Pneumonia, Round 2

Pneumonia. This is the second time I’ve been down with it in the past 45 days. It’s worse this time, much worse. I took all the precautions – got the 7-year pneumonia shot last year (that covers 25% of the strains out there – apparently the other 75% are in Kwethluk), take a daily vitamin (when I remember), drink plenty of orange juice, take Echinacea and vitamin C supplements, get plenty of rest, and I even started exercising (remember Jillian?). However, there is one little bugger that I can’t seem to tame… stress. Beyond that, I’m not sure what else I can do. Anyway, here’s the story that led me to today…

Last Friday, I came home from school feeling like I was getting a cold – stuffy nose, drainage in the throat, the usual. I started dosing up on herbal tea and vitamin C. It just got worse. By Saturday night, I had a pretty bad cough and by Sunday, I knew it was at least Bronchitis – fever coming in around 99. I made an appointment at the clinic for 9am, found someone to cover my class, bundled up, and made the half-mile walk there in 20 below windchill temps.

My fever was 100. After 30 minutes of her asking me questions, looking up information in a medical textbook, and writing down details on a sheet that she would soon fax to a doctor in Bethel, the exam was over. She told me that she heard crackling in my lungs and was sure it was pneumonia. I was sent back to school and told that she would call me later that afternoon with doctor recommendations.

At 3pm, I still had not heard from the clinic, so I called. My aide told me that the Bethel doctor said that my fever needed to be 102 before they’d prescribe antibiotics. That’s a new one! So, I called the Bethel doctor and she told me that without a chest x-ray (which can only be done if I spend an entire day flying back and forth to Bethel to have it done in the hospital there), my temperature has to be 102 for them to diagnose pneumonia. Where do they make up these rules?

By Tuesday morning, I was beginning to see stars from being lightheaded. In the classroom, I was useless as I only had a whisper of a voice. The soonest the clinic could see me was 2pm. I hauled myself there (remember that it’s a mile roundtrip) in the subzero temps, colder than Monday. They examined me (temp at 102), sent off the paperwork to Bethel, and I was given antibiotics. I barely remember my walk home. I know I was weaving as I walked down the road just concentrating on breathing, which was difficult, and keeping my eyes focused enough to put one foot in front of the other. Oh yeah, on my way out of the clinic, they demanded that I make a follow-up appointment for Wednesday (walk back there again? NOT!) which I did and promptly called to cancel Wednesday morning.

I spent the next several days in and out of bed, never leaving the house, doped up on as much medication as I could find. Thursday morning, I woke up with 9 cold sores lining my top lip and by Thursday night, I also had sores inside my nose. Miserable. Frustrated. Now, angry.

Now, it’s Friday. I’ve still got a bad cough and a sore chest, but I’m getting better, slowly. Now, my bigger concern is that I have a compromised immune system and I’m going back to the same conditions on Monday that got me sick twice so far. If I can just make it 12 more days, I’ll be on a tropical beach…