Blog - Superior Self

The Incredible Edible Artichoke

10/31/2022

The artichoke is the official vegetable of California. It is a member of the daisy family, and native to the Mediterranean region of the world. Originating from inedible thistles (thorny sharp plants), the artichoke is the product of long and intensive cultivation that has created not just a tasty food, but an incredibly nutritious one as well. It is my favorite vegetable. Most artichokes are green, but there are some purple varieties as well. On a recent walk around San Francisco, I witnessed the flowering vegetable in full blooming glory.

The edible part of the plant comes from the softer middle to bottom of the flesh of the green petals, the center of the stem, and the inner artichoke heart. The thistly portion in the center looks like pale green or purple hair, so pull that part off before enjoying the luxuriously velvety textured heart. After boiling, steaming, grilling, or baking, we eat the vegetable by turning the petals over and scraping the inside edges against our front top and bottom teeth. Some folks like to dip the bottom of the petals in olive oil, butter, mayonnaise, herb aioli, or salad dressing, one petal at a time. I prefer a bowl of melted butter. The slow process of eating a whole artichoke can be a mindful eating activity. It is a satisfying and slow meal time. The largest artichokes may take up to an hour to steam or boil, so prepare some appetizers while you wait for the hero!

The artichoke is extremely nutritious. It has phytochemicals, antioxidants, magnesium, potassium, niacin, and folate. Artichokes contain a lot of fiber, some of which comes in the form of the fabulous prebiotic fiber called inulin. A prebiotic feeds the probiotics living in our intestines. We cannot digest the fiber, so the plant fiber makes us have a bowel movement, but the healthy bacteria living in the the gut microbiome eats the fiber as their meal. Probiotics living in the intestines help us absorb the nutrients from the foods we eat.

If you don't want to take the time to prepare fresh artichokes, canned and frozen artichoke hearts are also available. Be mindful of the ingredients list on the packaging. They often have added salt and preservatives which alter the flavor. It is also fun to try jarred marinated artichoke hearts from Spain and Italy. The olive oil and herbs they are held in add to the flavor of any dish made. Try adding the marinated jarred variety to salads, pizzas, and artichoke dips!

How do you like to prepare your artichokes? I want to hear from you!
Blessings,
KJ Landis
SuperiorSelf channel on YouTube

Some Final Thoughts on Healthcare in the USA

10/24/2022

As I wrote the past 8 blogs about my spinal health issues and emergency surgeries, I was reminded by a close friend that I needed to back up and see the bigger picture. When we are immersed in pain and suffering, we can only see and feel that at any moment. When the pain is chronic and acute at the same time, it is all we know and understand. I felt like I was being disregarded and personally attacked on so many levels during my time in the Kaiser hospital system. Someone outside of ourselves, such as a loved one or counselor can help us to realize, we are not our feelings. We can acknowledge them, yet move on. We can move forward, and by being a health advocate for ourselves, we can fully take care of our overall wellness, being a partner with the experts. Isn't that what I try to do when I teach yoga and Pilates, personal training, and meditation? I try and give personal empowerment to each and every student. My personal motto for the students is always the same: LOVE YOURSELF INTO A BETTER EXISTENCE.

Now that the fog has cleared, and some time of healing has occurred, I can see the bigger picture, the 30,000 foot view from the clouds. Healthcare workers in the USA (and worldwide) have been extremely overworked and driven to exhaustion over the past 3 years since the pandemic began (even before the virus was identified, thousands of people were overtaxing the healthcare system with a mystery illness). They have been forced into overtime, not compensated for their own pain and suffering, and many couldn't even go into their own homes to be with their families after their extra-long shifts (due to safety concerns or short turnaround times between shifts). Many weren't given the mental or physical support by the management that they needed. Workers' face masks had to be used over and over again! Simple procedures all of a sudden became complicated ones, there were too many questions and not enough answers surrounding the pandemic virus and its variants.

Everyone was playing the blame game. Even the politicians were playing the blame game, from the top down, and that wasn't helping heal the sick or help the healthcare workers partner up and solve any of our systemic problems. All it did was show how broken we are in our healthcare system overall. Many healthcare workers left the industry. So, who was left? Now, near the end of 2022, most hospitals, clinics, live-in facilities, and short term care units are severely understaffed. There is such a need for staff that many are seeing the financial benefits of becoming traveling nurses, travelling medical social workers, and all support staff, even down to the cleaners and food service workers in the healthcare industry. Finally the money is there to support some of the desired incomes, but the solidarity of a consistent work environment and common goals shared in many settings is gone. There is a lack of comradery. There is a lack of community. When a group of workers share the same or overlapping shifts together for years, they become a family. There is a sense of knowing and trust. I have experienced this myself as an employee of 25 years at the Hilton in San Francisco.

I do not think the people who choose to go into the healthcare fields do so just to make money. I think they truly want to help people. The amount of schooling and dedication is large and long. The education and training is expensive as well. Now it is time to back up even further to see the world view as we move forward in the care of our world citizens. Let us take better care of the professionals who take care of us.

Blessings,
KJ Landis
SuperiorSelf channel on YouTube

Spinal Surgery Diary, Part 7

10/19/2022

After a few days at home, my physical therapist came to my home. Luckily for me, he was the same person who was helping me last year after my total knee replacement surgery. I immediately felt better taken care of than when I was in the 2 hospitals. I made great progress, and within a week I was able to walk up and down my stairs, and also was able to walk to the corner of my block with a cane and my physical therapist as my companion. Getting in and out of my bed was the most painful experience in the 24 hour cycle of healing. I began to get "moon face," a condition caused by the steroids in my system. My face puffed up, even though the rest of me was wasting away from inactivity. I lost all of my muscle strength. I called my new condition, "flat-ass-itis," to try and inject humor into my lack of exercise.

At day 12 of home healing, my physical therapist thought it was time to learn how to sit in a chair. Up until this point I had been flat on my back or walking upright a few minutes here and there. I was successful at sitting 2 minutes at the kitchen table without pain. It made me realize that humans are not meant to be sitting at desk jobs all day long. This is why lots of lower back aches are caused by sitting, driving, etc. We are meant to be moving upright, all day long!

I was so thrilled not to be eating flat on my back. Later that day I ate dinner at the kitchen table while speaking to a friend on FaceTime. I lost track of time. Maybe it was about 20 minutes of seated activity? It was definitely too long to be seated in a chair. A few hours later, my right buttock and leg began to hurt incredibly, and by morning the level 9 to 10 pain with electrocution was back. The crying ensued. I called my Kaiser surgery team and they doubled my prednisone and told me to stop sitting up altogether. After a few days I felt some relief. By the time 3 weeks had rolled around, I still was not comfortable. We drove back to San Jose and had my stitches taken out. It was still hard to move comfortably, especially in and out of bed. I still was either flat on my back or standing tall. After another MRI, it was shown that my disc had reherniated. The plan was to have a more invasive surgery, a spinal fusion. The only issue was with the pre-operative appointments by phone. My surgeon wasn't available for more than 3 weeks, just to talk! I immediately let the staff know that I wasn't prepared to suffer this deeply for another month. They somehow had to make it work.

Miracles showed up, and there was a cancellation for a phone appointment just a few days later. When I asked about if I could just skip the chat and have the surgery instead, the phone scheduler laughed. Then she got more serious and said, actually, there was a free spot for surgery two days after my phone appointment. Winner, winner, chicken dinner! Talk about manifestation!

My spinal fusion surgery was scheduled for September 8, less than 4 weeks after my initial surgery. I knew relief was in sight. Spinal fusion is when they take the disc out completely, substitute a rubber disc, and stuff pieces of bones and ground up bones in between. Then they create a metal cage around the lumbar 5 and sacrum 1 bones, add screws, and sew the back up again. The bones will grow into the screw threads and there is no more disc to leak. There will be no more movement between the L5 and S1 bones. They also planned on fixing the broken L5 vertebra. More stability and less electrocution was in my future!

Please share this with loved ones and your social media. It is important to speak up for your own health.
Blessings,
KJ Landis
SupeiorSelf channel on YouTube

Spinal Surgery Diary, Part 8

10/19/2022

On September 8, we woke up early and drove to San Jose, about an hour away. This time I was sent 2 preoperative kits in the mail! I was fully prepared with my cleansing wipes and special carbohydrate drink! When I arrived, the admitting and surgery team were very accommodating, especially compared to the last surgery and hospital experience. For full disclosure, between surgery one and surgery two I called the county health department in San Mateo and San Francisco, in order to share my experiences and disappointment with my care at Kaiser. Later on, after the second surgery, I also made a full report with Kaiser grievance department too. In order for me to stop crying and feeling like I was not hear, seen, or cared for, I needed to release in an official manner.

I stayed in the San Jose Kaiser for 3 days. Some of the same staff was there to take care of me again, and they were my favorite nurses! The day I was to leave, I lost all control of my right leg and fell. Lucky for me, nothing was seriously damaged. A nurse and a passerby helped pick me up and put me back into bed. Even though I fell, my prognosis was so good that I was released off of the Prednisone, which was creating "moon face" and mood swings. My beautiful teenage daughter brought me home, and laid with me in my bed for a little while. I could actually feel the spine stabilizing and I could also move around the home with less pain. The exiting and entering of my bed was much less painful even 1 day after surgery! I was able to sit at the kitchen table the day after I got home! I was told to literally do nothing except walk to my bathroom and back to bed for 3 weeks. For an active human like me, this was difficult. I was distracted by a steady stream of loved ones visiting me.

I had forgotten how many weeks it had been since the fusion surgery, and due to the medications I was on, somehow thought I was further along than I was. I walked too long outside with my husband about a week after surgery and the next morning woke up with a huge pear shaped swell at the incision site. I was told by telephone from a physician's assistant to put heat on it to improve circulation. After a week, the swelling still wasn't deflating. Then I went in to have my stitches removed. The other physician's assistant said cold compresses are for reducing swelling and hot was for stiffness. So, I was given the wrong information initially. Wow. I said that I hoped there was a conversation to be had with the initial advice. The response was a smile and silence. After all, they are in the exact same surgery unit and hold the same position...

Now, I am 4 weeks into my home healing journey. I can walk about 20 minutes around the block without a cane. I am off of all pain medications. When I went off of the heavy medications I had diarrhea for 4 days. I suppose this was the release I needed. I had constipation for days off and on since the initial pain began in May. Narcotics will do that to a person. Also for the first time in my life I had hemorrhoids. I am currently on medication for those, and being tested for a bacterial infection in my colon. When a person takes antibiotics in the IV for lengthy periods of time, usually during hospitalizations, it is easy to wipe out all of the good bacteria when killing the bad bacteria. I feel so much better all around, though. My physician's assistant said that my back and leg will never be completely without pain for the rest of my life. I will have good days and bad days. I will be able to be active again, but there is a chance the disc above the fusion will herniate later on in life. I must be mindful with my movements.

Isn't that part of our wellness goals anyway? Be mindful in words, deeds, actions, and thoughts...
Please share this with your loved ones and on your social media channels.

Blessings,
KJ Landis
SuperiorSelf channel on YouTube

Spinal Surgery Dairy, Part 6

10/17/2022

Finally, surgery day was here! On Thursday, August 11, I woke up at around 8 am, asking for my carbohydrate drink once again. This particular drink is given to enhance surgery and recovery, and is routinely drunk given a few hours before surgery. Once again I was denied because the intake doctor from the previous evening was not listening to what happened at the previous hospital, how it was supposed to be traveling with me. Then I was told it would be sent to my room at the Spine Specialty hospital in San Jose. The surgery nurses could only exclaim, "Too late now!"

The lumbar laminectomy and discectomy surgery is where the surgeon removes parts of the spine that are close to the spinal cord in order to make more space as the nerves and cord heal from the foreign matter breaking off of the disc, disc center, and broken bone bits, pressing upon my nerves. The surgery team also removes all of the foreign bits off of the nerves. Afterwards, there is more room around the spinal cord, and within a year the nerves should stop the feeling of numbness, tingling, and electrocution. Luckily for me, I only had to ask a few times for the catheter to be inserted before surgery. I knew I would have a problem if I couldn't relieve myself for hours. They gave me general anesthesia and then flipped the whole table over, like I was the center of the sandwich with my face down.

After surgery, I remained in the hospital 3 more days, for a total in-patient of 8 days, not including the off and on ER visits. When my husband came to pick me up at the hospital, I remember the discharge nurse specifically saying I was off of all chores for 6 weeks. That was a blessing! The ride home was interesting, as I was laying down as flat as the seats would allow. I was reminded of my childhood vacation rides, traveling along the highways and staring at the electrical wires as they danced along the skyline. I appreciated the clouds, the sky, and the trees. I appreciated the sun warming my skin through the window as we traveled from San Jose towards San Francisco.

When we arrived home, I had a walker and a cane to help me maneuver back into the house. Soon after settling into my bed, my home health physical therapy team called and set up weekly appointments to help me get in and out of bed, and to learn how to safely walk around the house a minute or 2 every hour. I was still suffering from the electrical shocks, but knew they would subside over the next year. I felt positive about my future. The hardest part for me, mentally, was, now, my extremely active lifestyle was to be completely placed on hold. It was really difficult to swallow that information, as my whole life is wrapped up in movement and meditation, in work as well as in play. How do I define myself without movement? For the weeks to come I cried all day long, off and on, due to the pain medications, my healing process, my pain levels, the intense level of Prednisone steroids in my body, and my lack of independence. My husband tried to make me laugh every day. He would mention that my 10 minutes of feeling sorry for myself was almost over, so it was time to change my attitude again. Bless that man, my ride or die for 33 years!

Please stay tuned for part 7 of my spinal surgery diary! Share these with your loved ones, and on your social media.
Blessings,
KJ Landis
SuperiorSelf channel on YouTube

Spinal Surgery Diary, Part 5

10/14/2022

After a night with multiple pee pads taped to my body like diapers, I finally received antibiotics in my IV for the UTI. Wednesday morning, I had a few more phone and Zoom visits with the surgery staff at San Jose Kaiser. They were setting me up for Thursday's surgery. I was really ready to move to a specialty center. Perhaps there I would be treated as a suffering human instead of dismissed as a person who was annoying the staff. I still had not figured out the state disability application on line with EDD. Luckily for me, a nurse who had surgery the year before helped me out as he passed by my room to see if I needed anything. Hip, hip, hooray! I am grateful for the miracle.

I was visited by a floor doctor, patient care coordinators, and daytime staff of nurses, cleaners, assistants, and food service staff. I could only drink broth, and it was delicious. I kept asking for the surgery kit with the special carbohydrate drink, and after 4 requests, I was told that now I would receive it in San Jose as soon as I arrived. I made them pinky promise. I also asked multiple times when my ambulance transport was going to happen, and I was put off multiple times without an answer. I asked for something to help me make a bowel movement. After 4 hours I was finally given something to help with the pressure in my belly. Remember, I could not put any pressure on my right foot or leg. I could not stand or sit. I was handed a bed pan to handle lifting my body all by myself in order to defecate without any assistance. At least I was issued 4 diapers for the transportation to San Jose.

At 5:15pm, exactly in the middle of rush hour on a weekday, the ambulance arrived to transport me to the other hospital. It took 2 hours plus more time to set me up in the new hospital room. The ambulance staff were incredibly kind. Unfortunately my UTI was not so kind, and I urinated through all of the diapers, pads, and onto the gurney. Perhaps the floor was wet too. I kept crying, saying I am so sorry, ashamed, and embarrassed. The ambulance staff lifted my spirits up, telling me that it was their job to assist, and to release any negative feelings about my condition during the travel.

When I arrived in San Jose, there was only one nurse who came in to see me after almost 45 minutes. It was too late for any food or water, except for my carbohydrate drink, which was to be taken the next morning. I hadn't eaten anything since August 4th except broth on August 7th. The nurse explained that they were extremely understaffed. At around 8:45pm, a doctor came in, saying he was my intake doctor who would put all of my information in their computer from the other hospital. I was asked to share why I was there. After 60 seconds I was abruptly told to stop talking. He said he could not do his work if I was talking. Wow. Just wow. He had a horrible bedside manner and obviously did not care about the patient at all. After he left the room, 2 nurses came in to finish the intake of my situation. They were much better at listening. I asked the doctor about my pre-surgery kit with the special carbohydrate drink which was supposed to help healing during the surgery and afterwards. He said that he didn't see it in the medical orders, so he was not going to give it to me. This is standard procedures for any surgery. I kept asking for my regular medicines as well, which were to be put in the IV and also given to me by mouth. This intake doctor either eliminated or changed some of my medications without even confirming with me what I was already taking! He completely dismissed me when I asked for the carbohydrate drink again! I think I cried a river of tears since August 4th. Both of the night nurses shared that this particular doctor was not compassionate or caring. He was not a favorite among the staff there. I cried myself to sleep. I prayed that the next morning's surgery would be guided by God.

Stay tuned for part 6 of my spinal surgery diary. Please share with your loved ones and on your social media.
Blessings,
KJ Landis
SuperiorSelf channel on YouTube

Spinal Surgery Diary, Part 4

10/13/2022

On Tuesday, August 9, 2022, I was still in-patient at Kaiser, South SF. The afternoon was full of visiting staff, making certain that I was aware of my Zoom appointments imminent. I was scheduled for a laminectomy and discectomy for Thursday in San Jose Kaiser. This particular hospital is a spine specialty center. I was to be transferred by ambulance on Wednesday. The patient care coordinator told me that there is a special carbohydrate drink I was to carry with me and take 2 hours before surgery to ensure rapid healing. I asked if they were going to bring me the kit or should I send my hubby upstairs to get the drink and special wipes for sanitizing my body. The staff assured me that I would have everything ready before the ambulance took me to San Jose on Wednesday.

Meanwhile, the social worker came into my room and quickly gave me the rundown of the disability forms I was to fill out on line. I was given 2 weeks disability at first, and then 6 weeks total with this surgery. Unfortunately, with all of the pain medicines inside my IV, and now feeling like I had a UTI as well, I was not understanding the social worker well. I felt overwhelmed with all of the tech instructions. I asked for her phone number or office extension so that I could contact her in case I became stuck while applying on-line. The reply was that she didn't have an office or phone number because she was a floating social worker amongst many Kaiser hospitals and therefore could not assist me. The suggestion was that I get a tech savvy friend to help me. After the social worker left, I tried many times to make the disability application complete, but my skills were limited due to the drugs in my system. I began to cry again. Also at this time my catheter was really irritating me something fierce.

I asked to have the catheter removed. After it was removed, there was blood in my urine. I still couldn't walk due to the electrocution pulsing through my right buttocks, leg, and foot. I asked for a UTI test. They gave me an external catheter. It really is a cool invention. It looks like a white hot dog made of thick gauze in a blue rubber hot dog bun. I was to place the entire thing between my legs into my crotch. When I felt like I had to urinate, the suction began, and the urine is taken to a container on the wall behind my bed through a tube. The UTI test was given. I had not pooped in 6 days at this point. I was feeling pretty sorry for myself at this stage of my visit. I still wept on and off all day and night, just as much for the medical system not believing me for days as I suffered in pain as the pain itself. Maybe Kaiser ER thought I was a drug addict looking for pain meds when I went to the ER multiple times? This was the first experience in 25 years with Kaiser where I was not treated as a human telling the truth.

Late Tuesday evening, a night nurse introduced herself. She said that she was a visiting nurse from Texas and was used to critical care in the cardiac unit, so there wasn't much to do here. She said that she was right outside my door if I needed anything. However, when my external catheter wasn't working correctly, I peed the bed multiple times. Her tune changed quite dramatically. My night nurse didn't even offer me adult diapers to make me more comfortable. I was chastised for not having the external catheter in exactly the right spot to work correctly. The team had to change my bedding, my outfit, put pads under me, and eventually decided to tape the bed pads around my torso like a diaper. This was so they had less visits to make to my room. Meanwhile, I asked for the results of the UTI test. After it was shown to be positive, I asked multiple times in the wee hours of Wednesday morning for the antibiotics for my UTI. Between 1am and 3am, the nurse telephoned the on-call doctor 3 times at his home asking when the pharmacy was going to be sending it up to me. After the 3rd time, my night nurse came in to tell me that I had to chill out because she was being yelled at by the doctor, telling her to stop bothering him at home. Meanwhile I was still suffering from the UTI! So when the test came back earlier, and was shown positive at around 5:45pm, nobody had given me the results information or medicine to help with relief...

Please stay tuned for part 5! Please share with your social media and friends and family. We need to be our own health advocates when we are really in the weeds (and any time we have a health concern)!
Blessings,
KJ Landis
SuperiorSelf channel on YouTube

Spinal Surgery Diary, Part 3

10/12/2022

As I loudly screamed and cried in the ER on August 7, 2022, around 12:45pm, the ER doctor in charge and a head nurse took turns coming into the area where I was being treated and yelled at me more than once. They said that I had to calm down because I was frightening the other patients! They finally subdued my rants with ketamine in an IV. I didn't know what that was, but it was stronger than anything else they had previously given me in the past 2 visits. So this was proof that when they told me on day 1 and 2 that they had given me the strongest available legal pain killer in the ER, they were lying. This was my 3rd visit to the ER within 4 days. I softly wept and for over an hour begging for a catheter. At this time, it had been more than 6 hours since peeing and I have a history of bladder retention. Remember, I also hadn't pooped in 4 days.

Once again, they didn't believe me. The staff took their sweet time, ordering a sonogram to see how much fluid was actually retained in my bladder. Only after this procedure did they assess that my hollering was for a legitimate reason, and gave me a catheter. Immediately, almost a liter was emptied. I could feel the plastic tubing scraping the insides of my body which later on provided me with a gift of a urinary tract infection on top of everything else that was going on. As I wept more quietly, I changed the the mantra to, "I neeed an MRIIIIII!" After an hour and a half more, I was rolled into the MRI area and also had an XRAY of my back. As I suspected, the spondololysthesis weakened the spine, and there was a disc herniation between my lumbar 5 and sacrum. In my case, the center of the disc leaked onto the main nerves controlling the muscles in the buttocks and legs. The gel, particles of hard disc, and broken lumbar bone were entering my nerves, creating the severe internal electrocution of the right lower parts of my body.

I was admitted to the hospital while they were trying to figure out what to do next. I continued to cry, my jars of tears collected from the fact that for days the medical professionals didn't believe me, as much as from the continuous pain and suffering. Luckily for me, I was scheduled for an emergency epidural the next day, a Monday, To my surprise, my regular chronic pain doctor was there to administer the steroids into my spine on the right side. An epidural puts steroid medicine precisely into the area of the spine to help relief the pain for months. It is not the same as a completely numbing epidural when a woman chooses this in labor and delivery. The epidural gave me some relief for about 24 hours. I still was not permitted to get out of bed, as I could not anyway. It was physically impossible.

My chronic pain doctor checked in on me on Tuesday afternoon in my room. He set up an appointment for later in the day with a spine surgeon specialist by Zoom. Hallelujah!

Stay tuned for part 4. Please share this on your social media and with anyone you love.
Blessings,
KJ Landis
SuperiorSelf channel on YouTube

Spinal Surgery Diary, Part 2

10/11/2022

After my second dismissal and disbelief from the ER at Kaiser South San Francisco on August 5, 2022, I went home. My soul sisters came over in the evening and brought an infrared heat lamp, CBD creams, and love. As I cried, they massaged my body and added their magic. I was finally able to sleep without crying for a few hours.

By August 6, 2022, a Saturday, I could not drive at all. I was unable to get a substitute teacher for the yoga and Pilates classes I had to teach. I took an Uber to the studio and explained to the students that I would explain in great detail the movements and the advanced students would model the moves. I was able to keep myself together without melting down in tears and screams. After the last class, the electrocution was as if I was struck by lightning. I crawled on the floor to the lounge bed and called Kaiser. The advice nurse said that a regular doctor could prescribe narcotics and also admit me so it would be better to get an urgent care appointment for the following day, Sunday. Great! I had a 2:10pm appointment for Sunday, August 7, 2022. I called for an Uber and somehow made it home. The Uber driver sensed something was wrong and he prayed with me. I felt so very grateful.

I couldn't eat, and couldn't sleep well because I was crying so much. My husband said I was whimpering in my sleep from discomfort. The next morning, at 7am, I couldn't put any pressure on my right foot at all, I crawled to the bathroom and tried to pee. It sent me to another planet, and not in a delightful way. After a few attempts and a slight success, I crawled back to bed. My husband was out of the home for a little while. I cannot remember why. I was crying and talking to myself until about 10am when he came home. I then asked him to help me to try to pee or poop. We were unfruitful and my screams amplified. I then ranted that I could not walk, pee, or poop, and I screamed for a catheter. Now it had been 4 days since my last bowel movement and hours without urinating. I begged for him to call 911, because I couldn't move. If I were an actor in a film, I definitely would have won an award. I felt my internal soul bleeding out, guttural screams and tears, snot and tear stained clothes, perspiration pouring out of me.

My husband knows I am dramatic by nature, so he begged me to just let him take me to the appointment we already had set up for 2:10pm. I screamed that I could not make it even down the stairs to the car! Please, please, please call 911. After what seemed like hours, he called 911 and asked their advice. He sked if they could send an ambulance to carry me to their vehicle and to my appointment. The operator firmly told him that the protocol was not in the style he preferred. They would take me back to the emergency room at South San Francisco Kaiser! A little after 12 noon a team arrived and caried me into the ambulance and to the hospital once again. Finally, they believed me! I was rushed into a separate area of the ER, the ICU part of the ER.

Thank you for reading this. Please stay tuned for part 3. Please share with your loved ones and on your social media. We need to share our health care stories so the system is held accountable.
Blessings,
KJ Landis
YouTube channel is SuperiorSelf

Spinal Surgery Diary, Part 1

10/10/2022

Dear Tribe,
I have not written a blog in 2 months. Unfortunately, I had emergency spinal surgery on August 11, 2022, and again on September 8, 2022. I will try and keep the blogs short, and write more often to share my journey to healing. I have been flat on my back and in bed, on pain medications which keep me from thinking clearly enough to write. Now the fog has cleared and I can share my life once again.

In late May, early June, 2022 I had an ache in my right buttock cheek. I assumed I worked out too hard, or taught too many movement classes. By July 14, the ache was strong. By August 4, after my last personal training client, I knew something was abnormally wrong with my body and drove myself to the ER at South San Francisco Kaiser Hospital. I could barely enter or exit my car. The ache was moving down the right leg and into my foot. It began to feel like a mild electrocution. It was painful in the body to urinate or defecate. I hadn't made a bowel movement in 2 days. The ER staff didn't do much except put Ibuprofen IV in my arm for 4 hours and send me home with spasm medication. I was there from about 6pm until after 10pm. I wasn't having spasms. The pain got worse overnight.

On August 5, I told my husband to drop me off at the ER again because the pain and electrocution feeling was getting stronger, level 9 pain, on a scale from 1-10. I was weeping continuously from the pain. I still couldn't make a bowel movement as the pain of pushing sent electrifying shocks down the buttocks and right leg into the foot. There was numbness and tingling all over the leg as well. I suspected my childhood spondololysthesis condition was the source of the issue. This is where a vertebra is slightly out of place and pushes upon the bones or nerves around it, causing pain or numbness. I had left leg numbness and back pain over the years off and on, but never right side pain, ever.

I was sobbing, begged the ER nurses for hours for stronger pain medication to be put in the IV. They lied and said that the medication I was given was the strongest available to them. After more than 3 hours of begging, I was given Dilaudid. It made me dizzy for 20 minutes, but did nothing for my pain. I also begged for an MRI because that would show the issues with my spondololysthesis condition, and the soft tissues affected.

The ER nurses refused, saying quite plainly that they don't have time to take me for n MRI, when they need to save that test for heart attack patients, for people with severe emergencies. Hmmm, even I know heart attack patients don't receive an MRI. Then they continued to say that they don't give heavy medication to people with back aches. I never once told them I had a back ache. I did not have a back ache. I said this out loud to the staff. I was consistently dismissed and was not taken seriously on the 4th or 5th of August. I was again released after about 4 hours with another prescription for the same anti-spasm medication. My husband brought me home, and I crawled into bed, weeping.

I think Kaiser staff didn't believe me because I am youthful looking, muscular, and vibrant, especially for my age. This is due to my active lifestyle. I was blinded by pain and suffering, yet was not taken as a person telling the truth. As a woman in her mid to late 50s, I know my body very well. I have deep women's intuition and practice yoga and Pilates. I am mindful of what I feel and how I move.

Thank you for reading. Stay tuned for part 2 of my spinal surgery diary. Please share with your loved ones and your social media. We need to be advocates for our own health!
Blessings,
KJ Landis