Five
On Saturday my body yielded to illness and to the medication which opened my airways, in order to prevent any potential closing of my vocal cords.
I curled into a ball of misery in my bed.
Not only was I going to miss my next day art event, I recognized the upcoming trip to Whistler Mountain in a few days with hubby wasn’t going to happen either. We cancelled.
On the Friday previous I’d gone for my Mammogram. On Monday the clinic called and I was asked to come in again the next morning for more tests. That information shoots up the blood pressure a tad and wild visions of the worst case scenario occupied my thoughts while I coughed, tried to control a fever and continued to drip from both my nose and eyes.
Monday morning arrived and I dragged myself off to the appointment for more x-ray exposure, being pulled and stretched and poked, then lying around waiting and sent home to wait some more for a doctors report.
So, what does hubby decide to do when he realizes a 4 day vacation is ruined because his co-vacationer is sick. He goes back to work.
No-one wants to know the variation of conversations between us that were produced by that one decision. It made absolute sense to him and months later it still does not to me.
He did text me on occasion and even called a few times during his next several work-days to see how I was doing. I never replied. I think he may have even popped in to see me. He says he did.
Perhaps I was too delusional with medication and fever and too busy emptying tissues boxes to notice what went on around me. I was consumed with the time waiting for more pain pills for the fire in my throat and the developing tear in my chest each time I coughed. And, with each cough my cheek bones felt as though they may explode.
On Thursday morning I arrived in my doc’s office who thought I may have Pneumonia and off I went for x-rays. More x-rays.
As I sat in my little cubicle in my blue or yellow gown I had difficulty breathing while trying to have polite and quiet coughs. With whispers of a voice I explained my situation to the curious lab person who had asked why I was there.
Using the walls as support I managed to do as I was instructed, walk to the test room, stand, sit, raise my arm over my head to hang onto a rail support while a picture was taken, release my grip and with some measure of dignity allow my arm to drop back to my side without fainting and then get back to my little room.
No one touched me or offered to help.
The lab person came by my space and I peeked out. She stayed long enough to inform me I didn’t have Pneumonia but Sinusitis and I could go home.
Hanging my head for acting so pathetic I managed to dress myself, fully aware that my door was a curtain and that I was barely able to control my groans with every movement.
Thankful for walls and railings both inside the building and out I made my way to my car, drove the million miles home and slunk into my bed.
A couple of hours later my doc called to let me know I have a sinus infection and Bronchitis and I need more pills.
Hubby has clued in that something might be amiss – the kitty litter box hasn’t been emptied, there are pill containers laying in various places in the house and for days there haven’t been any signs of meal preparation. Plus, I’m just not getting out of bed.
Care giving skills are learned as glasses of water appear bedside and food bits that are not eaten come and go from the room. Hubby and Thomas the Cat seem baffled by my continuous weeping and grunts every time I move and when I manage to open my eyes, there they are perched at the foot of the bed…watching me.
I wonder if they will hire someone to come in and take care of them.
There isn’t much to do in the midst of pain and fever except to pray and I remembered to do that. I’d committed to pray every day for my son who was in Regina for six months training to become an RCMP. I threw in a few desperate comments for myself too that an instant healing would be greatly appreciated.
I also wrote lengthy ramblings in my journal – with all the pills going into me it is the only way I remembered my summer saga. A week later and two doc visits down, I find out a follow-up Mammogram will need to be done in six months so I promptly sigh and file the information for another time.
Still no voice, but also no fever so I believed some good health may eventually return. If only I didn’t have to hug myself so tight every time a cough tore itself through my body.
Another week passes with yet another doc trip and it’s been discovered that on my second trip to the emergency ward, that I’ve not even mentioned, my latest x-rays from there reveal a fractured rib. On that particular visit the friendly emergency doc, referring to my lack of voice and nothing about my ribs, that I should consider the idea of Acid Reflux, sending me home with yet another prescription.
However, in my hand I also held a paper for magic pills that fogged my brain and dulled my pain.
Ah, I understood now, why all these special pills were being taken with such regularity – my simple Sinusitis, turned nearly full face Sinus Infection and Bronchitis, had been topped off with coughing myself into fracturing my own ribs.
By then I suspected the same on the other side too but didn’t even bother to ask for another set of x-rays.
And, the plugged ear which began the whole adventure weeks before was still the same.
Please return for the continuation and hopefully the last two or maybe three entries of ‘my summer saga’
Living in Truth 