Today, I was going to begin a lab test including 24-hour urine collection. To prepare, I have been avoiding coffee, tea, bananas, and citrus fruits for three days. The directions also said to avoid strenuous exercise and be “off medications for 3 days” (like the one I take for anxiety – LOL).
But I awoke at 5:00 a.m. or “O dark: 30” as one of my friends likes to say, with a headache and congestion. Usually I can take a pseudofedrine and an ibuprofen for this and go back to sleep, but since the directions said “be off meds” I wonder if it would affect the results. So instead of relieving my pain, I decided to go “google search” the test for Urine Metanephrines. According to Labtestsonline.org, the preparation for the test includes avoiding coffee, tea, bananas, citrus fruits, vanilla and chocolate. So I have been avoiding some but not all of the things I should have to prepare for the test!
FRUSTRATION.
Why am I upset? Because yesterday I ate some M&M’s and the day before had a Coke; the typed-out instructions did NOT say to avoid vanilla and chocolate! After reading the directions, I had called both the doctor’s office and the lab to double check if caffeine (in the coffee and tea) was what was being avoided. I asked if I should also avoid chocolate and soda, and NO ONE KNEW THE ANSWER. So apparently, my consumption may have invalidated the test.
Since accuracy in the test is the goal, I must now “start over” in avoiding these things, though ignorance of the reasons seems to be rampant. This is going to further inconvenience me, not to mention the pain of the headache. And I am also now upset, which can throw off the test. The phrase “suck it up” comes to mind, and I would appreciate your prayers since the test is for hormones that are released into the bloodstream in response to physical or emotional stress. I would like to be able to do as St. Francis de Sales wrote about in The Introduction to the Devout Life. Wish I had the exact quote, but it is something like, True patience is remaining patient when you are sick, where you are sick, with whom you find yourself sick, and during the circumstances surrounding your illness.
If you have the time, here is a YouTube video whose music and words stick with me even after it’s ended. And thank you for hanging in there with me.
NewDecadeNewME - Blog 