I am writing this from my hospital bed, not knowing when I will have the opportunity to post it. I feel like I have dropped off the surface of the earth. I have been in this hospital room for a week now, un-hooked from my life, my job, my own gastrointestinal system even. I read, think and listen to the sound of my IV pump.
So how on earth did I go from 60 mpw, super strong marathoner to this? The sad truth is that I have been sick for a long time. I have just been frighteningly good at ignoring it; at not connecting the dots and listening to the signals. The doctors were shocked when they realized the shape my stomach was in when they first saw me, and they are still very careful. It seems I have a chronic inflammatory bowel disease; it can be either Crohn’s disease or Ulcerous Colitis. It is a chronic autoimmune inflammation of the bowels, leading to severe GI distress and bleedings that come on in periods and then get better for a while.
All the bleedings – how could I ignore that? I feel so horrible about that. My last 20 miler: I ran 10 miles, had a potty stop (=acute GI bleeding) and then finished the run. Thinking nothing of it. Stupid, stupid Jenny.
The truth is I probably made it this far because I am in such good shape. All the running made me eat a lot, and healthy stuff too. Much to their surprise my iron, vitamin- and mineral levels were not too bad. They have been saying over and over “You look so healthy!” And I do, compared to the other patients here. They are pretty old, and shuffle slowly around the corridors, seeming mostly interested in how many cigarettes they have smoked in the last couple of hours and when they can sneak outside for the next one. Now, after a week on IV I am doing the Hospital Shuffle, too. In my over sized white hospital gown and with my IV drip by my side I look scary. My energy levels are so low I hold my cup with both hands when I drink. I want my life back so badly.
The weekend before last I felt weak. I was bleeding badly and not keeping my food. On Sunday, after cutting that medium long run down to 9 miles I had a fever and I felt sick all night. The day after I took the train to Stockholm to start the work week here as planned. I felt feverish all day and my stomach ache was not just the usual feeling of soreness in the lower belly that I had become such an expert at ignoring. Now it was all the way up to my ventricle, feeling kind of like gastritis. I bought some OTC acid blockers and a pack of anti-diarrheic pills. On the pills it said to contact a doctor if you had problems that lasted more than 2 days or if there was blood in your stool. I guess seeing it in print like that made me realize I should contact a doctor the next day. I couldn’t run, just went home and slept feverishly.
On Tuesday morning I still felt weak. I called a nurse for advice, a service they have here that will direct you to the right doctor or tell you too chill and relax. She was very straight forward with me: “You don’t need advice, you need a doctor’s appointment right a way, girl.” So she sent me to the same day clinic, where they examined me, sent me to another doctor there, and then sent me in a car to this hospital. I was examined again here by two doctors and before I knew what hit me all the urgency had landed me here. I couldn’t believe it. I wasn’t that sick, right? I was put in my own room with a nice view and I am given the best possible care. I was only allowed two cups clear liquid per day for the first three days, then I was upped to 3 cups per day. I drank only water since everything else hurt, but as of yesterday I am drinking tea too and it seems to work. All other nutrition is IV, to give my GI tract a chance to heal. It is called “Bowel Rest”, like it was a nice vacation for your innards! Three times a say I am getting cortisone IV and twice a day an antibiotic IV. I am also getting another antibiotic, vitamins and some other stomach pill three times per day. My vein-y, ropy arms are black and blue from moving the vein port around and from all the tests they are taking.
Luckily the inflmmation tests are getting better all the time, so the treatment is working. But I was allowed some soup today for lunch and that was a setback, since I couldn’t keep it. It made me very sad. I want to be able to eat again so badly. I am fixated on food. I fantasize about eating. You would think the body would have given up huger by now, by apparently not. The sensation has just shifted from being located to a grumbling stomach to being more subtle and general. I have never dieted or fasted before, and suddenly I understand how restriction of food intake in itself can cause all kinds of weird bulimic tendencies once the restriction ends. I think about Beyonce on that Master Cleanse Diet and I am sure I would have gnawed off my own arm after three days. Seriously. And I am still getting like 1600 kcal/day in my IV!
Yeah, the marathon is less than two weeks from today. With some luck I could be out of the hospital by the end of this week. I have probably lost some weight and a lot of muscle from being bed-bound for so long and from all the cortisone. I would need at least a week to find my feet again. So I’d say the marathon is out of the question. I have run enough of them by now to know that I can go the distance. I don’t need to prove that to myself and risk adding even more stress to my body. To run it I’d want to *race* it. And I don’t think that would be wise. The good thing is that this is not a *running injury*. I have seen so much improvement in my running during this time despite being untreated for this disease. Getting treatment will only make me come back a stronger runner. I could try to find a marathon in a few months time, but I think that would be difficult since the season is almost over here already. Or I could run a spring marathon, or even fall next year, instead and focus on just maintaining my running base now and learning to accept and live with this disease.
I am struggling to come to terms with the fact that this is not an isolated incident. This is a chronic disease that comes and goes, but never goes away completely. I will have to treat the acute inflammations with cortisone and other medications when they flare up. I might need to be hospitalized at times when the bleedings get too bad and I can’t keep food. I might have to take medication between the acute periods to keep the basal inflammation in check. I will have to get *much* better at paying attention to my stomach. It will be a learning period. I am not some kind of self-hating person who ignored this because I didn’t feel like I deserved care. I simply didn’t feel that bad. I was overwhelmed and shocked when I realized how bad it actually was. I probably have a very high threshold for pain, and I am in good physical shape, so I *really* didn’t feel too bad. Even at my worst, I had more energy than most people around me. I need to learn to pay more attention to myself.
Emil (my husband) was here last week and over the weekend and now my mum is coming up from Göteborg to spend a few days here by my bedside. It feels good to have family around me at this time.
I miss you all and I will try to post this as soon as I can. :love:
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