I really do. I hate pricks; specifically of the needle kind.
Let me be clear, I am totally cool around needles and don’t have a problem in the world with doing my own infusions every week (which requires four small needles that I insert across my belly and tape down). I have done home allergy shots over the years as well. It was no biggie.
I have never minded blood draws or IV starts or any of it. I am always; Ms. Oh-So-Cheerful when the nurses are poking around to get at an IV started, even when they have to do multiple sticks.
But I think I have finally cracked. I can’t take it anymore. Needles are what they are: they are little, pointy pricks. They are cruel and they make you bleed.
(I don’t hate all pricks, but I won’t draw that distinction here.)
When I was on IVIG (Intravenous Immunoglobulin ) every month, the hunt for a vein good enough for eight hours of medicine was a tough one and I know now that some of the medicines that were put in my monthly IV’s were vein killers. I took a lot of Benedryl and Promathazine right in the IV, undiluted, because that is what my nurses did. Finally it became too difficult, so I switched to the subcutaneous method of delivery I use now. The idea was that my veins could “rest” and would somehow be fine.
I had begged my doctor to give me a port a cath, which is a central intravenous line that is placed by a surgeon and has an open outlet so you can have access to a vein quite easily. Many people with my disease get a port but my immunologist at the time refused to let any of his patients to get ports because of his concern about infection risk. My rheumatologist is in agreement and says that people with my disease spectrum almost always end up with infected ports. This is really scary because the actual vein they use runs next to your heart. I understand their perspective and have put his off basically as long as I could.
However, I have just come to the road less traveled. I can no longer provide blood for lab work. Before a minor surgical procedure this week, it took two hours, nine sticks and five people to get an IV to stay in. The rest of them that were successful, blew out in seconds.
During my last ER visit, I waiting four hours for an IV and was finally given one through the groin area by the doctor. It worked but was kind of dramatic.
I cannot count on my veins to cooperate in an emergency. I will have to have a pic line; which is an IV placed along the heart (just like the port but temporary) or another one through the groin.
I feel like I have been assaulted. I feel like a piece of meat. I feel like a freak.
I feel like the patient they all go outside the door to whisper about.
I have to convey this to my doctor. It is time I got a port. I cannot do this anymore.
I have had enough pricks.
I hate pricks.