On Saturday, June 1, I was driving back home from the airport. Jessie was in the van, asleep as usual when we go to drop Jacob off for a visit with the grandparents. I had just turned onto the toll road to head back home, when in my left temple, I felt the sensation of liquid moving through a tube under my skin. I don’t know how to adequately explain it other than feeling like a long, skinny balloon was filled with slightly thick liquid, and it had moved from near my ear to the corner of my eye socket. After that, I got a sharp, stabbing localized headache.<\/p>\n
My doctor’s nurse, a beautiful, wonderful lady named Barbara, told me it was at that point I should have gone to the Emergency Room. And I probably should have, but I had Jessie in the car, and I had this reason, and I didn’t normally get headaches, and so I really didn’t think it was anything serious. My step-grandfather (grandma’s second husband), recently had a stroke, and while I knew that a headache wasn’t a stroke, I really didn’t know what was going on. I decided to sleep on it. The next day, it felt better, at least until I touched that part of my head. A pattern developed: touch it and it hurts. Occasionally to relieve the boredom of that, a random headache in that part of my head would start. Advil did nothing.<\/p>\n
Finally, yesterday I went to the doctor after a week of dealing with this. When Barbara asked why I hadn’t come in earlier, I told her the truth–I was stupid.<\/p>\n
The visit led to scheduling a CT-scan at the local hospital, which was this morning. The procedure went well, even though I’m not a big fan of IVs for fainting and nausea reasons. However, they needed to inject contrast, so in went the IV.<\/p>\n
The hard part about procedures is how you explain your fears, especially to your kids. How do I tell Jacob that I’m a bit afraid? Jacob has ITP; he gets his finger stuck every six months to check his platelet level. But still, I felt like I had to talk to him about my being afraid and that it was okay to be afraid.<\/p>\n
After telling me that he used to be afraid, but he wasn’t anymore, he said this: “Don’t be afraid, Daddy. God is with you.”<\/p>\n
I don’t know where he got it, but I’m thankful for him and his little unexpected wisdom.<\/p>\n
P.S. The scan came back clean. It’s just an inflamed nerve in my temple.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
On Saturday, June 1, I was driving back home from the airport. Jessie was in the van, asleep as usual when we go to drop Jacob off for a visit with the grandparents. I had just turned onto the toll road to head back home, when in my left temple, I felt the sensation of … <\/p>\n