Let me start off by saying that this one blog, may be the most personal I have or will ever post (time will tell). If you find yourself getting skweemish from the writing, please understand you are always free to stop (even now) and look no further. What I am writing about is a pretty serious health issue that happened just this last week and is still happening. Obviously, this is of serious importance to me but also many of you reading this might find some information that could possibly save your life sometime down the road. Just to allay your possible fears, whatever you think happened is definitely wrong.
Last Saturday morning, I was working around our house getting ready for a gathering we were hosting later that afternoon. Sara, James and I had the house pretty much together by noon, so I went to work putting together some food for the social. You see, the gathering was a group of new faculty that had joined the school where my wife and I work and the folks from the meeting were we are members. Who these great folks are is actually of very little import to the story so that will be left out. They know who they are. :-)
By 1pm, I started to feel a bit feverish and a little dizzy. Since we were 98% ready, I adjourned to my bedroom to rest. At that point I checked my temp and found it to be a mere 99.5 (all degrees in Fahrenheit, sorry rest of the world ). Still, I was beginning to feel weak, so I laid down.
About an hour later, I awoke and checked my temp again, 100.5. Now I was getting concerned. I called Sara upstairs and told her the news. She and I agreed that it was too late to send everyone away, but that I would stay in bed away from the gathering, while she hosted.
From the quiet of the bed, it sounded like folks had a great time meeting each other. They stayed the 3 hours scheduled for the pot luck meet and greet and headed home at about 7pm. A few very helpful folks stayed for another hour to help my wife clean up and left. At that point, my fever was about 102.
In addition to the fever and the dizziness and the weakness, I was beginning to feel very achy all over my body (read the joke about the guy who hurts all over) and I was definitely starting to feel nauseous. This day was not going well for me, and I was beginning to feel like I may have picked up the flu somewhere. That night, I met a fever of 103.5 which convinced me to take a dose of aspirin and go back to sleep.
The next morning was the beginning of a roller coaster of fever; up to 103 and back down to 99.5, over and over again. My appetite completely disappeared and there was not a spot on my body that did not hurt. Even my teeth hurt!
I began drinking lots of clear liquids; water, apple juice and ginger ale. I even worked very hard at eating some apple sauce and the very occasional banana. There were times where I thought I might be turning the corner, and there were lots of times where it was obvious that I might be getting worse. I was so sure that I had a flu, that I did not bother to contact my doctor will Tuesday that week.
After examining me, he was not so sure it was the flu (smart doctor). But I was so sure that I convinced him with a true story that 2 of my students the previous week had come to their lessons immediately after recovering from flu viruses. He let me go home with the caveat that I would contact him on Thursday if the fever did not drop to below 102. On Thursday, I recorded a fever of 102.5 and contacted my doctor. He sent me immediately to the hospital.
No comments:
Post a Comment