First Ketamine Infusion

I had my first low-dose infusion of ketamine on Tuesday, November 25, 2008 at approximately 3pm or so. Very surreal experience. I can't for the life of me imagine why anyone would use this stuff to get high! It felt like I was in some sort of vortex/whirlwind - trapped, weird noises, out-of-body-ish, even a bit un-human. I finally came to enough that I knew I was coming out of the anesthetic (which is what ketamine is), and that seemed to take quite a while. I'm pretty sure that we didn't leave until close to 5:30, and my doc said the infusion only takes 20-30 minutes. My pain was lessened greatly compared to when I walked in the door of the surgery center. I started out between a 6 and 7 (and was overdue for pain meds by the time I left!), but didn't take any until 6pm - my first dose that day had been at 3am. I've spent all of the 26th in bed except for going to the bathroom and nuking some leftover noodles around supper time. After the 6pm pain meds (30mg oxycontin) at 6pm the 25th, I was able to go 15-1/2 hours until the next dose - hooray! I needed my next dose at 10pm. This is a lot of progress, considering I was having to take them every 9 hours or so. They never took the pain away completely, as it is for most of us, but made it tolerable. So I'll be keeping track of my pain closely from now until my next infusion on Tuesday, December 2. The 3rd and final infusion is scheduled for Tuesday, December 9. Thank goodness for insurance, even if it is COBRA! And, I videotaped the procedure, and plan to video the others - I haven't felt awake enough to watch it until now, and I will post it if I can figure out how to do it. And as far as I know, I am the first patient in Iowa to receive this treatment. I was the first patient my doc used ketamine on.