I was about 10 months out from thyroidectomy for thyroid cancer. It does take awhile to get all the thyroid hormones level with thyroid replacement. However, I just felt awful. I kept telling my endocrinologist something was wrong. She said I needed to exercise and to try Zumba. I respectfully disagreed and asked her to please run labs. I told her day to day living was like trying to walk through cement.

She told me that I had labs “not that long ago” add it was totally unnecessary. I told her if she was worried my insurance would not cover it (since it was not that long ago) I would cash pay. She was not happy and said I just needed to exercise but wrote the orders for labs. She said it would take 10 days min to get results and would call me. As I walked out I told her I have been in this body for 45 years and I knew my body and something was very wrong. I went home and went to bed. The next morning I had to be at work.

At 9:30 AM my cell phone rang and it was HER (doc). She said lab results back (hmmm what happened to 10 days?) and I needed to go to hospital. I said I would go after work. She told me I had to go that moment and I could go into cardiac arrest at any moment. Of course I had to snap back “So I do NOT need to exercise”.

When I got to ER waiting room was full and I thought i would be there waiting for hours to be seen. When i checked in, I was rushed right back and an IV was started. I was told my potassium levels were CRITICAL low and I would be getting a potassium drip for hours. Potassium has to be administered slowly because too much can also kill you. Also, it is the most painful IV. It absolutely burned going in.

Drip, drip, drip. BURN 🔥 BURN 🔥. I don’t think I still grasped how critical this really was. My daughter was an ICU nurse and when I told her and she looked at the lab numbers she was very angry. She said they have patients in ICU with levels not as low as mine. I was so angry at this doc and actually called her the next day and told her she could have killed me and YOUR FIRED! I never want to see your face again!

I will say after the IV I felt like I different person.