Thursday, October 29, 2009

Oink?


I seem to be making a habit of vanishing for a week or more and then popping in with an excuse for why I was gone. But this time, I've got a really good excuse, I promise. Really. I almost died, y'all!

Okay, not really. And I shouldn't joke about dying, especially now, but judging by recent media hype, that's totally what happened to me. You see, I had the flu. I might've even had swine flu! Quick, Purell your computer screen!

I woke up on Tuesday morning and felt a little off, like I was maybe coming down with a cold or suffering from a bit of a seasonal allergy attack. I took Indy for his morning walk and felt mostly fine, but by the time I got out of the shower I felt a little worse. And once I got dressed and packed my lunch, I felt a little worse. And by the time I drove the ten minutes to work, I felt a lot worse. I was starting to have the prickly-all-over sensation that means I'm getting a fever, and I felt a little achy and just not-right. I probably would've stayed home, but I was planning to spend the morning helping my work friend Julia finish the huge project we'd been slaving over for the past two weeks and then use the afternoon to prep for two huge events that are going on this weekend. I didn't want to risk getting Julia sick, though, especially with a three-month-old at home, so I called her desk to warn her that I wasn't feeling well. She told me what I already knew -- if I had a fever, I needed to go home -- and so I went.

By the time I got home, my joints had started to ache, and I knew that this was no allergy attack. I texted MB, put on my pajamas, and called my OB's office. The nurse asked me a list of questions and instructed me to call "immediately" if my fever hit 100.4. I crawled into bed and napped for an hour or so, and when I woke up my temperature was up to 100.4. I called the OB's office again, and got a call back saying that the doctor wanted to call in a prescription for me for Tamiflu in case I had H1N1. I felt well enough to get up and eat some vegetable soup, go to the grocery and buy chicken soup and apple juice, and pick up my prescription, but by the time I got back home I was feeling downright awful. I took my first Tamiflu capsule and went back to bed. Everything hurt, from my eyeballs to my toe joints. I'd never actually had the flu before, and I was not pleased to note that it really was as bad as people say. Woe! Self-pity! I slept off and on, took my temperature whenever I woke up, and wailed to MB when he got home that I was worried about cooking the baby.

But! Apparently Tamiflu is made of miracles and the blood of virgins, because that shit works. By dinner time that night I was ready to get out of bed and hang out with MB on the couch and eat chicken soup. By yesterday morning, I felt drastically improved, and by the time my 30-week checkup rolled around at 3 PM, I felt absolutely chipper. My fever had been down for 12 hours, so the nurse said I should come in for my appointment, and I went back to work today and felt about 100% better all day. Blood of virgins, I'm telling you.


In other news, I'm crabby that I didn't think of this long before now, but I finally updated the Rock On playlist over there in the sidebar with some songs for Halloween. I'll be posting a segment of the Choose Your Own Blogventure Fall 2009 Spooktacular tomorrow, which I had WAY too much fun writing this evening. To start at the beginning, you can visit Nancy Pearl Wannabe starting at 9:00 AM tomorrow (Central time).

And in spite of my better judgment, I'm going to attempt to do NaBloPoMo again for the fourth year in a row. I guess you can start taking bets on how long I'll last!

3 comments:

  1. Anonymous5:54 AM

    Hi,

    I'm afraid your "Rock-On" choices won't work in the rest of the world.
    Aparently due to "licensing restrictions".
    The record companies wont allow those records to be played over the internet until they are released in the rest of the world.
    I dont see any plans to release them in the forseeable future.

    But i'm sure they are very nice tunes.

    John :)

    ReplyDelete
  2. Wow are you lucky! And I don't mean that in a "holy shit swine flu = the end of the world" kind of way I mean you were essentially hit with the swing flu in a vulnerable time and your OBs office totally rocked by just calling you in some Tamiflu in time. I can say (with the sort of certainty that only working in the ER of a women's hospital during this can grant me) that you absolutely had the swine flu (because we've even quit swabbing because every swab comes back positive) and that almost no one that comes to us for help can even get much relief from the Tamiflu because it has to be started in the first 1-2days of symptoms.

    Some of the OBs around us insist on sending the pregnant ladies in to get swabbed (the swab takes >24hrs to come back) and aren't willing to call them in Tamiflu until they're "sure"... I think I saw like 20% of children have it by now so could we please just start following the whole "if it looks like a duck, acts like a duck" mentality.

    I'm glad you and brachiopod are okay!!! :)

    ReplyDelete