Take Two Aspirin . . .

. . . or acetaminophen or ibuprofen.  For me, hands down, ibuprofen is what works when I hurt or am sick.

That was me last week.  I was sick as a dog.  I wonder where that expression comes from?  Anyway, I had the worst sore throat since 22 years ago when I had Strep.  This wasn't Strep.  I knew it wasn't.  I knew what it was from the first moment it hurt when I swallowed.  Or breathed.  Not really two things you can stop doing for awhile.  But it was a Friday when it started and I gave myself the weekend to get better.

I should've called the doctor on Monday.  No, meshugener (Yiddishdictionaryonline.com) that I am, I dragged myself to Half-Price Books because I had coupons!  I did get a couple of excellent buys on two new releases and found two books to fill in a series I've been reading.  Oops, digression.

 

I had my tonsils removed when I was three years old.  It's actually one of my earliest memories.  The girl next door lent me a suitcase . . .  Whoa, sliding into digression again.  Everything at the back of my mouth hurt.  The soft palate, the uvula (sounds like a dirty word, doesn't it?) and, of course, my throat.  I don't know if I had a fever.  As par for the course (now that's an expression I understand) in my house, I could not find a thermometer.  Not even the old fashioned kind.  What I did find was the pain pills from my Carpal Tunnel Release surgery back in October.  Thank God for Darvocet!!  I alternated between the pain pill and the ibuprofen.

I called the doctor's office Tuesday and got an appointment for that afternoon.  Now I had a dilemma.  The pain pills were helping, but they made me narcoleptic.  So, for my appointment, I had to skip a pain pill.  I took 4 ibuprofen tablets, instead.  They barely took the edge off the pain.  And when the nurse took my temperature, it was a perfect 98.6 degrees.  The doc listens to my symptoms, looks down my throat and says he's "not convinced" it's a bacterial infection.  He tells me taking the pain pills and ibuprofen alternately is fine, as long as I don't exceed 2400 mgs of ibuprofen in a 24-hour period.  I didn't ask what would happen if I did exceed that.  I already had, so what was I going to do?

Tuesday night was the worst.  It was hot and I felt horrible.  Then, at about 4:00 a.m., I heard one of the cats retching.  It's not a pleasant sound in the daytime, but at night, it seems much worse.  Then I realized how much worse.  I turned on my light to find Jessie, one of the old girls, sick.  On my bed!  So there I am, 4:30 a.m., so sick I could cry (except that would hurt my throat) and I throwing sheets and stuff through the washer!  And that was after I washed my right leg.  Yeah, my leg.  At least it wasn't my head!  I crawled back in bed about 5:00 a.m.  I just left the mattress pad on and put a clean pillow case on my pillow.  No, Jessie hadn't actually messed up the pillow case--thank God!--but I'd been so hot and sweaty, I figured, what the heck.  The cat was fine the next day.  Must be nice.

On Wednesday, I vegged out all day.  On Wednesday night, my right eye was itching.  This isn't all that unusual for me.  I live with and am allergic to cats.  But my reliable allergy eye drops didn't help much.  When I dabbed my eye after putting the drops in, I noticed something on the tissue that wasn't right.  Again, I knew immediately what I had.  Conjunctivitis, or Pink Eye.

I called the doctor's office at 9:30 p.m. and left a message for the doctor's nurse.  She called me the next morning saying that my message had cut off and she started asking questions.  I was abrupt with her and told her that I had Pink Eye and that proved that I had a sinus infection.

By the time I got the phone call saying antibiotics were called in for me, my eyes were so dark pink and swollen that I looked like an alien with Down's Syndrome!  I should've taken a picture, but it's not something I would care to see again.  I sent a text message to my daughter asking her if she could "pick up Rx's 4 me @ CVS?"

I find out later that she did not know what Rx was, at first.  Fortunately, she's clever and deduced I meant a prescription.  Unfortunately, I had not told her they were for me (even though I'd been sick for nearly a week at that point, but, oh well, she did figure out the Rx thing!), nor did she realize the 's after the Rx meant plural.  *sigh*  It's a good thing they know me so well at CVS (or maybe not such a good thing, huh?) because they gave her the correct stuff.  She even paid for it for me!  Of course, they were only $2.50 each, but still.  I felt better within 24 hours.

A lot of my Facebook friends offered sore throat remedies:  tea with honey (I can't because of the diabetes, I tried tea with Splenda and couldn't swallow it.); wrapping my throat with hot compresses and gargling with salt water.  My favorite--and the one I actually used more than once--was ice cream!  It was so soothing and I could swallow it easier than water.  Something about the viscosity of it.  Pudding worked well, also. :-D

Today, or rather, yesterday, was the first day I felt almost normal.  I went to Target for a couple of things and wasn't exhausted when I got home!  I did end up taking a 3-hour nap, but I'm still recovering after all.  It's good to feel like myself again!  Almost.