How it started....

I remember waking up on December 27th, 2010 at 1:00am in the morning with the worst pain in my abdominal area. On the left side.

To tell you the truth, thought it was the yummy chicken chimichanga I had for dinner. But this pain became really intense. I suffered most of the night just tossing and turning.

Finally the morning came and the pain subsided enough for me to sleep. I got up later and had breakfast which brought on the pain again. I ended up at the emergency room. And if you're like me, it takes alot to get me to say "Okay, time for the ER".

I had a CT-Scan with out contrast, an ultra sound and a physical exam. I was told I had a cyst on my left ovary and probably was having pain from cysts breaking. So they gave me some pain medication and sent me home.

The next day I ended up in the ER again with this aweful pain. No tests were run, but I was given a shot for pain and a prescription for something called "Go Litely". Let me tell you, it doesn't go litely! It cleaned me out but still had pain.

Day 3 - back to the ER. This time I collapsed as I was signing in. I was rushed back to the examining room and filled the doctor in. He checked my records since this was my 3rd visit and was in obvious pain. This doctor was really trying to help me. He ran tests again and this time he did two things different. He gave me a pelvic exam which told him I did not have an issue with my left ovary. He then ran a CT Scan with contrast.

Minutes after the exam, people were rushing all over the place. He came in and told me my spleen was not showing. I'm not a medical person, so I asked what does that mean. Turns out my spleen was not receiving blood. I ended up losing 40 percent of my spleen because of this.

I was rushed by ambulance to the hospital and was diagnosed with a Pseudoaneursym in my Celiac artery. I had no trauma or any other medical condition which would have produced this. I just woke up one night and there it was.

I spent 8 days in the hospital and was actually transferred to another hospital that is a trauma center. It was the surgeon's opinion not to perform surgery and send me home. I was glad not to have surgery but the first day home was really hard. Since I had been on so much morphine, percocet, etc. I believe I went through a couple of days of withdrawal. But I got through it.

This was only the beginning...