Thank you, Dr. Fleming

So I’ve been sick. I came down with a “head cold” last Monday, but looking back, I think it may have actually started on Saturday given the amount of sleep I started to require. It was bad for a day or two, then I started to feel better. And then I stopped feeling better. Don’t get me wrong; I didn’t start to feel worse, I just stopped feeling better. I stalled out at “cannot breathe through the nose; waking up in the night because mouth and throat are so dry.”

It always takes me a long time to realize I need to go to the doctor, however, so it was not until I was talking to my mom on Saturday that I realized I had been feeling fairly awful with no improvement for about a week. “Huh, I guess I’ll call the doctor on Monday if I’m not feeling better,” I said to her.

“Oh, yes, you really should,” she said. And for the rest of our conversation, which lasted about twenty more minutes, she told me to make sure I called the doctor on Monday approximately 427 times. “I will!” I kept saying. “I won’t if I feel fine, but if I’m not better, I will call the doctor. I promise!”

Now let me tell you something about my mother. My mother is a retired nurse in addition to being a mother, a situation known in medical circles as “the dreaded mom/nurse bifecta.*” This means that my mother is excellent at taking care of other people, but will not see a doctor on her own behalf under any circumstances. She once spent three weeks in bed insisting, “They’ll just tell me to get some rest!” and only agreed to see a doctor after her boss – an OB/GYN – called her and said, “I made an appointment for you for Friday.” When she fell down the cellar stairs and cracked a rib, her first thought was not, “Ow! Ow ow ow ow ow ow! Ow!” No, it was “Maybe I can get this load of laundry in while I’m still in shock, before the pain hits me.”

So, you know, pot/kettle and all that.

Anyway. Inklings on Saturday were solidified on Sunday that I did not, in fact, have a head cold, what I had was a sinus infection. So on Sunday, Andrew took Jack to visit his parents and I stayed home by myself (and it was awesome) to rest. I had to call my parents first to tell them that I would not be able to stop by that day as originally planned, and I talked to my dad. “Oh, OK,” he said. “Well, I hope you feel better.” Then, just before we hung up, he said, “Oh, and your mother says to tell you to call the doctor tomorrow.”

I said to tell her I would, after I got the laundry in.

I did, in face, see the doctor on Monday, and he checked my ears, nose, throat, lungs… the usual suspects. He listened as I described my symptoms and asked if there were any more. “Well, I’m tired, but it’s hard to say if that’s because I’m sick,” I said, indicating Jack and my pregnant belly.

“Yeah, you look tired,” he said. Which, thanks, Doctor. I mean, I didn’t feel like putting on any makeup that morning, but sheesh.

Although the final diagnosis was not “sinus infection” so much as a generalized “infection of some kind, and why aren’t you coughing more – I can hear a lot of crackling in your lungs,” I didn’t really care where the infection was as long as I got my hands on some antibiotics. Sweet, sweet antibiotics. I ended up with a prescription for azithromycin, little pink pills that Jack kept calling “gum”, thus driving home the message that you really need to keep your medications far out of your children’s reach.

Today was the last dose, and I am feeling much better. I’ve still been falling asleep every night around 8:30, but see above, re: pregnant, toddler.

Coming soon: The Chicken Game.





*No it’s not; I just made that up. I also made up the word “bifecta.”