My Health Journey…Part 2: Unnecessary Process and Procedure

Let’s fast forward past the summer of 2016 and hit it right on to October of the same year. I decided to go ahead and have surgery even before meeting with my surgeon for the first time. I’m going to go ahead and have the part of my stomach removed that wasn’t functioning. My first meeting with him face to face was going good up until he said that he wanted me to have a Gastroenterologist perform a series of procedures called Endoscopic Ultrasounds to see if they can figure out a way to get my stomach functioning again without having to even deal with surgery. This wasn’t even a part of my plan. I wanted my surgery at least by January 2017 to get it over with and have the whole rest of the year to recoup. After asking 50 million questions (please ask questions); I agreed to it because I thought that it made sense to try any and everything to prevent any type of surgical procedure. I’ve had ultrasounds before so how bad could it be? I had absolutely no idea about the bullshit I was getting ready to go through. NONE!

I can’t remember the exact date; the only thing that I remember is it was the same day as the last presidential debate between Hillary Clinton and that rotten ass cheeto. This would be my first procedure and later that night (actually early in the morning) I was praying that it would be my last. Let me just say that I’ve never felt discomfort on that level; and I’ve had some major pains in my stomach for years. I wasn’t here for it; nope…not one bit. I’ll spare you the details of what happens during this procedure, just know that I felt extremely “violated.” Just sayin’! When it was over, she told me that I wouldn’t feel anything for the next few hours. I’m confused? What is she talking about? Feel what? It was just an ultrasound! However, this was not a normal ultrasound. I didn’t realize the discomfort that I was feeling was actually them poking at my stomach constantly trying to move shit around and get it to start functioning as normal. Soooooo…hours later while I was asleep…I woke up in the middle of the night and almost fell out of my bed from the pain that caught me completely off guard. It was ridiculous, just out of no where. It felt like I was constantly being stabbed in my stomach. What in the hell did I get myself in to? And they want me to do this 5 more times?!? Yes…they wanted me to do this 5 more times…once a month starting again in January of 2017. I made sure to schedule them on Friday because I would seriously need the entire weekend to recoup. I would be so exhausted and sore after these ultrasounds that I would just sleep and lay around the entire weekend. To top it off, I was still groggy on Monday. Each and every time after an ultrasound; I would tell myself that this was going to be my last one. No more of these BS ultrasounds. But there was something in the back of my mind saying that maybe it’s actually working and I won’t need surgery. I was losing weight, but not as much as I should’ve been. I lost around 20 pounds and if this was working I should’ve lost at least 50…at least 10 pounds a month. My stomach went from functioning at around 20% to around 25%. Not the increase in production they were expecting. Nothing really changed. My last procedure was in May and they had the nerve to form their lips to say they wanted to try something else. “HELL NO YOU AREN’T!!!” And yes…that’s exactly what I told them. “I don’t want to try anything else, no more procedures, no more tests…nothing! Let’s just get this surgery approved and scheduled so I can move on with my life!”

In the end, I felt that this was an unnecessary process that I had to go through. This crap wasn’t only wasting my time, but was also wasting my money. Some of which I’m still paying on. Insurance doesn’t pay for everything. It was becoming a problem. I was so over it. So as I mentioned, my last procedure was in the middle of May on a Friday. That Wednesday (I gave them a few days to get the results and report together); I called the surgeons office to make sure that they had everything that they needed because I didn’t want any delays. We all know that paperwork can get lost in the shuffle. All of this had taken long enough and I was more than ready for my surgery. My paperwork was submitted to my insurance company and I was approved within a week of them receiving it. Shockingly, everything went smooth. Now it was just the waiting game for the office to schedule my surgery. Of course I had to “remind them” a couple of times that I hadn’t been scheduled yet. They made sure that they called me to get that deposit though. I would have my surgery 2 months later after the approval which took us to August 2017. The Endoscopic Ultrasounds weren’t the only thing that I went through during all of this. However, it was definitely the most challenging part of the “process.” More of what happened during my year-long journey to follow.