![\"IMG_6321\"](\"http:\/\/www.alwayssupportourheroes.com\/WordPress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/03\/IMG_6321.jpg\")
<\/a>“Where Throb resides …”<\/p><\/div>\n
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On 10 May 2011 I woke up with what I thought was a migraine headache.\u00a0 The pain literally was that of an elephant sitting on my head.\u00a0 After a few weeks of various doctors and hospitals; along with a plethora of tests, a friend of mine jokingly referred to the elephant as “Throb”.\u00a0 And that is the name that took on the form of being a noun and a verb for me.\u00a0 Many of my close friends and family members have asked me to write a book.\u00a0 At this point I could probably write several, and many different topics.\u00a0 But if I ever do write a book, the title will be “Lessons Learned from Throb”.\u00a0 You see, this pesky elephant has taught me many, many lessons.<\/p>\n
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One is that he is as stubborn as they come.\u00a0 He is relentless in teaching me what my limitations are, and does not give in to my negotiations.\u00a0 If he were a real person, I would say he would be a perfect hostage negotiator – because he just doesn’t give in.\u00a0 As long as I remain aware of his existence, I am not caught off guard by his tactics or the consequences of not listening to the “signs” sooner.\u00a0 If you have known me for a long period of time, you know this journey with “Throb” has not been an easy one.\u00a0 When he first arrived into my life, he pulled the carpet right out from under my feet.\u00a0 Almost every medical professional I went to had no answers, and in their inability to diagnose me, they just wanted to shove prescription drugs down my throat.\u00a0 Since I am allergic to 98% of prescription medications on the planet – I had to seek alternative practices in order to find any relief from the pain.<\/p>\n
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Because I could not be by myself for the first 2 1\/2 months of having Throb in my life, I stayed with family and friends on the west coast ~\u00a0 (Again trying to make a long story short here) and ultimately moved back to the area I grew up in Sept 2011.\u00a0 There is no way I could have predicted that medical professionals would have me in tears and completely worn down over time.\u00a0 I have sat in offices with prominent physicians, who said “there is no hope for you”, “you will live in this debilitating pain the remainder of your life”, “you are a lost cause” and in sheer frustration asked them if they would want ANYONE to speak to their husband\/wife\/or child in that manner.\u00a0 I have refused to pay those doctors for their time and ironically, never received a single bill from some of them.\u00a0 In my mission to find relief, the one thing that remained steadfast was my faith.\u00a0 Without it, I really am nothing.\u00a0 With it, I have endured what I thought was impossible at times, and found myself in the process.<\/p>\n Tigger pillow to comfort me during GunnIMS<\/p><\/div>\n <\/p>\n After two full years of no real improvement (other than when I was going to Montreal for treatments), I found a neurologist here in the Seattle area.\u00a0 She is from the Czech Republic and has a very strong personality.\u00a0 I will never forget the first time we met.\u00a0 My attitude sucked because I had “had it” with doctors telling me there was no hope.\u00a0 I was sick of filling out paperwork with every new doctor, and I absolutely refused to take medications that could have possibly been prescribed.\u00a0 (Did I mention in the summer of 2011 that I was on 18 different medications in a day?\u00a0 Or that I felt like a walking zombie?)\u00a0 But this doctor put me in my place. She asked “do you think crying in my office is going to get you anywhere”?\u00a0 She insisted that I had not done everything possible to get well.\u00a0 I was furious.\u00a0 I had changed my complete way of life in order to get better.\u00a0 I was volunteering every week like the doctors wanted, in order to keep my mind from sinking into horrible depression.\u00a0 I completely changed the foods I was consuming.\u00a0 Yet I wasn’t getting better.\u00a0 I was just hanging on by a thread.\u00a0 That thread for me was faith.\u00a0 Deep inside was a burning desire to prove everyone wrong and go back to work as a flight attendant.\u00a0 Dr. Murinova diagnosed me with a Traumatic Brain Injury that very first visit.\u00a0 (from a fall that occurred in 2010 where I hit the back of my head and don’t have any idea how long I was unconscious).\u00a0 Every other doctor had told me “it can’t have anything to do with that fall”.\u00a0 But apparently they were wrong, and someone may not have symptoms for 4 months to five years after harming their head.\u00a0 (No wonder so many of our Veteran’s are not getting the proper care after being involved with IED blasts – something I am a huge advocate for now).<\/p>\n My job as a flight attendant does not define me as an individual; but it is a vessel for me to be the person I believe God intends for me to be.\u00a0 It provides an outlet for me to make a difference for people on every flight, on my layovers, and in circumstances others may never have the opportunity.\u00a0 I take none of that for granted.\u00a0 And oh how I longed to have my identity back, because so much had been taken away from me the day Throb arrived.\u00a0 With my new neurologists guidance (even though she really did make me soooo mad at that first visit.\u00a0 hahaha), I was sent to another physician at the University of Washington Center for Pain Relief.\u00a0 Dr. Heather Tick started doing a treatment called “GunnIMS”.\u00a0 (see photo above).\u00a0 You can look up the treatment and testimonials at www.istop.org .\u00a0 Where I once was only able to have a few needles pushed into my skin, I got to the point I am now, where I basically ask her to do as many as she possibly can.\u00a0 You see, there is no medication in those needles.<\/p>\n It really is difficult to explain how the procedure works.\u00a0 It is different than acupuncture, because the needles are much longer. And they are going into muscles all over my body.\u00a0 The base of my skull where I say “it feels like a butcher knife stuck in the back of my neck”.\u00a0 In the crook of my shoulder where the bone is (I call it my chicken bone, because of the way it sticks up when I put my arm behind my back) there are muscles underneath.\u00a0 And those muscles are connected to my shoulder muscles.\u00a0 And that is where I carry a whole lot of stress.\u00a0 Sometimes when I see Dr. Tick, we talk about my care packages for the troops, or my progress.\u00a0 Before I get side tracked, I do want to say that after only four treatments (keep in mind, I had already been out of work for two years) – we started talking about what it would take for me to return to work.\u00a0 And in September 2013, I beat the odds and returned to the job I love, under the realm of “pain manageable”.<\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a>