Recovery
or
"The Otorrhea" Is Not The Title of An Italian Opera

For those of you who didn't know, I've been very sick lately.

The illness struck Greg first, who developed ear pressure and pain on first one, then both sides. That was about two weeks ago.

I left for Vegas on the 16th, feeling shaky and nauseous. I slept almost constantly once I arrived. I chalked it up to nerves. After all, I had no appetite. I began to have feverish dreams, waking every hour or two to wander the house disoriented, before dropping onto the bed again.

Somehow I scraped myself off the carpet long enough to make it to The Pirate's Ball across the street from my house - in costume, no less. Nerves, just nerves, I told myself. A few drinks into the night, my senses were dulled enough to dance and frolic with the other pirates. See, I was going to be fine!

When I awoke from nightmares on the 19th, my lymph nodes in my neck were enormous. I could barely turn my head. I had pain inside my left ear, and couldn't walk around without bumping into walls. I had body chills. I had visual and auditory hallucinations. I'd never had a bug quite like it before.

Naturally I went to the doctor. My good friend Sam took me, as I was broke, and in no condition to drive. I had the equilibrium of a drunk. (Bless you, Sam. You saved my biscuits.)

The doctor was unsure which microbes were ailing me. After looking into all of my cranial orifices, I believe her exact words were: "I have no idea what it is, but let's give you some kickass antibiotics to knock it out of you." We began with an injection of Rocephin. She then prescribed me Doxycycline - 100 mg capsules, 2 of them a day. No kiddie stuff, here.

Rocephin is the antibiotic of choice for preventing infection after major surgery. It's also effective against meningitis, septicemia (blood poisoning), Necrotizing fasciitis (flesh-eating bacteria), bone infections, as well as typhoid fever. Among many other things. They administer it by injection or IV. I got mine shoved into my flank, which hurt like a bitch, but I didn't care too much. Injections work swiftly. I wanted to feel better as soon as possible.

Doxycycline will take just about any bacteria (and some parasites) out of commission. It's often used to prevent resistant strains of malaria. It'll help you if you've been exposed to aerosolized anthrax. If the Europeans of the Middle Ages had access to doxycycline, they wouldn't have known the scourges of black plague or cholera.

Either one of the two will take out every bacterial STI known to man.

I felt somewhat better the next day. Enough to go to the firing range with Sam. He's the one who took that freaking wonderful photo of me with the m249 SAW.

Don't tell the range master, but (guns + girl) = SEX^r , where r is how many rounds I shot on full-auto.

We also had a lovely luncheon at the Red Velvet Cafe. I recommend it for all vegetarian, vegan, and cake-loving types. They make the world's best desserts. All of them VEGAN. (Are the tears of angels vegan? I suppose they must be.)

By the next day, I had devolved into a bed-ridden amoeba. I was so weak and woozy, I could not stand of my own volition. I lay limp under the sheets, sticky and wan like a poorly made waxwork.

Arturo moved the spare bed into the living room, so I could watch movies with him and use the computer while I rested. I stayed in the same spot for nearly a week.

I'm unsure whether it was the illness or the medication, but while I lay that week, I endured strange symptoms, even as my throat and ears began to heal. Great purple contusions appeared mysteriously on my body. (Editor's note: as of 10/07/2010, the original bruises are still green shadows, and later ones are yet purple.) Nausea and vomiting kept me from eating or drinking for hours at a time. And the fatigue was smothering. Never in my life have I been so tired. Yet when I closed my eyes, demonic technicolor faces leered at me in the darkness, mutating into hideous crustaceans that smushed and garbled into one another until I begged Arturo to turn on the lamp and we slept in the light.

I recovered slowly. By the time I finished my antibiotics, I felt no more physical symptoms, and my appetite has returned, but the fatigue remains. How long it will be until it fully lifts? I don't know.

All I know is that Greg never had the bulk of my symptoms. Instead, his illness concentrated in his ears, dampening his hearing and causing him pain in both sides of his head. He also experienced the nightmares and feverish thoughts that made my illness so hellish. He also has otorrhea. Which in layman's terms means:

Kermit green goo coming out of your earhole.

Don't let the photo deceive you, kids. This stuff is Kermit the frog frickin' green.

Would someone like to tell us what on earth we had?

UPDATE 10/7/2010: We've both been given the clean bill of health. I'm still really tired, pale, and shakey. Greg is too strong to admit it, but he looks kinda sick still, too. Ears still leaking green fluid. Doctor says this is not worrisome. Whatever.

But it's not Lupus. It's NEVER Lupus.

P.S. Here's some articles on my antibiotics in case you guys think I'm making everything up. Copy and paste, you lazy bastards.


http://www.drugs.com/pro/doxycycline-hyclate.html

http://www.rxlist.com/doryx-drug.htm

http://www.webmd.com/drugs/drug-7012-Rocephin+Inj.aspx?drugid=7012&drugname=Rocephin+Inj&source=0&pagenumber=4


http://antibiotics.emedtv.com/rocephin/what-is-rocephin-used-for.html

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmedhealth/PMH0000848

Head Like A Hole
or
"I'll Take 'Things That Fall Out of Your Face,' For $175"

Ah, that good ol' fashioned tonsillitis, such a beloved melody from my childhood. If memory serves me right, it goes a lil' something like this:


I woke up on Friday with a twinge of pain in the right side of my neck. A quick palpation revealed an enlarged lymph node. Well, that could be anything. Maybe the air-conditioner was on too high. Maybe I slept with my mouth open. No time to deal with it anyway. Off to work with me!

By Saturday morning, I knew I was in for some real fun. My right tonsil had begun to swell, making swallowing painful. I didn't need to feel my nodes - I could see them bulging through my skin just fine. It's a cold. I'll feel crappy for 2 days, and get over it. I don't need to spend $150 for a doctor's visit. I'll cope just fine. Oh well, no time to deal with it anyway. Take a few asprin, gargle with Listerine, and off to work with me!

On Sunday afternoon, I woke up shivering like a heroin addict. The ghastly fingers of fever ran up and down my limbs. My muscles ached. And my throat! Even my own saliva proved too difficult to swallow. I designated an empty water bottle as my spittoon. Robbed of my speech, I whimpered piteously until my roommates understood my fate. Greg looked down my throat and told me that my tonsils were so swollen, he was concerned for my airway. Indeed, I felt as if my throat might close up at any moment.

I bit the bullet, and went to urgent care.

If I had more political fire in me, this is where I'd rant about how much a capitalist health care system sucks for a commoner like myself. There's no reason why a throat infection should cost $175 dollars to treat, in an otherwise healthy person. I even skipped getting a throat culture to save money.

If only I could figure out how to buy black market antibiotics from Mexico . . . but I digress.

The real reason I wrote this post is to show you some amazing photos of what came out of my tonsils today!

I've been on antibiotics for about 24 hours now. That's long enough to feel some improvement, though I'm still sick as a dog. I managed to get myself in a hot shower. All that steam felt mighty nice, and really helped my throat relax. In fact, it relaxed so much, the pus pockets fell off of my tonsils. (See the diagram at the start of the article, if you don't know what pus pockets I'm talking about.)

Of course I took pictures. I couldn't deny my gentle readers such a spectacle!

First a picture for scale . . .




Here's a macro glamour shot of the one that came off my right tonsil:

Look, you can see the little ridge where it was attached to my headmeats.

And one of the left:

Say "pus sacs!"

Did I mention that both these nuggets of joy smelled like a cadaver? The human body is so charming.


I sorely (HAH!) envy you adults who had your tonsils removed during childhood, under the auspices of your parents' health insurance plan. Please wish me a speedy recovery.



******UPDATE*******

Two more pus sacs fell off a few hours later, only they were half the size of the first set. And then a single long stringy one uncoiled from the right tonsil. And blood. Lots of blood. Just thought you'd all like to know. No, I didn't take a picture.

Yes it does hurt. Thanks for asking. *hack*