I Ate a Meatball and Almost Died

That title could be a post all by itself, but since I’m a blogger, you get the full story. I went back to work on Monday and made it basically through the day. There was the part where I had to go home and lie down for a long lunch hour, but that can happen even on my non-surgical recovery days. I blame Vicadin really. Now that the pain is more on the outside of my stomach and my abdominal muscles, as opposed to literally feeling the band tightening my stomach on the inside, Vicadin does me little good. Right now, I’m still sore from Sunday when I decided that I needed to actually take my recycling to the recycling center for the first time in months and months and months. That really wasn’t my brightest idea. Lots of bending down caused a searing pain to shoot through my right side. It’s calmed down and now only aches when I stand up and walk. It’s basically where I imagine my appendix might be, if my appendix went on a field trip to a random spot on my right side, between my ribs and belly button. Right there. That’s where it hurts.


In addition to overdoing it physically, I have to confess that I’ve been testing my gastric limitations. I was on a full liquid diet for two days after my surgery, then started sneaking in solids. Mostly there were in the form of scrambled eggs, macaroni and cheese. (because soft is almost a liquid, right?), chili with no beans, and chopped tuna and chicken (because being pre-chewed is totally three steps closer to liquid than a solid in my mind). I kept drinking broth and throwing away the rest of the soup, which is fairly unsatisfying. Then on Sunday I demanded that Clicker take me to the sacred house of pancakes and let me eat one. He tried very hard and very valiantly to talk me out of it, but I wouldn’t hear of it. Pancakes are very soft! Sometimes they even fall apart when you try to pick them up with a fork. I ate two of them very slowly with some scrambled egg substitute. Then I wasn’t hungry for the remainder of the day.

I’m at work today and the office orders Potbelly sandwiches for lunch during our wholesaler meeting. I’m hungry. I ate/drank my soup around 10:30am and I don’t have any other food. Then I see a meatball sandwich on wheat bread and I think, “I can do this. The meat is ground together and the bread is wheat instead of white. It shouldn’t get stuck. Chomp. Chomp. Chomp”

Then immediately I knew that I had made a very large mistake.

Three bites into the sandwich, I get a searing pain in my chest and I have to rush out of the meeting. I started walking around the office, much like a pregnant lady with contractions. I sat down at my desk and a wave of nausea rolled over me. I got out my trash can and willed the food not to come up and upset my sore appendix site and delicate stomach. Then my breathing got a little harder and it felt like I couldn’t catch my breath, which caused me to try to breathe even harder in a panic. Fortunately, a I’ve been training for the past couple in the art of mastering anxiety attacks and I’m now a Jedi master – er- scratch that. I’m now at least able to appear normal in public. I walked around some more and felt a hard lump right at the edge of my diaphragm. I have to assume that it was part of the meatball because I don’t like to think about my tumors growing heads and talking back to me.

It took about two hours for me to feel somewhat normal again. I’m now firmly back on liquids until Friday because I’d rather drink my meals than have an aneurism and die at work from a renegade meat and some whole wheat bread. No sandwich is worth a trip to the ER. I just wish that Jello tasted better.

Blink

I'm not really sure what just happened there. I was going to write all this great build up to my surgery, including another post with my unreasonable expectations and then, I dunno, I blinked. I went to school two days after work to work on a take home final. Then suddenly it was the day of my surgery, on Thursday, February 24th.

I woke up at the normal time and started to get Zac ready. My Mom came over to take Zac to school and my Dad came over to drive Clicker and I to the hospital. Of course, we were 30 minutes early to the hospital, but the nurses managed to get me into a temporary room within 15 minutes of arrival. Then this happened:

Even with bed in a banana boat position, I promptly fell asleep for close to two hours with Clicker and my Dad in the room. Apparently, my nerves weren't enough to prevent me from enjoying a good solid nap at 9:30am. When I went to sleep, both Clicker and my Dad were on their iPhones for what I assume was the entire time since they were both playing with them when I woke up. Eventually, a nurse came to get me and move me to pre-op. I said good bye to my family and boyfriend and they wheeled me away. I wasn't even nervous then, just anxious to be in the recovery stage.

Pre-op seemed to take forever, although my nurse was incredibly nice. She started my IV and then a lovely woman came to "give me something to relax," which I was told was something along the lines of medical grade Valium. It worked. I was veeeerrrrryyyyy relaxed.

Then I went into the surgery room and the nurses were all talking to each other and basically ignoring me and one of them must have slipped over and gave me more sedation because the next thing I remember is waking up. My actual memories from waking up aren't particularly memorable so I'll just skip to the next step. I got wheeled into a "Transportation" waiting area. Then I started getting angsty. I wanted to see Clicker and my Dad and pretty much knew that my Dad would be nervous until he saw me again. I tried to dose a bit during the transportation waiting phase, but I couldn't fall back asleep. They finally rolled me into the Recovery Room and I saw both of them for five minutes and then a nurse escorted them out. Then I went back into the Transportation area and waited for a doctor to monitor my upper GI x-ray.



Like before in my pre-op appointment, I had to swallow barium while the doctor watched on the monitor. Unlike before, I was in a decent amount of pain and didn't really want to be swallowing anything, even if I had gone without water or food for close to 15 hours. The worst part was when they laid me back and made me roll on my side to get a picture of the back of my stomach (note: it looks just like the front, but with more ribs involved). Then I waited some more for another person from Transportation to wheel me into a hospital room where I saw Clicker and my Dad again. My Dad kept saying that I looked better than he expected and, of course, he wasn't surprised when my campaign for water kicked into high gear. I was tired and very thirsty. It was close to 3:30 - 4pm by then and I hadn't had anything to drink since midnight the night before.

Once in the room, I was told all the tasks I had to do before I could be discharged home. I was glad that the nurse gave me a good 45 minute notice before she expected me to pee. That gave me enough time to get all the saline that I had received through IV out of me. Once my pee was measured, I got some water, ice chips, and Vicadin, in that order. Codeine on an empty stomach really doesn't work for me. I almost got sick, but managed to walk up and down the hall four times with Clicker (who I must say is really quite a task master).

I got to go home around 6:30pm and struggled though the manual transmission of my Dad's car in Houston traffic. Again, my memories go a bit fuzzy. I just remember getting into bed and waking up every 1 - 2 hours or so every time Clicker came into room, opened the door, breathed in my direction, or I woke myself up. He gave me codeine every four hours and we finally got to sleep around 2am.

I took off the pads and tape on my five incisions in the shower, with the firm instructions that I wasn't supposed to remove the steri strips below. I joked on facebook that it look liked I had been in a prison brawl with a sharpened toothbrush - and lost. Here is what my stomach looked like after multiple showers and a couple of days of healing:

I'm guessing the longer of the incisions on my right is where they went through to put in the band. There was a steri strip in the middle of my belly button, but it fell off this morning. As of this morning, I'm down 4lbs from soup, jello, and applesauce. So much soup. More soup and broth then I had after my C-section, although my Mom swears that I'm walking better now than I did after Zac was born.

Tomorrow I'm back to work. Here I go.

Conflicted

I've been hiding out a bit...

On Friday, Clicker came down to my part of town and, after a rough start, we drove to Galveston, Texas for the weekend. We ended up having a pretty fantastic time and on Sunday I urged Clicker to earn his name and go into full-out photographer mode.

Here are some shots from the trip. It was beauitful and a sunny 65-68 degrees and we spent some time just looking at the water, even though we didn't go in:

 This was the view of the pool from the room, even though it was too chilly to go in.

 I woke Clicker up, accidentally, at 6:45am on Saturday and he took this picture of the sunrise at the coast.

 The view of the hotel from a breaker in the water.

Clicker and I (this time with permission to post - and yes, I realize that we both have our eyes partially closed. It was very, very bright.)

I could never get this kind of shot on my own. This shot definitely comes from dating a former photographer who could tell me what to do and where to look. I like the final product.

Now I come to the conflicted part of my life right now. Here's the condundrum: I haven't been this happy in a long time AND I've never been bigger. I got weighed today at my final pre-op appointment and I'm now officially heavier than I was when I was pregnant. I was so big that I actually felt shame at the number. It was the kind of deep-seated shame that I can't even write about very openly. It's the kind that starts out with, "How can anyone love me? How did I let myself get to this point?" and it spirals down from there. Trust me when I say those are the kind thoughts that I'm thinking when I go into the dark place. I have to remind myself that my friends, family, and boyfriend love me for who am I, not what I look like. I need a little bug on my shoulder to remind me that it's ok that I'm uncomfortable in all of work clothes and can't imagine meeting clients they way I look now, that doesn't make me a less qualified Financial Advisor.

On the flip side, I'm very, very happy right now. I like my job and the days pass quickly. I'm excited to start my own business and learning more about the financial services industry. Things have been hard with Clicker recently, but we are trying to work through it and when he holds me in his arms, the world quiets down and I feel calm. I especially love my time with Zac. Five years-old is a great age. He's so smart, funny, and kind. I can honestly say that I look forward to getting off work because I know that I get to spend the evening with him. We just hang out most nights. Sometimes we are both on our laptops and I laugh to think that I'm raising the yuppiest kid ever, but damn, he's just so cool. He knows more about space than I do and likes to make up songs about multiplication. How cool is that?

That's my guy. I know that I need to be around for him. I just wish that my outside matched my inside.

Series 66

No, I have no idea why it's called that either. All I know is that when I got hired onto my company in late October 2010, I knew that I would have 90 days to pass the Series 7 and the Series 66 examinations. Series 7 is a 250-question, five hour test with an hour break in the middle. It's over federal law and the test designers seem fixated on options and municipal bonds. I was told point-blank by one of my coworkers in the office that if a client ever asks about the underwriting of a municipal bond, that I should fire them as a client. No joke. Basically, once you pass the tests, you aren't really required to retain the information, especially since most of the public will have no idea what you are talking about if you start mentioning bear straddles or naked puts. It kind of sounds like both of those should be done in private, no?

The Series 66 tests your knowledge of state laws, without actually being specific to any one state. The State Administrator, who is a shadowy figure at best in the study materials, can require that an investment advisor representative (aka: me, known as a broker or financial advisor in most circles) take the test before they can trade securities in any state. You can see why taking just the Series 7 would be problematic then. I suppose I could sell securities in Puerto Rico or Guam, but since I'm not planning on leaving one of the 50 states anytime soon, I also had to take the Series 66. I like living in a state. States are good.

The actual test is 100 questions long and they give you two-and-a-half hours to complete it. I found that I either know the answer to the question or don't. 99% of the questions on the Series 66 don't involve math so it's basic problem solving and memory recall. Does the State Administrator have this power? What about this one? If we blindfolded the State Administrator and put him in a room with three issuers of corporate securities, a rabbi, and two investment advisors, what do you think would happen? That sort of thing.

There was a couple hard questions that I'm kicking myself for not knowing, mostly because I feel like after 18 months in a MBA program I should have known them. I had to completely guess on how to find the alpha of a stock when given the stock's beta and the expected return. Uhh...6.8? Yeah, that's what I went with too. Then there was a question about the minimum value of an investment needed to fund a monthly stipend of $1,000 in perpetuity with an expected 3% rate of return. There wasn't enough information to do present value calculations since I didn't have the risk free rate so I just started doing some math long-hand with my calculator. It was only after I submitted my test that I realized I had assumed a 3% MONTHLY rate (or 12% annually,  which is huge if you imagine getting that rate of return forever) instead of a 3% ANNUAL return (or .03/12 monthly, which is much more reasonable). I think I've actually had this question in one of my finance courses and I'm pretty sure I got it wrong then too. Fortunately, most people think about college tuition or retirement in terms of an annual amount of money. I'll leave the calculations on monthly cash flow streams to annuity providers. They have charts and everything.

Today also coincides with Day 1 of my liquid diet. I had some eggs this morning because I didn't want to feel sleepy during my test. I had a protein shake for lunch and I'm about ready to go have another. The commercial that got me today while I was watching tv was for an Italian restaurant, but I managed to stay out of the kitchen, although I'm back to feeling hungry and a little stabby right now.

13 more days of this. Really?!?

T-1

The next big, "pass or you're fired" test is tomorrow at 8am. I was going to study more tonight for Erika, but I fell asleep and then my Dad called four times to wake me up. Good news - I'm up. Bad news - I didn't study any more.

Here's hoping that Houston doesn't close down the freeways tomorrow. Fingers crossed for me!

The Rule of 5 and 3

The only thing blander than my posts about a pair of fat shoes (which I need to return to the store) and my impending liquid diet has to be my geekdom enjoying studying all things financial in the world of legal finance.

 

Under the Uniform Securities Act (USA for short – yes, really), the statue of limitations for criminal penalties is five years, the maximum fine is $5,000, and maximum sentence for prison is 3 years. 5-5-3. For civil penalties, the statue of limitation is either two years from the discovery of the offense or 3 years after the act occurred. 2-3. The fines are worse on the civil side. Under the Securities Act of 1933 (more three’s), a person that purchased a security based on a false or misleading statement of a material fact or omission can sue:

 

• Every person that signed the registration form
• All directors of the security issuer
• All their attorneys
• And their accountants (although presumably not your attorney’s accountants. Probably just the security issuer’s accountants)
• The appraisers
• The underwriters
• A parent company
• AND Everyone and their Mom for your court fees, attorney fees, and the cost of the security OR the current market value of the security, whichever is greater.

Here is what I learned today: Crime pays. Committing fraud doesn’t. As long as you don’t mind three years in a federal minimum security prison (and really, your sentence will most likely be reduced if you are a high-profile criminal like Martha Stewart on her insider trading charge), $5000 penalty, and the revocation of your securities license from here into eternity, a criminal charge is the way to go. Basically, make sure the profit from your crime is large enough to sustain you after you get out of prison, and after the civil litigation which will almost certainly ensue, because you most likely won’t be able to get a job and the talk show circuit only pays so much. Just keep that in mind That’s the rule of 5 and 3.

 

 

 

Curse this Blog

I have a bit of a blog curse with this blog. As soon as I write about how excited I am about someone or how much I like them, a gray cloud immediately hovers over the relationship. Sometimes I'm blinded by the lightening flashes, wondering "where in the hell did that come from" and other times its just a steady downpour of rain.

This weekend I was profoundly hurt by a series of bad decisions. It was one of those situations where I should have known far enough in advance that it was going to hurt, like when you avoid putting your hand directly over a hot stove because you know you are going to get burned. But I went and put my hand over it anyway because I thought that was what was expected of me. I try to be all bad ass on this blog and say, "fuck the expectations. I'm going to do it MY WAY" but really, I'm one giant pushover away from being a loud-mouth, passive aggressive woman that can't deal with other people's disappointment. So, I suppressed everything and tried to pretend that I wasn't really experiencing what I felt. At least I'm cognizant enough to know that never really works. Now, I'm left with a sea of questions and doubts.

I thought for sure that I had outsmarted the blog curse. I waited nine months to blog about someone that I was dating and he doesn't even read this blog! Surely, this was enough to allow me a little bit of space in my little sliver of the Internet. Guess I was wrong.

I consoled myself tonight with a blender. I actually bought one that wasn't the absolute cheapest on the market, which is a new experience for me. This baby has 450 watts of power and can crush ice in under three seconds. I've decided that I'll taper my meals down to the liquid diet, which starts on Friday. Instead of doing anything vaguely healthy with the blender, I decided to show Zac what a homemade milkshake tastes like.

Nothing like soothing myself with food. Just for the record, they were pretty damn good milkshakes. I have manged to learn everything and nothing, simultaneously.

EDITED: I was in the shower trying to wash the at-home hair dye out of my hair and realized that I had kind of threw Clicker under the bus. He's a generally good guy and I didn't acknowledge my responsibilities for some of the bad decisions that were made. So, to use a grossly drawn-out vague metaphor, I present (ta-da!) a trainwreck.

At any point, I could have stopped the train from colliding with another train, but I didn't. I could have stopped the engineer from getting into the engine and tooting the train's horn, but I didn't because I thought it would be fun to hear the engineer toot the train's whistle and I like the way the engineer wore his hat a little to the left at the thought of making a really loud noise. Then the train started rolling. I could have picked which track it went on, but I let someone else decide. Even when I saw the other train approaching, I could have said, "No! Wait! Put on the brakes. There is a train approaching!" but I didn't want to cause a false alarm on the slimmest of possibilities that we would avoid the collision. The engineer even turned to me and asked my opinion about the on-coming train and I shrugged my shoulders and thought it was going to be ok. Then, it was so not ok. It was a giant trainwreck in the middle of the damn tracks and now I wish I would have taken the bus instead. End of story.