that I use. He seemed happy with that answer and waved off the elevated white blood cell count.
I had hoped that I would be able to rush the surgery date but the doctor had other plans. According to him, he still wants to wait anywhere from two to four weeks to give the new treatment time to work before we go to surgery. Apparently, a muscle flap is the last option for sores like mine. He’s still waiting on the images and test results from the Cabrini hospital where I was discharged to check out the CT scan for bone infection. Once he receives the results he can schedule his test to check for infection in the bone. I’m assuming that it’s after all of these steps we can go toward surgery. I honestly wanted to cry because I’ve been dealing with this wound for three months now and I’m tired of waiting. It’s been the same depth since just about the beginning so it’s obviously stalled. I tried to explain this to the doctor and he understood. He told me that the ultimate goal is surgery but he has certain steps to take to get there. He took the ultrasonic machine that uses only sound and saline to clean out the wound and promote healing to the inside of the wound. The sound was not as loud and harmful as the last time but it still does not feel too good. I noticed this time that the gauze that he was pulling out was red with blood. He kept telling me that the machine used no blades while he was working.
On the way out of the office, we scheduled the next appointment for Friday. By the time that we got out of there the small amount of sleep was starting to catch up with Mallory and me. We got our pharmacy order, and a bite to eat at Dairy Queen and stopped by a vape shop before heading home. We didn’t go right home but stopped by Jessica’s just to chill there and get out of the house. We stayed there for about three hours just laughing and enjoying ourselves before we came home and I got put back in bed.
Sunday I was invited to a small Christmas party with Lil Mike and some other family at his house. It was very nice to get out of the house. I ate so much food that my belly hurt so bad. There were ribs, seafood gumbo, green bean casserole, potato salad, and homemade cheesecake. Everything was so good. I can see why I dropped so much weight once Jessica stopped cooking for me. I miss how things used to be and I know that’s my fault. If I could go back to fix our relationship I would in a heartbeat. All I want is to go back but I can’t and I have to live with how things are now.
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    Paralyzed from the neck down after an ATV rollover at 14, April Otwell is beating the odds the doctors gave her. She's a blogger, fantasy writer, college student, sugar glider guardian and spinal cord injury survivor.  She's even writing her first fiction novel!

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