Steve's brain illness...part 1

It was towards the end of January of 2002 Steve was complaining of a bad headache. He thought it may be from his eyes cuz they hurt and they were really red. He went to an eye doctor who told him he probably has iritis. Little did I know at the time that this was a much bigger problem than an eye infection. Steve's headache continued to get worse and worse and I kept taking him to doctors who had no answers. On my sons birthday, March 8th, he was in tons of pain. The next morning....around 5 am. Steve woke up throwing up and I immediately took him to ER. He couldn't remember all of our kids names and was very forgetful. They did a spinal tap on him, which was negative, and transferred him to Utah Valley Hosp. I ran home, checked on the kids and went to the hospital. The doctors asked me if he had been to any foreign countries and I told them that he went to Viet Nam the previous fall. They told me it was too long ago for it to be something from there. They gave him antibiotics (IV) and he stayed the night. The next day they sent him home. Over the next month he deteriorated. There were lots of visits to doctors....all kinds from family to sleep doctors.....we saw them all. I took him to the ER a lot where they gave him a shot of Demerol and sent him home. I remember constantly telling the Dr.s that he went to Viet Nam but it was brushed off. I finally had Steve's parent come and help cuz I couldn't take care of the kids and Steve on my own. I was barely hanging on. With Steve's bad headaches, he was very sensitive to noises and Emily was 4 at the time and not real quite. She stayed at a friends for most of this. He also went through times where he went blind and threw up quite a bit. Then April 7th Steve did not sleep. This is what he said happened......

"That night, as I lay down to sleep, my headache seemed better than it had been for a long time. Rather than intense pain, things had mellowed to a dull background ache. I noticed that the bed was covered with a beautiful pattern of soft light green that glowed brightly through the darkroom.
Unexpectedly, people began to arrive. Strangers. I did not know who they were or why they were there. Several young women and an older man walked around my bedroom, browsing through our odds and ends as they would at a small shop. Although they did not appear dangerous, I was slightly afraid of them and wondered what they were doing in our home.My reaction seems odd. Normally, I would have actively tried to confront intruders, but now I just watched them from my bed, timid and afraid.They looked real—not in the least dream-like. Moreover, although solid,they had the ability to pass through things like outlandish ghosts. They did not appear to be interested in me, however, and seemed to wander aimlessly, chatting casually with each other. Occasionally, through a subtle motion of a hand or head, the wanderers caused a star-burst of white dust to rain down upon me and cover the already glowing bedspread. I could not understand how they did any of this, but it was unsettling. When the visitors got to the far end of the room, I jumped up and turned on the bedroom light. The people scattered. They did not simply disappear like the dark shadows created by ordinary objects, but I could see them physically flee as they zoomed away like roaches scampering to hide from the sudden light. Lori told me to turn off the lights. She was exhausted from caring for me and just wanted to get some sleep. I tried to explain but she said I was dreaming and to come back to bed.I turned out the lights; but in only a few minutes, the people re-turned. They again seemed to wander about the room like nonchalant tourists in a museum. Sometimes, one would look at me and the others would warn him or her not to do that, as if it were a breach of etiquette. It never occurred to me that they were not physically there or not real. My natural skepticism had been suspended. I accepted all this activity as patently real."

Steve was hallucinating and seeing things. At one point I woke up with him on top of me strangling me. He thought I was someone else. That morning I took him to ER....again and waited for hours till we could see a doctor. The whole time he seeing butterflies and insects of every kind everywhere in the hospital. He kept wanting to wander all over and I tried to keep him in one area. Then he was finally admitted.

I wanted to write this down somewhere so I can remember what happened. It seems over time I forget some of the details but as I write it a lot of it comes back to me. This can go on for pages and pages but this is just the brief account of what happened to Steve. During the whole time this was going on I tried to keep myself together for him and the kids but I wasn't doing too well. The dr. put me on a couple of different meds. I will finish the hospital stay tomorrow and tell you what this picture meant to Steve.