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To the clinic and back again.
Feb. 1st, 2007 05:52 pm
Wednesday, I thought that going to an evening examination for a county position with a bad case of the flu was about as bad as this week could get. But today put that in perspective.
Today started around 1:00 AM, with Sandy complaining of fever and chills, and escalated into her barely being able to walk when I took her to the clinic at 10:00 in the morning. Fortunately, the waiting room was only half filled, or I would have taken her to the emergency room.As it was, it was a half hour before we got shown into a room...where after a short examination, the doctor decided that Sandy needed an IV drip to deal with massive dehydration. It's a sign of how sick she was that Sandy, who normally has a phobia about needles, took the IV without a flinch...even after the nurse said in effect "Whoops! There goes the needle- fortunately you have another arm!"
The human body contains on average 5.6 liters of water; the nurse ended up giving sandy almost 1.2 liters of saline solution. We couldn't really figure out how she had gotten so dehydrated, except possibly from sweating it out over five days of fevers. But on the good side, after spending nearly five hours at the clinic, she felt better: the dizziness and chills faded, and I was able to take her home, where I'm being careful to keep her- and myself- well hydrated as we wait out the worst flu I've seen in years.
We didn't go to the clinic in time to get any antivirals, so we can only deal with the symptoms- but fortunately, we got there in time to get a room (the place filled up FAST after us), and in time to keep Sandy from getting much sicker.
And that's something to be grateful for.
Today started around 1:00 AM, with Sandy complaining of fever and chills, and escalated into her barely being able to walk when I took her to the clinic at 10:00 in the morning. Fortunately, the waiting room was only half filled, or I would have taken her to the emergency room.As it was, it was a half hour before we got shown into a room...where after a short examination, the doctor decided that Sandy needed an IV drip to deal with massive dehydration. It's a sign of how sick she was that Sandy, who normally has a phobia about needles, took the IV without a flinch...even after the nurse said in effect "Whoops! There goes the needle- fortunately you have another arm!"
The human body contains on average 5.6 liters of water; the nurse ended up giving sandy almost 1.2 liters of saline solution. We couldn't really figure out how she had gotten so dehydrated, except possibly from sweating it out over five days of fevers. But on the good side, after spending nearly five hours at the clinic, she felt better: the dizziness and chills faded, and I was able to take her home, where I'm being careful to keep her- and myself- well hydrated as we wait out the worst flu I've seen in years.
We didn't go to the clinic in time to get any antivirals, so we can only deal with the symptoms- but fortunately, we got there in time to get a room (the place filled up FAST after us), and in time to keep Sandy from getting much sicker.
And that's something to be grateful for.