A Plethora of Pics / Vids & A Combination of Crap! in General Mental Anesthesia

Drop your pants and pull out the measuring tape, ‘cause this is a long one!

I know, I know… it’s been over a month! I’m sorry. There’s a lot to catch up on and a radical new development or two. I may push the boundaries on how long an entry can go, but I owe it to you guys; Thank you PB for not having (that I know of) line or character limitations like the old OD had. I’ll try to keep it interesting. Soon, you’ll understand why I’ve been absent.

HEALTH

Since my last post, I saw my gastroenterologist and guess what?

I was hospitalized yet again (for a week) now back in North Carolina. The cause: severe internal bleeding (ulcerative colitis). As predicted, just like every other time over the past 26 years when I’m weaned off Prednisone, I’m hospitalized; of course Dr’s never listen to me.

My blood pressure was 170/118, my heart rate was in the 130’s and because of the blood clots in my lungs, I was having difficulty breathing so they had me wired to just about everything.

Yup, once again my IV’s were a nightmare!

That IV (once they got one after about 100 attempts) only lasted a day before it got infected and my forearm and elbow completely swelled up.

They kept sticking me and sticking me with needles!

17 or 18 individual injections in the 1st 3 days!

Then I was scheduled for another colonoscopy. For my regulars here on PB, if you recall my 16 day hospitalization in Feb / March of this year, my gastro tried to do a full scope to check for Crohn’s, but the inflammation was so severe that he couldn’t go very far. This was the makeup exam if you will.

Out of the 30 or so I’ve had in my life, this was by far and way the worst!

At the start of the procedure (just after they put me out) my oxygen levels dropped into the low 70’s, I nearly died and they had to pull me out of the anesthesia, but the colonoscopy continued and I was awake and alert for the entire thing! Something you shouldn’t be awake for, It fucking hurt!!!!!!!

Afterwards (and partially because of being on blood thinners) I bled out like crazy! Way, way more than normal. So much blood pored out of me that I was lying in a puddle of it. When I got to my room, my gown was covered in blood and when I went to the bathroom, I lost even more. I lost about 4 cups of blood!

The next day I finally got to take a shower, but they were REALLY serious about wrapping my IV tight!!!

My newest back injury still hurt and now my old ones were flaring up. I was very stiff and had trouble walking. I was helped into bed where I asked for a Flexeril and a pain med. I was given the Flexeril but not the latter. I also asked for a sleep aid which I never received.

Then I asked not to be disturbed over night. Of course at 2:30am I was woken up for a breathing treatment, then at 3:45am woken up again for blood labs (ugh). Lastly, I was woken up yet again for blood pressure etc and a change of my IV.

I’m so tired and in pain, I can’t take this anymore!!!

The Gofundme that explains it all to anyone new to mt PB page

To top things off a dear friend of mine and a mentor Rose Warner (a producer in the film industry) who supported me and my work as well as got me hired to work on films passed away this same day. She had been battling cancer and you guys know of my health struggles. We had spoken last about a week before her passing. :’(

This is us talking while also on set working on the Christian comedy film “Highway to Hell”.

A few days later, in relatively the same condition:

I went for a walk on my hospital floor, my back spasming something wicked, my knees extremely swollen for some reason and still reeling from the worst colonoscopy of my life. Weak from anemia and limping, I tried to walk anyhow and ran into the hospital Dr. She said: Are you ready to go home?” I said: “No!” She said: “Well, you’re walking”. To which I replied: “Yeah, well I also walked into the hospital, what’s your point?” She then said she was going to release me.

I asked for a muscle relaxer and a pain med because I was in excruciating pain (an 8 out of 10). She didn’t fill either request.

I was also told not to take my blood pressure medication, but not told why. When I left the hospital, my BP was 138/104. What happens when my BP goes up to 165/115 again? I was told to go to my primary care Dr. Well, what do you think he’s going to do? He’s going to me back on my blood pressure medications. I mean WTF???

They never gave me an mri no matter how many times I requested one or complained about pain. The shitty hospital Dr. said that in the x ray, I had no breaks or fractures.. I said: the pain is comparable to my herniated disc pain, but she just the x-rays didn’t show anything. Does she really think I’m that stupid? Asshole!

I got back in bed and dozed in and out of consciousness; had a nurse take a pic of me. Does this look like someone ready to go home?

Should a chart read like this when you’re releasing someone?

I can feel and see severe swelling in my knees and feet. I not only feel, but can hear ‘sloshing’ under my skin! It’s incredibly painful and uncomfortable! No idea what’s going on there and no one at the hospital would even address it.

No health insurance… no one cares.

The next pic is just before I got sent home. I had my nurse take a pic of the 8 puncture wounds from failed IV’s and blood draws.

I even contemplated just going directly to another hospital, but I know that I’ll just be treated the same, besides… I’m sooo over tired.

---

RESIDENCE

The above was just under a month ago.

As some of you know, my mom, our pug & I have been relatively homeless over the past 2 months. Since then, we’ve stayed at 2 airbnb’s, a motel (myself, I’ve had several ER visits and 3 different hospital stays in that time).

It has been HELL trying to find a rental where we live thanks to the Military who gobble everything up. every application costs between $30 - $40. Many rentals that we saw were in horrible shape, here’s just a few pics.

Insect infestations

Broken appliances

Leaks and worse…

Those are 3 different places that all said they were “move in ready”.

Finally, we came upon a place that also said it was “move in ready” but it was in better shape that these… it was also supposed to be freshly painted.

We were so desperate and tired and sick of losing out on other rentals because someone else had more money or just beat us to the punch; we just needed to get a roof over our heads. So we applied, got approved and got in!

We hired movers (2 men and a truck) who ended up ripping us off. Obviously I can’t do a Uhaul move, so we were forced to hire. I called multiple movers and got quotes between $600 - $800, frigging ridiculous! 2 men and a truck quoted $516 - to 8 and change, but by the end of the move it cost $1240!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I didn’t know this! It was over 100 degrees outside, had been a long arduous day, my mom was hurting, tired, sore and the movers stood over her until she signed that she accepted and paid.

The icing on the cake… the new rental hadn’t been painted and here’s a few shots of our new home the realtor (whose also the home owner) calls “move in ready”.

and the cherry on top of the icing… the ac doesn’t work efficiently. Lower the temperature 1 degree and it lowers 1 degree, you lower it another degree and it goes up 2! Then you have to start over. It’s a fucking nightmare and hot as hell! I know the realtor has responsibilities, I just hope she doesn’t try to fight us over this shit and gets things fixed!

So now we’re moved in.

---

A week ago.

We called several companies to get renters insurance but because of the potential threat of Hurricane Florence, no companies would let us purchase it.

THE STORM

She was headed as a direct hit. I can skip a lot of this because you all have seen the news and updates. I took some shots expecting to chase the storm as always.

Stores ran out of water quickly, but I got mine.

When a store did get a pallet of water in, immediately there was a line.

But here’s the reality of storm prep…

Running out of canned goods.

No Bread

Camping supplies gone

If you were out of TP, you weren’t gettin’ any!

Many generators purchased.

Hardware stores were busy

Speaking of which… as the storm approached, we ended up in a mandatory evacuation. I want to stay, film and help others, but my mom and pug “Inspector Noodles” needed to go (and I needed to drive them. I was so pissed that I was going to miss this storm! Driving hurts btw… I can’t turn to see, but my mom can’t drive at night or at length. :/

Now… in my health, I had to find some way to protect our few belongings (mostly in boxes in the garage, but supplies were few).

I did the best I could and I was hurting so much that I could barely stand and breathing was extremely difficult. It was 100 degrees, humid… Sweat just poured off of my in literal streams! I was dying!!!

I came up with this…

I have no idea if this will be effective (or was).

Then we had to evacuate.

A couple of concerns I have:

A rickety fence in our back yard, I don’t think it will hold up very well.

These trees could easily fall and if they do… our home could be crushed.

Before we left, I took a shot of the neighborhood.

Shelters were full, most don’t accept pets, besides with my health and severely compromised immune system, a shelter would be a death sentence for me, so we were once again forced to get an airbnb, but to find one on short notice that allowed a pet and with all the evacuates, we had to go all the way to Georgia (an 8 hour drive).

After we got out of the area, evacuating was smooth sailing.

Since being here at the airbnb, getting updates has been rough with the widespread power outages. Here’s what I know.

I live in Craven county. As you might of heard, it was hit hard! the winds weren’t bad, but they’ve had 3 days of tropical and hurricane force winds. Even today with Florence a weak tropical storm 193 miles away, it was still pouring in my area with 50+mph winds in rain bands.

We’re talking 30 inches of rain in the past 3 days with more rain tomorrow and possibly Monday. There was a 10 foot storm surge just to our North in New Bern and another just to our South in Moorehead. I have no idea what my neighborhood looks like or if we’ll even have a home to go home to.

A couple images (obviously not taken by me) of my actual town.

This was day 1 of the storm.

This was yesterday (Sept 15th). Rescues.

This Food Lion (a grocery store) is less than a mile from me.

Serious Damage to Buildings

New Bern, neighboring town.

I’ve been tweeting about it, looking to get any info and one of my tweets nearly went viral. 34,000 views!

Popular Tweet

Additional photo’s (I should have taken).

Damage in Southeast North Carolina by Florence

My (3 months worth) of Humira which is sitting in the fridge at my Gastro’s office which is in New Bern (out of power) so now I have to try and get that replaced because all of it will be ruined now! Not only do I need financial help for my health, but now I need to look into disaster relief funds because we couldn’t get renters insurance, were forced to evacuate and now we have no idea if we’ll be homeless when we go back to North Carolina this coming week. And we have to go back because there’s no money to pay to stay anywhere else. It’s extremely stressful! Yesterday, officials made a statement for evacuees not to return home because of continued life threatening flooding.

On Monday I’m going to call City Hall to try and get some information, the roads in and out may not even be passable, there could be sinkholes, washed out bridges and continued flooding. All I’ve heard is that it may take 2 weeks to restore power.

Is our home ok? Is it flooded? Or is it completely destroyed?

I have absolutely no idea.

---

Last updated September 16, 2018