Blood Clots.

My name is Maggie Boone. I am 16 years old. Today is November 12, 2009. I look like a normal, happy, healthy teenage girl, but about 8 months ago, in February, when I was 15 I had this weird pain in my calf. It was slight, so I didn't think anything of it. As the days and the weeks by, it got worse and worse. So, I went to Coquille hospital. I didn't have insurance at the time so of course my Mom was mad and both her and my step-dad thought it was a pulled muscle. First my parents told me to walk it off. That didn't help. So, then they said rest it. That didn't help either, then the pain was so incredible that I couldn't even walk. I didn't know what a pulled muscle felt like, considering I've never had one, so as far as I knew it very well could have been one. So, I go there. They do an ultrasound. They see that I have blood clots on the screen. They blame it on machine malfunction because it's so rare to get them at my age, they thought it was impossible for me to have them.
So, they wrapped my leg up in this bandage thing and sent me home with some crutches. They told me to rest for ten days. The ten days passed. My leg was still not only hurting, but hurting worse and the pain had not only got worse in the same spot it was originally hurting in, the pain had started to move up towards my knee. I tell my parents that and they're beginning to think I'm faking the whole thing to get out of school. Which, is something I would probably do. But, that's besides the point. I rest for a few more days. The pain is still there, still getting worse and still moving. I went to school like that and I walked around town, and I did normal stuff but little did I know.. it was making it so much worse. After two months of this non-stop, pain my leg begins to swell and get discoloration. At that point, my mom calls my regular Doctor. That was April 23rd. After talking to my mom and hearing all of my symptoms he wanted to see me immediately. We got dressed and we left. He felt my leg, and I had what's called "Pitting Edema", which is when the leg is so swollen that when you press on it, it stays indented. It's kinda gross looking, actually. So, he keeps messing with it, He doesn't know what it is. He has no idea, so he calls in another girl and she automatically thinks it's blood clots so I was sent to the hospital for a "Venus Doppler", which is an ultrasound of the leg. They seen clots immediately. I had and still have multiples all throughout my leg. I was immediately admitted, I stayed there for 5 days and 4 nights. I was staring death in the face and didn't even realize it. All I knew was I wanted the pain in my leg to go away. That's all I wanted, I had no clue just how serious a blood clot can be. They are very dangerous.
While I was there, I was put in these things called "compression ted hoe stockings", they're just really tight socks that are knee high. They are white with a hole in the toe. Or you can get closed toe ones that are pretty, which is what I got. I was also put on a pill called Couamdin and a Shot called lovenox. They are both blood thinners. The coumadin is a pill, I had to take it every 24 hours. I took it every night at 6. Lovenox, that's a shot. I had to get it every 12 hours. So, I got it twice a day. Once at 9a.m and once at 9p.m. Those shots are very painful, I mean very painful! I was getting my blood drawn, temperature taken and blood pressure thing every 2 hours. It was not fun, not fun at all. I was so happy to get released. It wasn't much more fun at home, considering I was on bed rest for two months and still on the shot that was given to me by my mother. They didn't even want me to sit up, I had to be mostly laying down that whole two months. I had to go to the Doctor three times a week to get my blood checked, which is called Pro-Time. After two months of that crazy stuff, I finally got off lovenox and I was only going to the Doctor's twice a week. My blood just wouldn't adjust right and stay the same so I was on and off with the shots and going from twice a week to three times a week. Finally after about 5 months of all of that, I was finally stable, I was doing good. Then, after 4 weeks of stable and doing good. My blood decided to get all thick again. Then after two weeks, my blood was finally good again. (: I now have been stable for 6 weeks. It's been 6 months and I am doing pretty good. I went to get another "Venus Doppler" on October 25th, they found a clot in my groin, meaning a clot moved. I was supposed to get off coumadin, and be off for 12 weeks so they can give me a test to see what exactly caused the clots. But, now I have to be on coumadin till December and get another Venus Doppler then. Let's hope they clots are starting to dissolve.

They don't know exactly how, or why I got blood clots, espicially at this age. I was having an incontrobabe bleeding problem in my menstrical cycle. I was bleeding for two months straight, non-stop. The Doctor put me on birth control to try and stop the bleeding, they put me on "Zovia". I bled non-stop for another two months while on the pill so they put me on a strong birth control called "seasonique". It workd. I stopped bleeding within a couple weeks. That was 10 months before this whole blood clot situation started. At first they thought it was the Birth Control that caused the blood clots. Then, I did a blood test and it said that I have the gene and I was going to get them eventually but the seasonique made me have them now, at this age. I have to be off coumadin for 12 weeks before I can get the real test to see if my body will create clots the rest of my life. But, first my clots need to be dissolved before they can trust my body to handle being off coumadin without creating new clots. Hopefully that will be soon.

While on Coumadin, you have to go to a thing called Pro-Time. Its a Pro-Time test. You go, the prick your finger and the blood goes on this little stick in a little machine that reads the thickness of my blood. I am supposed to be between 2 and 3 every week. I am down to going only once a week. That's just about all I have going on for now. Here are some pictures of what your leg looks like when you have blood clots. They are in my right leg.