Happy New Year!

One of the players (who knows StarMaster IRL) posted this in another game I'm in that he runs;

In reply to Vasily Pavlychenko (msg # 490):

Gosh, that's terrible.

So here's what's been happening...

I've been 'ill' for about three months now, starting with getting COVID back in the beginning of October. Wasn't too bad and I got over it in a few days, but it left me with the typical aftermath symptom of being tired ALL THE TIME. I was slowly getting over it, and even had a few hours of energy every day.

I had a doctor's appointment scheduled for mid-October but then Hurricane Ian hit. The VA clinic took some damage and was closed for two weeks. I finally got the appointment rescheduled for Jan. 13.

December 1st, I had a minor chest pain on my right side. It felt like just a minor muscle strain but at my age and with my medical history, I felt it was prudent to check. Called the VA clinic to see about a walk-in visit the next day and the nurse I talked to went into panic mode with the 'chest pain' words, and told me to go to the ER. So, on Friday, December 2nd, that's what I did. More panic mode.

Spent 4 days being poked and prodded, inspected, detected, and injected and stuff, only to be told my heart was fine. More exactly, they couldn't find any cause for the chest pain... the obvious cause seemed to elude them.

Here's where it started going to hell. Getting out of the hospital, I had an extreme loss of appetite, shortness of breath, and NO ENERGY. Didn't have any of that when I went in!

Not only was I not hungry, but nothing tasted appealing any more. Could barely eat my favorite foods, and then only 2-3 bites. On top of that, I ran out of one of my diabetes medicines. Not eating and drinking much, I also wasn't taking my meds as regularly as I had been.

This went on for the next three weeks, so things probably grew gradually worse without me quite realizing it.

December 31st, I managed to pull a back muscle, and while the pain meds I took didn't do squat, I at least knew it'd go away in a few days. It did. And then I got hives!

Jan. 6 I went to the VA clinic to get bloodwork done for my doctor's appointment. No sooner did I get home than the doctor called to tell me my blood sugar level was 903! I needed to go to the ER pronto! That's where I've been for the past week. :-(

I still didn't feel all that bad (weak and no energy), but I definitely had some serious health issues. Turned out I had ketoacidosis and some kidney issues. After a few days treatment, the keto was gone, kidneys were all better, and my blood sugar was back to normal. Now I had to survive the 'recovery'. As long as I was stuck in that hospital bed, though, I knew I wasn't going to get better. So now I'm home.

Have a nurse helping me, and physical therapy should start tomorrow. And now I have to play tag with a doctor's appointment again...

Anyway, the reason I'm telling you all this is in case you, family or a friend should find yourself in a similar situation, you'll have a heads-up/warning about what's might be happening.


Now it's just recovery and rehab.

In reply to Dread Pirate Robert (msg # 492):

I hope you get better.

It was kind of a perfect storm of bad circumstances.

Health-wise, I'm all better. It's now just regaining my strength, energy, and stamina. As it turns out, post-hospital recovery is now an accepted and valid medical condition. For every day you spend in the hospital, it takes three days of recovery at home. We'll see how it goes for the next two weeks.

I'm glad all of the acute issues are resolved. Hopefully recovery goes well!

Still here. As it turns out, seven days in a hospital bed really did a number on me, no doubt helped along by my age. Still tired most of the time, energy/stamina comes and goes. There are times when I get out of the recliner and only manage to take three steps before I have to sit down again. Other times, I can get up and zip around the house with the walker with no problem. So it seems like it's going to take me twice as long to recover as I was hoping/expecting it to.

Hoping to get back to my games in another day or two.

Geez, that is tough. I don't know what I'd do if I was that fatigued. Might go a bit crazy.

More health issues. Been in hospital for past 11 days. Transitioning to rehab soon. Will update when I can.

Damn.  Good luck.

Happy Valentine's day!

So while I was stuck in the hospital bed for two weeks, I wrote and rewrote this post in my head several times. Don't remember any of it now, so here's the newest version.

THE NEVER-ENDING STORY...

The Missing Chapter: when I was discharged from the hospital back in January, I was sent home with a Foley catheter, which was more of an annoyance and handicap for my home rehab at the time. Managed to get an appointment with the VA  urologist two weeks later. He thought I should never have been sent home with it, but it was time to get it removed. Took a week of scheduling shuffles but finally went home without it on the following Thursday.

That Friday night when getting ready for bed, I lost my balance while setting something on the floor and fell over on my back onto the concrete floor. My housemate helped me get up and everything seemed fine once I was back out in the recliner. Nope. Come Saturday, I was in excruciating pain across all the muscles in my chest and back. Doan's, Aleve, Tylenol didn't help at all. Monday added a heating pad... better. Wednesday, switched to BenGay... better, but still couldn't sleep, so Thursday went back to the VA for some stronger pain meds.

That doctor saw the previous records and thought I might be having a pulmonary embolism and immediately did an ambulance transfer to the ER. 6 hours later the ER doctor decided that wasn't the case and sent me home with vicadin. Didn't do anything but pharmacy was closed so had to wait till the next day to get more.

After that, everything was fine for a few hours. Mid-afternoon, I suddenly couldn't move my legs!

EMT/PD shortly had me back in the ER. MRI of head and neck revealed a tumor in my C2 vertebra. Had spinal surgery next morning! Being the weekend, it took 4 days to get the pathology back which identified it as prostate cancer. Caught it early and getting chemo, and now in rehab to walk again.

Other than that, I'm in great health (for my age)! Probably 4-6 weeks in rehab before I go home.

It is great that it was caught early. That makes the chemo and such worth it. You said "for my age", so I assume that you are retired, which is definitely a good thing in this case; the stress of missing work (even though it is 100% justified and necessary, etc, etc) would just make it all even harder, I'm sure. I hope your recovery goes well, and I hope you prioritize that rather than this stuff... just use us as a means of escape, not as a responsibility! I'm certain that everyone will understand you taking all the time you need, whenever you need it.

Uh oh.

Alas, not sure she's still with us.

A shame, but if she's not still playing, then NPC time it is I guess.

I'm a little disappointed that events prevent Vasily from dining on fine Ussuran boot.  I was hoping he'd say something about the phrase "Nobility and freemen" being redundant...  While talking to the highborn escaped slave. (Vodacce is weird)

No offense to the player, it's just a missed opportunity for drama

But alas, the McGuffin started doing a thing.
This message was last edited by the player at 08:23, Thu 09 Mar 2023.

Ah, well Vasily would never have tried to claim that nobility are free, especially Montaignians are slaves to the Emperor's whims.

An interesting point.  It's a matter of degrees I think.  L'Empereur may wield nigh-absolute authority on Montaigne, but he's the only one who does.  The sorciere aren't bought and sold the way Streiga are, or forbidden to learn how to read and write.

A conversation to have in-character I think.

If Alessandra were still here I'd be more inclined to do it, but if she's an NPC now I don't really want to hand the GM ((N+1)²)/2 danger dice, where N is the strength of the fate effect on her from the pearl.
This message was last edited by the player at 05:04, Fri 10 Mar 2023.

In reply to Fiora Ambrogia (msg # 509):

I'm here.

Yea! You're back! Puppies, unicorns and rainbow tossed your (unless you are allergic to any of those)!

I also don't really want to hand the GM a mountain of danger points AND clamjam Alessandra from gaining a sorcery at the same time. ;)

(Unless she actively doesn't want to have one.)

Hah