Hospital

This summer it was time again for me to the hospital for my regular CF stay. It had been 2 yrs since my last visit, so really I’m doing pretty good. This year, because of insurance reasons, I had to go to St. Al’s hospital instead of St. Luke’s. This was all able to work out because Dr. Rulon, who is a Family Medicine/OBGYN/Cystic Fibrosis doctor (and part of the CF clinic here in Boise) has hospital rights at both St. Al’s and St. Luke’s. It was hard to go to a new hospital where they didn’t know my regular routine and some didn’t even know that much about CF, but I was blessed to have patience with them and we all made it through just fine. Some of the advantages at St. Al’s are that the food is really good and I was in a bigger room (the hospital bed, a desk, couch that folded into a bed and extra space to move around in) so I didn’t feel very claustrophobic in there at all. There were lots of downsides to it too, but we won’t dwell on those…With this hospital visit I have once again decided that my life calling is to educate others about CF. It is a good thing, but it does get old sometimes.

St. Al’s also has a hospital Healing Garden, so one day my Mom, Brenda and my friend Crystal decided to go exploring and find it. It was beautiful, but I didn’t get to enjoy it much. It was extremely hot outside and after being inside for a week and not having my sun glasses with me, I could hardly keep my eyes open because it was so bright.

I was blessed to be able to get lots of rest, have someone else be in-charge of all my IVs (every 6 hrs, 8 hrs, and 24 hrs), eat lots of food and gain about 5 lbs, and was able to visit with family and friends too. Another huge blessing was that I didn’t have to worry about work at all. After I found out I was going in I called my boss and he said not to worry about it and to take the time that I needed to get feeling better. He even volunteered another worker to work with my clients until I could come back to work, so that they would still be able to have a regular schedule. As long as I turned in my paperwork and told my client’s what was going on I had nothing to worry about! What a blessing!!!! Don’t worry, I took the full week off that I was in the hospital and an extra week after that to get back into the swing of things (doing nothing but sitting in bed, eating, doing breathing treatments, and taking my medication really does wear you out and it takes time to get your energy back to where it was before you went in). Anyway, I feel better and am looking forward to having another 2+ yrs out of the hospital. Thanks to everyone for the prayers, food, and kind words…they helped A LOT!

I spent a lot of time "smoking & shaking"