Welcome Dr. Raab

Today, St. Patrick’s Day was my first appointment with Dr. Vicki Raab, a neurologist in Ocean.

Today is also a day on which my dear Grandma Nancy, my Mom’s Mom, passed away a few years ago so I spent the morning listening to a lot of Irish music, particularly the Clancy brothers singing Will Ye Go Lassie Go. Grandma Nancy’s mother’s maiden name was Clancy and her own maiden name was McDonald. We are Irish and Scottish through and through on that side of the family~ and then Grandma Nancy married a Russian! We always liked to mix it up.

I love having a car. I love the lengthening days. I love the ring of purple crocuses that just opened. I love the pink cherry blossoms which look like landed butterflies on the end of the tree branches.

And I love Dr. Raab.

She listened to my story. She asked a few questions. And then out of the blue, first thing, she said, “I wonder about porphyria.”

Which you might recall is something I too, since December of 2009, have wondered about.

So somehow we were on the same page. I with my internet medical degree and personal agony and quest, and her with her knowledge and professional demeanor.

She was Absolutely Wonderful.

A medical professional.

She wants to do some tests. Another EEG, and she will call me to come and pick up a lab slip for more blood work. She might want another MRI, and a spinal tap.

My blood pressure was good today. Something like 124/84 or something. We were both pleased and indeed the first part of my day was a pretty decent pain-free/low pain day. I was down to like a 3. This past week has been my best in 2011.

I am filled with a desire to mother. Like I just want to get a diagnosis and get well, and take care of a child who is here and needs help. I know I can help that child. It’s like I know these children who could use love and mothering are all around.

Dr. Raab did the most thorough neuro exam I have ever had, (which just made me sad for the time and money and energy wasted with the neurologist last Fall and with the doctor I had been seeing for the past 3 years). But onward. Forward.

Dr. Raab said, “You look fairly normal on paper, but I know if you are worrying about disability and you are in so much pain, something is not right.”

I asked about my MRI results, the specks and spots, and she said, “We don’t know. What they write is typical. Could be MS. Could be migraines. Could be vascular changes. That is why we do another one also. Each time you are experiencing the severe pain, maybe its one of those spots.”

I went out into a sunny day thinking that this is a real doctor. That this is someone who is going to help me.

Praise Dr. Raab.

Strangely, I now have a terrible headache. Or the start of one. When she looked in my right eye with her light, I heard crackling. And then when I left, a little more right-sided crackling began, and then I went to Trader Joe’s (which just opened here this week and is of course like water to a woman in the desert, how I love Trader Joe’s) and as I walked carrying a basket, on my right side, perhaps foolishly, I noticed I was starting to feel sicker and sicker and the right side of my head was hurting. It is like having a weird tooth ache in a place there is no tooth.

So then my right eye started to pinch down and weep a little and by the time I got back to the car I thought ‘Oh No, here we go again.’ But thankfully I got home and walked the dog and talked to a man in the park who was looking for a ring his daughter had lost, and now I am here and the headache has thus far not gotten worse.

Still, my 3 is beginning to rise.


(angel from a church dedicated to St. Francis of Assisi, NYC)