Showing posts with label WBC. Show all posts
Showing posts with label WBC. Show all posts

The "good enough" clinic

I'm a too little tired to give the most detailed account of today, partly due to the fact that my clinic went until 7 pm. I was at St. Mikes from 12:30 - 7 pm, so yes, a VERY long clinic!

The details . . .
I kind of got the impression today was going to be a long one when it took me 15 minutes to get an elevator... the first elevator car arrived packed full of people and a stretcher. The paramedic holding onto the railing of the stretcher gave me a sympathetic "sorry" and I tried not to look too disappointed as the doors teasingly closed again. A little peek-a-boo session of sorts. I waited a few more minutes and the second car came, this one only had two occupants, a man in a wheelchair and I assume his wife pushing him. "Get out the way please" the pushy woman announced, and I stepped back to let them pass, only to have the elevator  doors shut on my face and swiftly leave. Apparently being the broken girl with oxygen still doesn't qualify for someone to hold the door for you. "Motherfucker" I said out loud as I pressed the button again, with a little more force than necessary. The only satisfaction I got from this moment is when I heard the couple looking for their exit and I realized they were going the wrong way and got off on the wrong floor... too bad they pissed off their would-be tour guide. Anywho, after 15 minutes and running into an RT, who kindly gave me his extra poppy (random exchange, but I noted that I can't seem to find them anywhere), I finally made it to clinic. 

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False Security

Backtracking: February 25th-March 8th

I finally got a bed on Friday (the 25th) and was started on my dream-team med combo (Meropenum and Chloramphenicol), the very combo that saved my lungs from being permantly fired in 2009. Within 24 hours I felt great, my voice had returned in full-strength and my shortness of breath had lessened... I hopped on the exercise bike daily and didn't require oxygen--my levels, oddly, were fine. However, we later did decide that 1 L of oxygen would be helpful, since my heart rate shot up to 160, and it was very possible my heart was overcompensating for my weak lungs (thank you overachieving heart, remind me to reward you later by avoiding all trans fats). My main problem, upon this admission, was the inability to clear mucus (which, let's face it, is a lingering issue), all the physio in the world cannot get the stuff moving, which makes it difficult to clear infection despite strong antibiotics, if you can't cough it out... then you have a problem.

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'Calm' Before the Wicked Storm

Backtracking: February 16th-24th

I write out the word 'calm' with slight amusement tonight, as I realize my definition of calm is and was anything but. Needless to say, home IVs were not the cakewalk I'd hoped for; I woke up with my usual start-of-IV-fever, and coughed up streaky blood two days in. After one week of IVs not much had changed, if anything I felt worse on my insane schedule coupled with the pressure to gain weight and monitor my blood sugars (which is difficult to do when all you want to do is sleep, plus the blood sugar monitoring required 2-hr fasting). I spent the week in a complete zombified state, hanging my Tazocin every 6 hrs and Meropenum every 8, whilst doing my regular treatments in between (three nebulizers a day and three physios a day for those taking note). At the beginning of the week, I was ambitious enough to continue walking around the block so I wouldn't evolve into some sort of useless lump on the couch, but by the weekend I was completely drained and couldn't get off the couch--I had no problems with accepting my role as couch mole.

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