False Alarm

(Ahh, the infamous hospital pic. Laugh it up folks, laugh it up.)

Soooo, 8 years ago, before my 19th birthday, I woke up one day with a swollen leg. It was a blood clot... or DVT (Deep vein thrombosis to be technical). There was no rhyme or reason for it, no disorders, no good reason at all. It was a pretty trying time for me. I was living in Fort Collins, CO, the first time on my own and I had no insurance to boot. Luckily, lots of wonderful friends and work associates took the utmost care of me.

Needless to say, I'm always on the lookout for anything that might be wrong, or signs of another one. My leg (the same one as before) has been kind of swollen and in & out of pain for about a week. Normally, I might get a little swelling, but I can usually attribute it to some kind of stress (working out, sitting for too long, standing too long, yada yada). I might even get a little pain from that swelling, but I always know its because of my jacked-up veins. This time it was different. More..consistent/persistent I'd say. It actually made me worry. Quite a bit.

I left work about 3pm today and headed to the hospital. Check in, the man says "what're you here for?" I say, "I think I might have a blood clot." Lame. Anyway, I had to go and answer all of his questions, get my little wrist band, and put up with the witchy (<-putting it nicely) triage nurse, then got whisked away in a wheelchair to my room/bed. Doc came in and ordered the blood test and ultra-sound. The phlebotomist missed my vein and it hurt. The ultra sound was fine, lots of goop. 30 minutes later (side note! we passed the time by starting two new books both by Ken Follett: Pillars of the Earth and Fall of Giants- I hear both are super good) the doc struts in and says I'm just fine.

Whew! No cumiden for life on this day! False alarm. I did get to see on screen the scars in my veins from the old one though. So, I guess that's cool. And I am going to sleep really good tonight. ;)