Sick

Down For The Count

After weeks of ignoring my wife’s heed to go see a doctor, I finally did today. What finally pushed me to go? Two factors really. One is the fact that I cannot laugh, talk, or walk to the bathroom without gasping for a breathe. Second was when I dragged myself into work on Sunday morning only to be sent home by the store manager because I looked like ass. Personally I think my store manager and my wife are in cahoots here. Just a theory though.

So what did my brand new physician from the West Side of town think of me? Truth be told, she wants to put me in the hospital. I have a bad case of pneumonia. I am currently on a very aggressive regimen of steroids with an antibiotic, inhaler, and a cough syrup with codeine. I am on complete bed rest for the next 24hrs. I have to call their office tomorrow around noon. If I do not feel better by then, they are going to send me for a chest x-ray which may indeed lead to my being admitted into the hospital.

I had something very similar to this almost 10 years ago. Although the doctor I saw at the local clinic at that time never used the word pneumonia. The only difference between now and then was that my throat swelled to about 80% closed, limiting my food intake to soup and applesauce. That same doctor wanted to put me in the hospital but instead put me on meds and made me take a week off from work during Christmas week while working at a video games store (Electronics Boutique). Ironically, it was for similar reasons that I did not see a doctor. Back then, I was working 6 days/48hrs per week. I simply did not have time to go to a doctor until I could not stand for more than 10 minutes at a spell and hadn’t eaten solid food in days. This time, it was a combination of no time and ignorance…with maybe a little bit of ego.

I have literally been sick since the beginning of November. I have just learned to ignore it and medicate only when absolutely necessary. With that philosophy, I managed to get myself through the all important Holiday season without too much discomfort. I thought I could beat this thing.

I was wrong. My wife was right. Not the first time, and likely not the last time.

On a side note, I took the cough syrup with codeine about 2 hours ago. Other then a light headed feeling and some tingliness, I am not sleepy. Not one damn bit. Curse my body and its weird reaction to sleep inducers.

02/07/2011 by Trevor General Nonsense 0

Bitten

I have been down since Monday night with the infamous ‘big’ that’s going around.

Jess has been sick for 2 weeks, Jackson has been sick for 2 weeks, and I have been healthy as can be. In fact, just about everyone at work has been sick and somehow, I have avoided it’s curse. That is, until Monday night.

When I came home Monday evening I didn’t feel well. I had a sore throat and my body was aching a little bit. I tried to brush it off but by about 8:00pm there was no denying it: I was getting sick. So, I labored on for the rest of the evening and went to bed. Notice I didn’t say that I went to sleep, merely went to bed. That’s because I slept like crap Monday night. In fact, were it not for a dream I vividly remembered when my alarm went off, I would have sworn I tossed and turned the entire night. Getting out of bed it felt like my body was encased in wax overnight. Nothing wanted to move and when it did it hurt. I ignored this pain and the burning sensation in my throat and headed off to work.

Arriving at work, I had a lot I needed to do. After an hour though, I went into priority mode. What did I NEED to get done in case I needed to leave early. You see, my body was quickly winning the argument as to whether or not I should have left my bed. Mind said yes, body said no. As is usually the case, my body was right. By about 9:00am I was ignoring all the pain and anguish and focusing on getting the core work done. At one point one of my co-workers even told me that there was no way I was going to last the entire day. Sadly, I knew they were right. By about 10:00am, my mind threw in the imaginary white towel and I resigned to the fact that I needed to go home and go back to bed.

I left work and headed directly to the closest drug store. There, I picked up the strongest cold medicine I could find and headed directly home. Once home, I changed, and within an hour, was sound asleep in my bed. I would remain this way for the next 4 hours. Once awake, I got up feeling like crap. In fact, I felt so bad I could not and would not be able to fall back asleep until about 4am.

Wednesday morning I woke up to even more symptoms of this plague ravaging my body. After an hour conversation with myself, I decided to take the day off. After calling in sick, I went back to bed.

By about noon, I had to get out of bed. Physically I was still wiped, but my mind couldn’t handle being in bed for almost 14 hours. I got up, and headed upstairs to my office. By the time I climbed my stairs my stomach wanted to take the express back downstairs. Not wanting to throw up on an empty stomach, I decided to try and take my mind off of it. I sat down and coded for the next few hours, trying to keep my mind on anything but my stomach.

By late afternoon Jess and Jackson had come home. I went downstairs to see Jackson, who I hadn’t seen in almost 16 hours. He was hungry and moody, so I got him a bowl of Chex Mix and we sat down on the couch. Surprisingly, I had a few pieces and it didn’t kill my stomach. So he and I shared a nice bowl as a snack while Jess made dinner. Once dinner was ready, I had some but not a lot. It wasn’t for the fact that it wasn’t good, it really was. But my stomach could only take so much food since I really hadn’t eaten anything substantial since Monday. After all was said and done, I spent a nice quiet evening on the couch with my wife and was in bed with her by 11:30pm.

This morning I slept in until about 9:30am. I got up, showered, and then woke up Jackson to take him to day care. You can tell both of didn’t feel good since I slept 10 hours and he slept 13 hours. Not only were neither one of us feeling well, but we had to get thru this to make it to day care.

We are in the middle of a freakin’ monsoon! They’re calling for 2-4 inches by this evening. I can believe it by the way it has been coming down all morning. Needless to say, I got him to day care and now I am sitting here dreading the hour of work as it approaches. I really wish I had more sick time so I could have one more day to rest up and be near 100%, but that’s simply not a reality. The reality is that I am going to go back to work this afternoon at about 75%, and by the time 11:00pm rolls around and we’re allowed to leave, I should be back down to about 25%. Then I will come home and go to bed. Lather, rinse, repeat.

09/30/2010 by Trevor General Nonsense 0

The Week In Review

This week has had moments of sheer awesomeness, and moments of total suckage.

I had this past weekend off, and I had a most awesome weekend. Jess and I spent Saturday afternoon at Claws N Paws animal park. We got to feed some of the animals and walk around in near perfect weather. After we left the park, we grabbed a bite to eat at a diner and then headed to a bar to meet some of our friends for drinks.

Sunday was a nice relaxing day as well. Jess had work in the early afternoon, so I took Loki to Kirby Park in the morning and we went for a nice 4mi walk. He loved walking someplace new! Afterwards, we came back to the house, and then met Jess at my parent’s house for a Mother’s Day cookout. All good there.

Monday wasn’t too bad at work. There was lot’s to do, but that’s just the status quo. When things started to suck was Monday night when I could feel myself getting sick. It ended up being a quite annoying stomach bug. I won’t go into details, but let’s just say it was nasty.

Tuesday saw me not wanting to get up to go to work. I was feeling like crap, but I was ignoring it for the most part since we were having an ultrasound that day. Also, I was only working ½ a day at work, so again, not too bad there. The ultrasound ended up being totally amazing! The first picture we got of the baby was him waving at the monitor. I guess I kind of just have it away there, but yes, we found out we are having a boy! We are officially having a baby boy named Jackson Shafer in October. Here are some pictures of him from Tuesday’s ultrasound.

Tuesday night I was feeling pretty sick. I woke up Wednesday and felt even worse. I ended up getting up at 7:30am, calling off, and going back to bed. I did not wake up again until 3:30pm. I pretty much spent the day lounging and trying to keep things down. I was finally starting to feel a little better around midnight, so I decided this would be a good time to head to bed. It was around then that I heard tires screeching and a bunch of bangs. Long story short, a drunk driver hit my sister’s car, bounced off of it, and ended up buried in the neighbor’s bushes. I got to spend the next hour with the cops instead of sleeping. Oh joy.

Thursday saw me waking up feeling just as crappy as I did on Wednesday. Unfortunately, I was out of sick time and needed to go in. However, on my way in I made an agreement with myself that I would take it easy and not let myself get stressed out. I am happy to report that I was able to do just that. I had a great night, got some stuff done, and did not stress out once. I came home to a very domesticated wife who had gone on a baby clothes shopping spree. Showing me her bounty, she went to bed and I retired to the couch to watch some Stargate Atlantis. After 1 ½ episodes, I ended up falling asleep. I woke up, and hauled my ass to bed for the night.

That brings us to today. Today hasn’t been that bad so far. Then again, I have only been awake for about 90 minutes or so. I close once again tonight (2-11) which is no surprise there. It seems all I do anymore is close. My only regret about closing tonight is that it’s beautiful out and I would love to take Loki for another walk at Kirby Park. Unfortunately, he’s going to have to wait until Sunday for such a thing to happen.

I can say with certainty that life is good!

A Good Ending To 3 Bad Days

The last 3 days have been horrible. I’ve been down for the count with a Super Bug ripping me apart from the inside out.

It all started on Sunday morning. I thought it was just the aftermath of going out with the boys the night before. However, by Sunday night, I had the sneaking suspicion that it was something more. By Monday, I was knee deep in the shit. I had a headache, sinus pressure, fever, sore throat, congestion, and nausea. I made it through the entire day at work on Monday but then came home and laid on the couch for most of the night. On my way home I did stop at the store and pick up some medication. I started taking it as soon as I got home, but it was like putting a band-aid on a severed arm. I needed more. I took another dose before going to bed at 8:30pm in the hope that I would feel better the next morning.

I woke up on Tuesday and felt like I had just gotten hit by a truck. I did go to work but only made it until about 9:00am. I came home, finished up Kyla’s surprise birthday present (a computer) and went to bed. Jess woke me up by phone at 2:40pm. I got up, got dressed, and headed over to my sister’s house to setup the computer so we could surprise her with it when she got home. After all was said and done, I was home again by 6:00pm and went right back to bed. I stayed there for pretty much the remainder of the night.

I woke up this morning at 8:00am and wasn’t quite sure how I felt. Then I got out of bed. As my feet hit the floor, my head went to the left and my stomach to the right. I felt like I was going to fall down and vomit at the same time. I managed to stumble to the computer room and grab my cell phone. Heading back to bed, I called off for the day. I literally remained in bed until about 2:00pm.

Thankfully, I feel somewhat human now. I chalk that up to almost 2 full days of medication, rest, and plenty of fluids.

On the plus side, I did get some great news today. I finally got my transfer to the Edwardsville store! Why is this good? Well first of all, it means a nice pay raise. On top of my hourly raise, I will be getting spiffs in the department I will be managing. So that means in any given check I may have a few extra hundred dollars for just doing my job. Add to that the fact that my commute is about a good 1/3 to ½ of what it is now and it’s a damn good day to celebrate. I’m not sure when I start officially, but I am going over there to walk with the store manager on Saturday afternoon to meet my new staff and to go over some issues that need correcting. By her best estimates, I should be over there permanently in about 3 weeks or so. That gives my current store about 1 ½ – 2 weeks to post my job, interview, and hire someone if they want me to train them. That also gives me about 3 weeks to tie up any loose ends before I leave my life in Installed Sales behind me. Although I will miss it, I will not miss the constant stress of the job. That is one tough position!

For now, I’m going to relax for the rest of the night. There is a new ‘Ghost Hunters’ on tonight and I am looking forward to that. Later…

03/18/2009 by Trevor General Nonsense 0

Back in Action

I have been in somewhat of a depressive funk since getting hurt. Not being able to do normal tasks in the course of your day due to extreme pain can get most frustrating. Although I do have a nice collection of narcotics and muscle relaxers to help me out, I have never been one who feels comfortable being medicated. With the exception of a good antibiotic, I am not much of a pill popper.

When the doctor told me I would have to go to physical therapy for a few weeks, I really shrugged it off. I had always thought of physical therapy as something for people who are learning to walk again or relearning basic motor skills. I never thought that going to physical therapy for a screwed up shoulder and neck would do me any good. But, since workman’s comp was paying for it, I decided to give it a shot.

Man was I pleasantly surprised. After my first two sessions, I had 80% of motion restored to my neck. A short 2 visits later and my back no longer ached all day and I was able to sleep without taking a vicodin and muscle relaxer. Here I am after a full 2 weeks of therapy and I rally feel that I have recovered about 90% since my accident. I will never think of physical therapy as hokum again.

The above is mostly the reason for the lack of posts lately. But since I am feeling much more like myself (for better or worse) I am back!

The past few weeks have seen quite a few interesting things. Let’s start with my wife. She has started student teaching and is loving every minute of it. She was very gracious and bought me a present for putting up with not having a life for the last 18 months while she got her Graduate Degree. She got me a very nice 24” LCD monitor for my computers. This baby has dual VGA and DVI inputs, so I can switch between my Mac (DVI) and PC (VGA) input with the push of one button. Very slick!

ingenuiTEA In an effort to curb my nasty soda habit, I have started drinking more green tea. Being bored with the selections at my local mega mart, I went online and made some selections from Adagio Teas. I picked up 5 samples of various green teas, and a nice brewing pot. In fact, I am enjoying a nice hop cup of ‘White Monkey’ as I type this. Even Jess got into the tea game and picked up 6 samples of various black teas. So far, ‘White Monkey’ is my favorite of the green teas I ordered, and I will be placing an order for more very shortly.

I also made quite a geeky purchase on Think Geek yesterday morning. When I check my email, I saw a new shirt that I immediately ordered. The truly awesome thing is that I got the shirt today! I didn’t even pay for next day shipping, but standard UPS ground and I still got it 24hrs later.

Think Geek, you rock!

So what shirt did I get? I picked up this lovely item here.

Don’t get it? Here, this may help you a bit.

I have the upcoming weekend off and I am really looking forward to it. Not only did I have to work last Saturday, but Jess was sick all weekend to boot. The weekend before that, I also had to work and was in constant pain. I can’t wait to relax and spend some quality time with my wife, which should be an easy task thanks to me reactivating our Netflix account yesterday. We’re slated to receive 2 new Blu-ray movies tomorrow, “Zack & Miri Make A Porno” and “Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist”. We’ve also started watching the first season of Doctor Who via Netflix streaming an my PS3. Add a pizza into the mix and I smell one kick ass Friday night!

02/05/2009 by Trevor g33k stuff General Nonsense I Found A Happy Place! 0