Droooool..

I am sick and miserable. I rarely even get a cold even when exposed to them during chemo with my white blood count down but now I appear to have strep throat. It hurts to swallow so I drool like a St. Bernard and it's disgusting. My throat has been vaguely sore for the past few days but I didn't feel badly otherwise and was still able to run without feeling miserable. I have no symptoms of a cold or flu. In the middle of the night Friday, I took some ibuprofen for pain relief-did nothing for my throat but it made my arm feel better (so the bad arm is probably not due to neuropathic pain). I had agreed to meet with a friend's physician yesterday while she was undergoing surgery. I ended up taking some vicodin on am empty stomach right before I left. I still felt OK otherwise, just wanted the throat to stop hurting, which it did for a while. While sitting in a coffee shop with my friend's husband, I suddenly felt a huge wave of nausea and ran to find a bathroom. Couldn't make it and I ended up throwing up all over the place in a hallway. Very embarassing. I went to clean myself up and got cleaning supplies to pick up my mess which had disappeared by the time I got around to it (we were in a hospital). I went home and threw up some more just as my daughter-in-law was knocking on the door with my granddog Sunny. I let them in and my pug promptly pees on the floor. Ugh. Do I need this? Steve shows up a half hour later not thrilled with our house guest and my uselessness.

What I should have done is see my doctor yesterday but I felt too bad to even deal with the phone calls. Now it is Saturday and I am trying to convince the nurse I can self-diagnose, just give me a script for antibiotics please so I don't have to wait hours in an Urgent Care facility with H1N1 people. She is now consulting with the doctor on call who isn't my regular so I might be SOL. I do feel better. I might even eat something other than mango gelato.

Naomi came over but I wouldn't let her stay in a room with me. I need to help her today. Strep throat isn't very contagious but can be. I remember when my nasty neighbor Bonnie (thankfully moved away) sent her little darling to play with Josh while she had a case of strep throat, which I found out about too late, managed to give it to him when he was 4.

And Sunny demands attention around the clock. She'll go home tomorrow.