vituperation

April 14, 2005

It started on Saturday, when we were in Gatlinburg. My Claritin-D (over the counter now, yeah!) didn’t quite knock out the sneezing, stuffiness, and itchyness up in my nose. Looking around at the yellow pollen swirling in the street in great drifts, I thought I understood why.

I was wrong.

Sunday, I started feeling washed out at the end of the day, and the same on Monday and Tuesday. Felt great in the morning, but by three or four o’clock I was starting to tire out. Heck I even went hiking Monday afternoon, a good three-mile jaunt on Rainbow Mountain where I checked out a trail I’d never been on and found what looks to be a pit cave.

"It’s weird," I told anyone who’d listen over those days. "My Claritin doesn’t seem to be working, but other than being tired that’s it. I don’t feel bad at all."

And then, friends, then I woke up yesterday morning feeling already tired and washed out. Lifting weights, I had a hella time because my muscles were aching. Yeah, I’m a freak, and still did the whole workout. Just before work I checked my temperature.

100 degrees. Fuck.

You guys know me, know me well. I don’t get sick (except for that hepatitis thing three years ago, but that doesn’t count), not now, anyway. Years ago it seemed like I stayed sick but once I got into a semblance of good shape the sickies, they went away.

I went to work and sat in a fog of aches and pains, sneezes and coughs. It felt like I couldn’t catch my breath. My eyes burned, my nose begged to be cut off, sliced from my face in a glurt of snot, blood, and pressure relief.

Initially, I thought I had the flu. Should I make an appointment with Dr. Judy? The last time I had the flu, there was no cure, just some medicines that made it last not quite as long. Besides, flu season’s over, right? The more I discussed it with myself, the more I convinced myself it was probably an upper respiratory infection, and they have cures for that.

I made an appointment with Dr. Judy. My logic was thus: if it was the flu and I didn’t go, I’d get better eventually anyway, but if it wasn’t the flu and I didn’t go it would just get worse and worse.

I felt like hammered shit by noon, staggering around at work in a blurry fugue, and my appointment wasn’t until 2:50.

I posted on my forums and intimated I might, in fact, be dying.

I went to Dr. Judy’s a half-hour early on the off chance that they’d get me in earlier. Miracle of miracles, the waiting room was completely empty and they took me right back.

"Do you have a fever?" the nurse asked at the first station. I nodded, and when I stopped I had to wait for me rheumy eyes to catch up.

When she took it, my temperature had crossed the 102-degree mark.

"You do have a fever," the nurse said. I think I moaned, or maybe cried a little.

All the patient rooms were full so I had to wait in the lab waiting area. And then the nurse said the most horrible words possible in the situation.

"We need to do a flu test."

Have you ever had one of these? In essence, they take a q-tip roughly the length of a football field, wet it with some burning liquid, and jam it so far up your nose you can feel it in the back of your throat.

She handed me some tissues and did my left nostril. Tears squirted out of that eye from the pain, but I wouldn’t give her the satisfaction of acting like it hurt. So she did the right nostril. The tears rolled.

Then she stuck it BACK into my left nostril a second time.

"It’s supposed to burn," she told me, swirling at my tonsils via my nostril. "I don’t know if I’ve gotten a good swab unless it burns."

"IT DOES!"

She gave me an I-think-you’re-just-telling-me-that-to-placate-me look, but she pulled the swab out of my nose and sent me back to wait for an empty room.

Guess who has the flu, after flu season’s already over? It’s like karma, for all the times I jokingly said, "I don’t need a flu shot, those’re for old people."

Dr. Judy prescribed Tamiflu, an antiviral that is supposed to stop the virus from replicating, thus making it not last quite so long. Not only do I get to take it, but so do Robyn and the spud, for prophylactic (hee!) reasons. Dr. Judy also prescribed Tussionex (aka, "the good stuff") for the cough I’m developing.

The medicine — 4 ounces of cough syrup and 20 pills — was $180.

I’m in the wrong line of work, obviously.

Anyway, that’s what’s going on with me. Mostly I’m sitting around and feeling dog-tired. Dr. Judy also told me to take 4 Advils every 6-8 hours to keep my fever down, and that’s helping a lot. Oh, and my chest hurts like hell from the coughing.

And I’m eating Double-Stuf Oreos, because comfort foods are allowed on non-Fridays when you’re sick.

That’s a law.

Not as impressed by the daddy’s flu as the daddy is
impressed by the freakishly large foot.