A Night in the ER

After being called into work Thurs. night for a 7pm-3am shift (YUK!!) I started feeling bad around 8:30. I was checking my temperature watching it rise to about 100.5. I told the charge nurse I felt terrible with chills and aches and she said she'd try to get me home early. Funny thing is I clocked out at 2:57am. She helped me by 3 mins.!!! Praise God for Ibuprofen which I took around midnight and it sustained me for 3 more hours. Got to sleep around 3:45 and Micah woke up at 6am. I ached at the thought of taking care of the kids all day on little sleep and still feeling rather sick. Thankfully Rob came home from work at 9:30. I retreated to bed and stayed there til 6pm. I told Rob "I felt like I was dying" when my fever reach a whopping 105.3!! I was so nauseated, but was diagnosing myself with strep throat since my throat was a problem as well. To make a long story short I decided to go to the ER at Missouri Baptist. I was way too sick and weak to make it to my doctors before 5pm. I got some toast down and we left. Rob took me. I was triaged by a nice nurse and doctor who decided to give me IV fluids and medication. At this point my lower back was hurting worse than my throat. I received an IV steroid for the swelling in my throat, pain medicine, tylenol, and zofran for nausea. I had a throat swab (WOW was that bad) and a swab up the nose to check for influenza (NOT fun either). Now I can really empathize with my poor sweet patients who are 3/4 my age! After getting results back that I do have strep throat I knew I was on my way to getting better! I should start feeling better by Monday after getting some amoxicillin in me. It's really amazing how IV fluids and some drugs can make a person go from a feeling of dying to "OK I can get through this." We were there about 3 hrs which wasn't bad. Now I am following my wacky ER doctors recommendation to gargle with salt water 4 times a day to help with my throat pain. The gargling isn't wacky the doctor was, but that's a whole different story. My nurse Brian was awesome!! We found out he graduated from CBC in '86. Rob can't go anywhere without having a CBC connection. All is well, I am on the mend and Rob's wonderful mom and sister split up the kids last night so we could rest without any interruptions! Oh, and Rob was a great companion in the ER with me even though I was a little delusional at times.