My Illness of Tuesday

I said I'd discuss my illness and then never did. So, here's your update on that.

My family spent most of the weekend at my sister's house, watching Conference, eating meals, etc. Her ward apparently had some stomach bug going around, but her house had been symptom free for a week before. On Monday night we met there again and had dinner of 5 Buck Pizza. Now, whether it was the pizza or the stomach bug we'll never know, but regardless I'll probably avoid 5 Buck Pizza at this point; probably not their fault, but those are the breaks.

Anyways, that was the setup. Tuesday morning I got up, was still tired, turned off my alarm and went to sleep for another hour. I crawled out of bed around 10 and started my morning internet routine, check the news, email, weather, etc. After sitting there for about 10 minutes I started feeling not so great in the digestive area. Curious as to if I were an isolated case I called my mom to see if anyone else was not feeling well after the pizza. She was also ill.

I haven't had digestive illness for a long while now. I thought I'd try a small sip of water as I was thirsty. Mistake. Within 30 seconds of that cap full of water hitting my stomach I was in the bathroom undoing the process, unpleasant. I've managed to not vomit in several years. I don't enjoy the process. Since I had just woken up there wasn't really anything to throw up, so it was mostly dry heaving and stomach acid... gross. On top of that my nose was running. On top of _that_ tears were dripping onto my glasses, and then drying leaving salt spot so I couldn't even see. I was a very miserable mess.

That was not all of my problems though. The vomiting continued sporadically for ~6-8 hours. This was accompanied with other... unpleasant... digestive issues. I think that from Tuesday at 10am to 10pm I spent 6 hours in the bathroom being sick or feeling like I was about to be sick, and the other six hours sleeping. I was able to sleep through the night only waking up a few times until about 9 Wednesday morning. So when I got up Wednesday morning I hadn't eaten anything for 36 hours. Tuesday afternoon after the vomiting had died down I was able to keep down small amounts of 7-up coupled with Tums, and a little water. So I was able to avoid complete dehydration.

All in all it was an incredibly unpleasant 24 hours to endure through. I really, really hope I did not pass the problem on to any roommates or friends (assuming it wasn't the pizza). So far no one I know has gotten ill so I think we're safe.

Update on Unwell v2.0

I finished my 10 day course of amoxicillin (an antibiotic in the penicillin family). On Saturday evening/night all of my previous near-death symptoms returned. The bacteria had survived the antibiotics and bred back into full force in the intervening ~30 hours. I woke up around 4 am on Sunday morning and every time I would fall asleep I'd wake up again about 6 seconds later. I finally figured out that my natural breathing pattern while sleeping wasn't working due to my swollen tonsils. So my body would fall asleep and when it tried to breathe, no air would come in and then my brain would wake me up saying, "WAKE UP YOU FOOL YOU CAN'T BREATHE". So that was pleasant.

So Sunday morning held another trip to the Urgent Care Facility in Orem. This time I got to see Dr. Christensen. Seeing that I had a textbook case of an infection surviving weak antibiotics he took another throat swab (to test for Strep: Negative) and a blood sample (to test for Mono: Negative). With these two likely factors ruled out again for 4 and 2 times respectively he decided to prescribe me a stronger antibiotic (Avelox) and a steroid (prednisone) for the swelling. The antibiotics usually cost >$10 per pill, and due to my insurance being CT only, and unlikely to cover the drugs right at the pharmacy he instead went and found me 9 sample pills, and gave them to me (which I was very grateful for).

The drugs are working nicely and I can continue about my life. Hopefully my body with the new drugs can finally kill off the infection. An interesting side effect of one of the drugs is that I have an slightly increased resting heart rate. Which provokes a feeling of slight nervousness or unsettledness. Somewhat like a person with ADHD feels. As long as I'm involved in something I find engaging I'm fine, but anytime I'd otherwise just be relaxing I start to feel like I need to find something to hold my attention or I get bothered. It's a fairly odd sensation.

Update on Unwell

I went to the Urgent Care Clinic in Orem on Sunday morning. I had a negative rapid Strep test, but because this happened to me last time I had Strep they sent a culture into the lab. The doctor prescribed me "Magic Mouthwash" which is just a cocktail of Benadryl, Maalox, and Lidocaine. It's supposed to coat and numb the irritated area; it had no effect. Then as previously mentioned Ibuprofen solved my issue for 7 hours before becoming ineffective.
Monday evening I began having fairly severe pain and went back to the Urgent Care Clinic. They ran another rapid Strep test because this time I had a fever. See I was presenting textbook Strep symptom at a severe level; because of this the doctor this time prescribed me antibiotics and Tylenol with Codeine for the pain. I came home and took my new drugs hoping for the best. A maximum recommended dosage of the Codeine seemed to have no effect on my pain, I was becoming very annoyed.
I went to bed, and slept for about 45 minutes when I woke up with more pain, and the new symptoms of being unable to open my jaw more than half way, and being unable to touch my chin to my chest. I took two more Codeine pills and but they brought no relief within 20 minutes. So, I called the Nurse Hot-Line that my insurance company participates in, and with the addition of the new symptoms she told me I should go to the Emergency Room to get checked because I may have developed an abscess. So I changed into quasi-normal clothing and drove to the Emergency Room.
I checked in at about 1:30am and there was one other person in front of me. (Random aside, they were trying to call someone, but couldn't make long distance calls from the hospital, so I let them borrow my cell phone). About the time I finished checking in the Codeine seemed to be taking effect (FINALLY!), which was quite nice. Having the extra dose of Codeine made the ~1 hour 15 minute wait bearable.
Upon being seen the registrar working that night was a guy from my last ward, so it was kind of nice to see a familiar face, even if I didn't know him very well at all. Anyways, they gave me a steroid shot to help the inflammation (I never really noticed it have any effect though). Then they did a CT scan of my throat to check for abscesses. The CT came back clean, so I was released with a follow up appointment for today at a Ears, Nose, and Throat doctor, as well as a prescription for Lortab in case the pain got worse (since the Codeine hadn't been working originally). I haven't filled that prescription yet, since I've already spent like $75+ on drugs so far.
I came home and took another couple Codeine pills and fell asleep. The biggest problem with sleeping has been that the body needs to do something with the spit it creates. So I either have to swallow it which is painful enough to wake me up, drool it (not ideal), or let it pool up in my mouth until I choke on it. My body had retrained itself to do the latter in order to get some rest. Thankfully, one of my many drugs gave me dry-mouth last night, and I slept for 4 hour stretches at a time.

I'm feeling quite a bit better at the moment, and hopefully it's not just the Codeine. I should be hearing back the results of the Strep culture sometime this afternoon or evening.

Still not good

Yesterday evening I took some Ibuprofen for a painful lymph gland. To my pleasant surprise it also took down the swelling in my tonsils and I felt almost healthy from 4:00 to 11:00 when I went to bed. I took more Ibuprofen throughout the night, and all day today, but without the same amazing effect. It still helps with my swollen tonsils, but not as much as yesterday, and now I have a painful lymph gland on the left side of my neck which seems to be ignoring the Ibuprofen.

I'm beginning to suspect that I'm infected by nanoscopic Borg virii. They simply adapt to any effective treatment. Perhaps I just need to randomly modulate the phase pulse of the Ibuprofen signature; that always worked on Star Trek, right?

I am hating modern medicine for being unable to treat viruses.

Unwell

I am ridiculously ill feeling today. I woke up yesterday morning with a slightly sore throat. I came home around 5, and by 6 my slightly sore throat had developed into an extremely painfully sore/swollen throat, a headache, muscle pains, joint pains, and a fever. That is one fast acting bug. I'm now attempting to survive on cough drops, Alka-Seltzer Plus Day Cold cough syrup, and ice cream to attempt to numb my throat.

I would wish this on no one. I haven't felt this sick in like 7 years. Honestly I can't remember the last time I actually stayed home from illness (except when I had gotten out of the hospital). I hate being sick.