II
Needles and Pins
Suggested listening “Needles and Pins by Del Shannon
There was nothing special about the Tuesday before New Years
Day 2012. Towards the workday's close, I am composing an email at my desk as
executive assistant to the founders of a local start-up; something I can
practically do blindfolded. As I stare down at the keys of my laptop, I come to
notice my right hand dancing across the keypad while my left hand lay
motionless on the wrist rest. What was particularly peculiar is that I fail to notice my ex-animate hand until my eyes catch sight of this bewildering scene.
A strange sensation is developing in my left fingers; a
feeling of weakness unlike anything I have ever felt before. And within the time it
takes to flip a coin, my left hand is completely without feeling. It is as
though all of the blood has drained out as I sit staring at it in my desk
chair. The sensation quickly progresses, tingling and trickling upward before
my entire left arm has become completely numb.
Perplexed by the swift progression of
this numbness, I reach to pick up the phone on the left side of my
desk. I am deliberately telling my brain to coach my left hand to pick up
the phone, but my fingers are not grabbing hold. Concerned but not yet
panicked, I walk over and stand in front of my co-worker Ellen's desk. "I
know this is going to sound strange, but I am going to try to pick up your up
your stapler," I say to Ellen. I slap my limp hand atop her lime green
stapler and again find myself without the coordination to grasp.
By
this point, I have been experiencing the inexplicable sensation for
several minutes. With each passing moment, I begin to recognize that this
is not simply an inexorable case of pins and needles. Anxiety begins
to build in my chest, as my heart starts to race. I take a long, deep breath and
per the recommendation of Ellen and the several office looky-loos, I make
the decision to walk to the emergency care clinic a couple of blocks away from
our Camp Street office. Walking back to my desk to grab my purse and health
insurance card, the feeling of numbness travels down the entire left side of my
body. My left arm, leg, and foot are without feeling as I take the
short walk, dragging my lifeless left leg through the streets of the Central
Business District. By the time I reach the care clinic, the left side of my
face follows suit.
When I mention to the embittered front
desk receptionists of the emergency care clinic that the left side of my body
including my face is numb, without hesitation they dismiss me, telling me that I "may be
having a stroke," and that I "need to be taken to the emergency room
immediately." Having spent the day in an Uptown Infirmary’s emergency
room for a head injury I sustained a few months prior when a
distracted morning driver ran a red light and crashed into the car I was
driving, I was less than thrilled with the suggestion. I call my mother, instead, and ask
that she come pick me up from the office since there is no way that I can with good conscience get behind the wheel of a car. By this time, the numbness has
remained ruthless and unrelenting for a little under an hour's time.
When
my mother, Judy, does arrive, she hastily inspects my face but does not at all
seem phased. Bothered that I had asked her to travel downtown close to rush
hour, but not at all phased by my physical condition. "You're not having a
stroke. Your face isn't drooping," she angrily
replies. "Dammit Erin, there's always something
with you," a regularly used comment by her with regard to
my existence. "What do you want to do?" she asks in a tone of
painful irritation. I reply, "I know what I don't want to do. I don’t want to go
to the emergency room. I don’t want to spend the
rest of the evening in a hospital to later face some ungodly copay."
After an hour of being
home, the
lack of sensitivity in my left side begins to feel as
though it is starting to normalize. When getting into bed, nearly six hours
after my hand can no longer type, I regain my grip, my coordination and almost
all feeling in my left side. The "needles and pins" – what I
believe to be a more appropriate name I have given the sensation - has
finally subsided. Before closing my eyes, I make a promise to myself that if this unusual affliction were to ever return, I would not hesitate ...
I would go to the emergency room.
Wednesday, December 28th, 2011
I awake the following
morning and my left hand still feels weak, sluggish and slow; it is not functioning
at one hundred percent by any means. After reading that this kind of numbness can
be the symptom of a pinched nerve, I ask to be slipped into the schedule of my
general practitioner, Dr. Brandt.
Dr. Brandt
is one of those doctors that one can really come to love, and his crowded
schedule proves this point; though I am sure the fact that he is a bit of a pill pusher helps just as well. A young widower, having been through his own
share of personal medical stresses, he is an extraordinarily compassionate and gentile
person. His receptionist lets me know of a patient cancellation and I am
able to meet with him later that day, in the early afternoon.
I describe the day priors strange phenomenon, and he goes on to perform a series of physical tests; he
tests my vision, hearing, grip, reflexes, as well as my senses using a pen and light touch before suggesting that the needles and pins can be one of three things: a
pinched nerve, multiple sclerosis or nothing at all. With his two
index fingers he loudly types up his internal report including a referral for
an MRI of the head. After leaving the office, I call the number on the
referral form and schedule an MRI first thing in the morning that same
Friday.
Friday, December 30th, 2011
Filled with trepidation, I
arrive at Advanced Imaging in Metairie at 7:45am. The older woman behind the
reception desk eyes me up and down as I approach the long beige counter. While
I am in the middle of wishing her a, “good morning,” she abruptly interrupts me
to ask me for my name. Without a reply, she asks that I sign in. Though
bothered by the unwarranted attitude I have received, I have a seat as I anxiously
await my turn to be tested.
A couple of minutes later the
sour older woman calls me back to the counter. Reluctant to have another interaction
with her or her negative energy, I approach the counter very slowly. All the
while I can hear her nervously fidgeting with papers on the desk. Making a
point not to look at me, she asks how I will be paying? Confused by her
question, I am aghast when she tells me the exorbitant price of $674.00, which I
apparently owe for the test. "How can this be? Why is my insurance not covering
the scan and more importantly, why was I not told about this when I made the
appointment" I ask? Like a robotic shrew she rattles off her habitual
insurance rhetoric … “I haven't yet met my deductible, I will have to
pay for this procedure out of pocket, and it is not the office’s responsibility
to disclose whether or not my insurance will cover the procedure unless I ask.”
Irritated by our communication,
the time that I have wasted, and ashamed that I do not have the expendable cash
that it will take to have the test done, I bid her a heated farewell before
exiting the building. I cannot afford the test that my doctor suggests; but the needles and pins are gone and have not returned, so I go on with my
day making the drive to my office downtown.
There was nothing special about the Tuesday before New Years
Day 2012. Towards the workday's close, I am composing an email at my desk as
executive assistant to the founders of a local start-up; something I can
practically do blindfolded. As I stare down at the keys of my laptop, I come to
notice my right hand dancing across the keypad while my left hand lay
motionless on the wrist rest. What was particularly peculiar is that I fail to notice my ex-animate hand until my eyes catch sight of this bewildering scene.
A strange sensation is developing in my left fingers; a
feeling of weakness unlike anything I have ever felt before. And within the time it
takes to flip a coin, my left hand is completely without feeling. It is as
though all of the blood has drained out as I sit staring at it in my desk
chair. The sensation quickly progresses, tingling and trickling upward before
my entire left arm has become completely numb.
Perplexed by the swift progression of
this numbness, I reach to pick up the phone on the left side of my
desk. I am deliberately telling my brain to coach my left hand to pick up
the phone, but my fingers are not grabbing hold. Concerned but not yet
panicked, I walk over and stand in front of my co-worker Ellen's desk. "I
know this is going to sound strange, but I am going to try to pick up your up
your stapler," I say to Ellen. I slap my limp hand atop her lime green
stapler and again find myself without the coordination to grasp.
By
this point, I have been experiencing the inexplicable sensation for
several minutes. With each passing moment, I begin to recognize that this
is not simply an inexorable case of pins and needles. Anxiety begins
to build in my chest, as my heart starts to race. I take a long, deep breath and
per the recommendation of Ellen and the several office looky-loos, I make
the decision to walk to the emergency care clinic a couple of blocks away from
our Camp Street office. Walking back to my desk to grab my purse and health
insurance card, the feeling of numbness travels down the entire left side of my
body. My left arm, leg, and foot are without feeling as I take the
short walk, dragging my lifeless left leg through the streets of the Central
Business District. By the time I reach the care clinic, the left side of my
face follows suit.
When I mention to the embittered front
desk receptionists of the emergency care clinic that the left side of my body
including my face is numb, without hesitation they dismiss me, telling me that I "may be
having a stroke," and that I "need to be taken to the emergency room
immediately." Having spent the day in an Uptown Infirmary’s emergency
room for a head injury I sustained a few months prior when a
distracted morning driver ran a red light and crashed into the car I was
driving, I was less than thrilled with the suggestion. I call my mother, instead, and ask
that she come pick me up from the office since there is no way that I can with good conscience get behind the wheel of a car. By this time, the numbness has
remained ruthless and unrelenting for a little under an hour's time.
When
my mother, Judy, does arrive, she hastily inspects my face but does not at all
seem phased. Bothered that I had asked her to travel downtown close to rush
hour, but not at all phased by my physical condition. "You're not having a
stroke. Your face isn't drooping," she angrily
replies. "Dammit Erin, there's always something
with you," a regularly used comment by her with regard to
my existence. "What do you want to do?" she asks in a tone of
painful irritation. I reply, "I know what I don't want to do. I don’t want to go
to the emergency room. I don’t want to spend the
rest of the evening in a hospital to later face some ungodly copay."
To save four hundred bucks,
I opt to ignore the suggestions of the emergency care clinic receptionists, the
Internet, and all logical rationale. I take the ride to my mother's house where
she can monitor my still ongoing symptoms. Little did I know at the time, that
this would be a decision that I would later come to regret…
After an hour of being
home, the
lack of sensitivity in my left side begins to feel as
though it is starting to normalize. When getting into bed, nearly six hours
after my hand can no longer type, I regain my grip, my coordination and almost
all feeling in my left side. The "needles and pins" – what I
believe to be a more appropriate name I have given the sensation - has
finally subsided. Before closing my eyes, I make a promise to myself that if this unusual affliction were to ever return, I would not hesitate ...
I would go to the emergency room.
Wednesday, December 28th, 2011
I awake the following
morning and my left hand still feels weak, sluggish and slow; it is not functioning
at one hundred percent by any means. After reading that this kind of numbness can
be the symptom of a pinched nerve, I ask to be slipped into the schedule of my
general practitioner, Dr. Brandt.
Dr. Brandt
is one of those doctors that one can really come to love, and his crowded
schedule proves this point; though I am sure the fact that he is a bit of a pill pusher helps just as well. A young widower, having been through his own
share of personal medical stresses, he is an extraordinarily compassionate and gentile
person. His receptionist lets me know of a patient cancellation and I am
able to meet with him later that day, in the early afternoon.
I describe the day priors strange phenomenon, and he goes on to perform a series of physical tests; he
tests my vision, hearing, grip, reflexes, as well as my senses using a pen and light touch before suggesting that the needles and pins can be one of three things: a
pinched nerve, multiple sclerosis or nothing at all. With his two
index fingers he loudly types up his internal report including a referral for
an MRI of the head. After leaving the office, I call the number on the
referral form and schedule an MRI first thing in the morning that same
Friday.
Friday, December 30th, 2011
Filled with trepidation, I
arrive at Advanced Imaging in Metairie at 7:45am. The older woman behind the
reception desk eyes me up and down as I approach the long beige counter. While
I am in the middle of wishing her a, “good morning,” she abruptly interrupts me
to ask me for my name. Without a reply, she asks that I sign in. Though
bothered by the unwarranted attitude I have received, I have a seat as I anxiously
await my turn to be tested.
A couple of minutes later the
sour older woman calls me back to the counter. Reluctant to have another interaction
with her or her negative energy, I approach the counter very slowly. All the
while I can hear her nervously fidgeting with papers on the desk. Making a
point not to look at me, she asks how I will be paying? Confused by her
question, I am aghast when she tells me the exorbitant price of $674.00, which I
apparently owe for the test. "How can this be? Why is my insurance not covering
the scan and more importantly, why was I not told about this when I made the
appointment" I ask? Like a robotic shrew she rattles off her habitual
insurance rhetoric … “I haven't yet met my deductible, I will have to
pay for this procedure out of pocket, and it is not the office’s responsibility
to disclose whether or not my insurance will cover the procedure unless I ask.”
Irritated by our communication,
the time that I have wasted, and ashamed that I do not have the expendable cash
that it will take to have the test done, I bid her a heated farewell before
exiting the building. I cannot afford the test that my doctor suggests; but the needles and pins are gone and have not returned, so I go on with my
day making the drive to my office downtown.
