I thought I would throw in a few more details, since I did not have the same manifestations with the e.coli as Kim did. Might be a PSA.
I think everyone kind of knows that if a wound 'looks funny' - you ought to have it checked.
I did have mine checked, and I thought 'fixed', and I wasn't even sure there was anything wrong ~
Ripped open leg, on rocks, fell in like this marshy area by a creek. It was a large tear, like ripping open jeans if you skin your knee. I wasn't wearing jeans - tights or leggings (isn't there a thread about these in the closet? ha.) They were thin and like a black / white / grey kind of tie dye pattern. I really liked those. They kind of looked like an abstract zebra print. Or a skeleton. They had to be cut off. I did get a good look at my *own* skeleton. Erg.
I had to hike back home, apx a mile, with my bones hanging out. I was wearing these like 'ankle boots' - the right one subsequently became a bucket o'blood.
So I go to a hospital in that area (near WI / IL state line. believe it or not I am still not entirely sure what *state* this incident took place in.).
They cleaned it, stitched it, 20 something stitches as it was across the front half of my calf, right under the knee. Gave me some 'general' anti biotics and that was that.
Then the real fun started ~
I was taking the meds and thought it was healing - but the first bad sign was that the leg was getting redder. And redder. By day three the calf was swelled up bigger than the thigh, was bright red (with streaks like what people used to call 'blood poisoning'), the stitches were popping out, and let's just say it was 'leaking'. Alot.
I couldn't tell you if I had a temperature. It was so hot here then, like 110 F and high humidity. It was just brutal. Around the first of August.
I had no stomach or bowel issues and in fact did not really 'feel' sick. Unless I did and the heat was masking this. By the third day however - I was beginning to feel rather strange. I can't even describe it. Like *completely OUT of it*. Like I couldn't think straight. I was almost kind of writing that off to the heat, too.
But of course once the leg swelled and reddened like that - I was alarmed. Other people convinced me to go back to the hospital. I was still kind of on the fence here and thinking - oh, I'm ok. I'm about ready to pass out but - oh, it's the heat.
And, they also talked me into going to a *bigger* hospital. You have to go to a bigger hospital in Chicago. Yeah, I'm not driving 50 miles, I'm about to pass out here. And for some reason somebody convinced me to go to Loyola Hospital in Chi. I mention this too because it might be indicative of how 'out of it' I was. I attended the University of Chicago which has just as good of a hospital, I was familiar with that area, and who knows? They might have given me an alumni discount or something. LOL. Probably not. But - why didn't I even think of this?
Some friends of mine said you gotta go to Loyola Hospital in Chi so I called up my Mom, she came and got me, and that's where I went.
They took one look at me and said - You'll be staying with us for awhile. :D
And began work on me right there in the ER. No waiting. This place takes shootings and high level trauma, they take the helicopters there.
Right in I went and they began work immediately.
I will spare you the grisly details. Suffice it to say everything had to be taken apart and there were several 'surgical procedures' involved. I saw all that on the bills. I was wasted the whole time I was in there. You know you're fucked up bad when they're passing out the hard drugs freely. I asked the Nurse what she was injecting me with in the ER - Dilaudid 4 + Ativan. OK, that's big loud alarm bells right there!
They don't hit you with the industrial strength stuff unless you got serious problems. Erg. But, by then it kicked in and I was like - OK, feel free to chop my head off too - I don't care ha.
Several of these 'procedures' involved 'rooting around' in there, I believe we've discussed degloving here before.
I really did try not to look. And you bet your arse I demanded the hard stuff! No touchy unless you give me at least Morphine. And I got all I wanted! I wasn't bitchy otherwise and got plenty of extra treats and cokes and etc. one Nurse even told me where the "secret smoking area" was :) Maybe they wanted to encourage me to get up and moving lol. They were very generous with the drugs too, all kinds of pain killers, sleeping pills, everything. Ask, and it appeared :)
And I just laid there and rested. They had to leave this wound 'open'. They did not restich it. I guess because of the infection? They explained it to me but yeah - wasted.
I remember it being *so hot*. Stupid hot, really bad. I got a nice little holiday from the heat. A rather expensive holiday LOL. I heard a tech worker telling a Nurse that the air handling equipment was overloading. This is a *huge* medical campus and they have their own power plant, I'm sure. It was *so hot* though, just unreal.
Once I began to heal, and they determined it was e.coli, and they had blasted me enough with all the strange drugs which I mentioned in my other post - they decided I could go.
And guess who had to continue the wound care? That was no fun either. I had to pack it with bandages soaked in sterilized water, I had to do this three times a day, I still had this huge hole in my leg. Gawd. It took at least a month to heal fully. And there were more weird drugs to continue taking. I did get pain killers too.
And then I just carried on.
Researched the various drugs I was given and scared the hell out of myself!
One 'works' by unwinding the DNA of the Ec. :doh
I certainly hope that 'knew' where to ah - leave off ~
I should wrap this up. It's a grisly tale. And this is *not* the first incident that has happened to me. It's by far one of the worst.
From a PSA angle - I never really 'felt sick' - until it got to a critical point (badly swollen injured leg.) I did not have flu like symptoms, stomach, runs, none of that. I probably did have a fever. And then I did all of a sudden begin to feel violently ill and the whole 'out of it' thing - that was really scary.
The Docs (at Loyola) said I was in "excellent health". Otherwise this might have killed me. Take care of yourself! :) It might come in handy.
And with this, and things I've read - you need to catch it fast. If I had waited another day even ~
From what I've read on Ec - it seems like after 4,5 days - you're kind of SOL. It goes to amputation / brain and/ or organ damage / death range - fairly quickly.
I was already bad at 3, 4 days. I forget many of the particulars on this incident because I was so out of it. And the drugs. Sweet Baby Jesus! O_oo By this I mean too - the weird 'illness' drugs. The pain killers, Opioids and the synth versions there of - Those'll wreck ya good too, but it's pretty predictable and wears off (as I said, this is not my first incident.) The other strange drugs, meant to attack the thing or fix or something - man did that shit make me feel weird. Really weird. I can't even describe it. I hope these things weren't re arranging my DNA or anything. Erg. (The worst side effects of some of these go up to a full blown case of MS or RA. And, it can hit you years later. Erg.)
I do not feel sick anymore, but I don't feel right. My mind is OK, thank gawd! I remember seeing these 'brain damage' stories and PANNICKING! I immediately started imagining Math equations in my head! To see if it was OK. I do think it is ok ~
Watch those injuries! If things look weird, don't put off seeking more help.
I am glad I listened to others.
I might have let it go, or put it off - otherwise.
:doh
I think everyone kind of knows that if a wound 'looks funny' - you ought to have it checked.
I did have mine checked, and I thought 'fixed', and I wasn't even sure there was anything wrong ~
Ripped open leg, on rocks, fell in like this marshy area by a creek. It was a large tear, like ripping open jeans if you skin your knee. I wasn't wearing jeans - tights or leggings (isn't there a thread about these in the closet? ha.) They were thin and like a black / white / grey kind of tie dye pattern. I really liked those. They kind of looked like an abstract zebra print. Or a skeleton. They had to be cut off. I did get a good look at my *own* skeleton. Erg.
I had to hike back home, apx a mile, with my bones hanging out. I was wearing these like 'ankle boots' - the right one subsequently became a bucket o'blood.
So I go to a hospital in that area (near WI / IL state line. believe it or not I am still not entirely sure what *state* this incident took place in.).
They cleaned it, stitched it, 20 something stitches as it was across the front half of my calf, right under the knee. Gave me some 'general' anti biotics and that was that.
Then the real fun started ~
I was taking the meds and thought it was healing - but the first bad sign was that the leg was getting redder. And redder. By day three the calf was swelled up bigger than the thigh, was bright red (with streaks like what people used to call 'blood poisoning'), the stitches were popping out, and let's just say it was 'leaking'. Alot.
I couldn't tell you if I had a temperature. It was so hot here then, like 110 F and high humidity. It was just brutal. Around the first of August.
I had no stomach or bowel issues and in fact did not really 'feel' sick. Unless I did and the heat was masking this. By the third day however - I was beginning to feel rather strange. I can't even describe it. Like *completely OUT of it*. Like I couldn't think straight. I was almost kind of writing that off to the heat, too.
But of course once the leg swelled and reddened like that - I was alarmed. Other people convinced me to go back to the hospital. I was still kind of on the fence here and thinking - oh, I'm ok. I'm about ready to pass out but - oh, it's the heat.
And, they also talked me into going to a *bigger* hospital. You have to go to a bigger hospital in Chicago. Yeah, I'm not driving 50 miles, I'm about to pass out here. And for some reason somebody convinced me to go to Loyola Hospital in Chi. I mention this too because it might be indicative of how 'out of it' I was. I attended the University of Chicago which has just as good of a hospital, I was familiar with that area, and who knows? They might have given me an alumni discount or something. LOL. Probably not. But - why didn't I even think of this?
Some friends of mine said you gotta go to Loyola Hospital in Chi so I called up my Mom, she came and got me, and that's where I went.
They took one look at me and said - You'll be staying with us for awhile. :D
And began work on me right there in the ER. No waiting. This place takes shootings and high level trauma, they take the helicopters there.
Right in I went and they began work immediately.
I will spare you the grisly details. Suffice it to say everything had to be taken apart and there were several 'surgical procedures' involved. I saw all that on the bills. I was wasted the whole time I was in there. You know you're fucked up bad when they're passing out the hard drugs freely. I asked the Nurse what she was injecting me with in the ER - Dilaudid 4 + Ativan. OK, that's big loud alarm bells right there!
They don't hit you with the industrial strength stuff unless you got serious problems. Erg. But, by then it kicked in and I was like - OK, feel free to chop my head off too - I don't care ha.
Several of these 'procedures' involved 'rooting around' in there, I believe we've discussed degloving here before.
I really did try not to look. And you bet your arse I demanded the hard stuff! No touchy unless you give me at least Morphine. And I got all I wanted! I wasn't bitchy otherwise and got plenty of extra treats and cokes and etc. one Nurse even told me where the "secret smoking area" was :) Maybe they wanted to encourage me to get up and moving lol. They were very generous with the drugs too, all kinds of pain killers, sleeping pills, everything. Ask, and it appeared :)
And I just laid there and rested. They had to leave this wound 'open'. They did not restich it. I guess because of the infection? They explained it to me but yeah - wasted.
I remember it being *so hot*. Stupid hot, really bad. I got a nice little holiday from the heat. A rather expensive holiday LOL. I heard a tech worker telling a Nurse that the air handling equipment was overloading. This is a *huge* medical campus and they have their own power plant, I'm sure. It was *so hot* though, just unreal.
Once I began to heal, and they determined it was e.coli, and they had blasted me enough with all the strange drugs which I mentioned in my other post - they decided I could go.
And guess who had to continue the wound care? That was no fun either. I had to pack it with bandages soaked in sterilized water, I had to do this three times a day, I still had this huge hole in my leg. Gawd. It took at least a month to heal fully. And there were more weird drugs to continue taking. I did get pain killers too.
And then I just carried on.
Researched the various drugs I was given and scared the hell out of myself!
One 'works' by unwinding the DNA of the Ec. :doh
I certainly hope that 'knew' where to ah - leave off ~
I should wrap this up. It's a grisly tale. And this is *not* the first incident that has happened to me. It's by far one of the worst.
From a PSA angle - I never really 'felt sick' - until it got to a critical point (badly swollen injured leg.) I did not have flu like symptoms, stomach, runs, none of that. I probably did have a fever. And then I did all of a sudden begin to feel violently ill and the whole 'out of it' thing - that was really scary.
The Docs (at Loyola) said I was in "excellent health". Otherwise this might have killed me. Take care of yourself! :) It might come in handy.
And with this, and things I've read - you need to catch it fast. If I had waited another day even ~
From what I've read on Ec - it seems like after 4,5 days - you're kind of SOL. It goes to amputation / brain and/ or organ damage / death range - fairly quickly.
I was already bad at 3, 4 days. I forget many of the particulars on this incident because I was so out of it. And the drugs. Sweet Baby Jesus! O_oo By this I mean too - the weird 'illness' drugs. The pain killers, Opioids and the synth versions there of - Those'll wreck ya good too, but it's pretty predictable and wears off (as I said, this is not my first incident.) The other strange drugs, meant to attack the thing or fix or something - man did that shit make me feel weird. Really weird. I can't even describe it. I hope these things weren't re arranging my DNA or anything. Erg. (The worst side effects of some of these go up to a full blown case of MS or RA. And, it can hit you years later. Erg.)
I do not feel sick anymore, but I don't feel right. My mind is OK, thank gawd! I remember seeing these 'brain damage' stories and PANNICKING! I immediately started imagining Math equations in my head! To see if it was OK. I do think it is ok ~
Watch those injuries! If things look weird, don't put off seeking more help.
I am glad I listened to others.
I might have let it go, or put it off - otherwise.
:doh