Whoop de Do...
So I basically got two days off to recover before I could technically return to work (so tomorrow, that's where I'm going), and after the doctor's visit, I got a good lot of rest on Wednesday.
Today, not so much. Last night Mom apparently coughed up some blood :( She tried to wake me up, but apparently I was sleeping the sleep of the heavily sedated (except that I hadn't taken any drowsying medication), so she called up Dad. Apparently she hadn't brought her medical insurance card, but she could get her account number and such from him. In the morning, I got to talk to her insurance to figure out where she could go.
After a ridiculous 2+ hour wait (I guess the place felt it necessary to x-ray her TWICE), she was pronounced as having whooping cough, of all things. Of course, given my mother's still-pretty-damn-strong accent, it took a lot of teasing to sort out what the diagnosis was. She declared the doctor had said she had "hop-co," whatever that was. I eventually figured out that "co" was "cough," and after hearing variants like "hope-co" and "hoop-co," I eventually asked if the doctor had said "whooping cough," and she thought that sounded like it.
The pharmacy this place chose to send half of the prescription to (half was a paper prescription and half was electronic, supposedly due to some of these things not being able to be sent electronically...) was CVS, and the reason I know half of the prescription was electronic is because of the stupid communication issues. The doctor had told my mother she would be getting cough drops and an antibiotic. The prescription she took with her to this pharmacy produced a cough syrup, no antibiotic. A call to the clinic is made and of course, I get handed the phone and I get to straighten it out with the doesn't-give-a-damn-and-can't-be-bothered-to-check-the-computer clerk (bad day or something, dude?).
I should point out at this point that I've been doing a lot of explaining this morning, and talking (or swallowing) feels like I'm having a knife jabbed into the right side of my throat. Not talking means it just feels like there's a toothpick stuck in my throat, which is better but only marginally. Either way, I'm feeling pretty irritated about the whole thing.
Anyway, we get that straightened out and then we wait for the prescription to be filled. I'm pretty well bowled over by the price of this stuff (curiously, it's the special cough syrup thing that's super expensive, the antibiotic is cheap), and now I really REALLY feel for folks who don't have medical insurance D: I thought, since the clerk mentioned that they had access to the account info put in by the clinic for Mom, that they'd use the medical insurance from there (because I don't think Mom has a separate pharmacy card thingy like I do), but I was mistaken. And somehow it's all my fault. So here I am, exhausted and aching because I've tried to help my poor Mom out, and she's practically screaming at me the whole way home. Like the saying goes, no good deed goes unpunished :/
Either way, she seems to be somewhat better now. I got an hour or two of naptime before it was food time (ugh, swallowing, but the food is so tasty~! T_T) and I've taken another Tylenol for the pain... which only makes it a bit more bearable, really. Perhaps I will get a stronger painkiller (nurse practitioner suggested Aleve) when the Tylenol runs out.
Thus, in a word, BLAH. T_T
Today, not so much. Last night Mom apparently coughed up some blood :( She tried to wake me up, but apparently I was sleeping the sleep of the heavily sedated (except that I hadn't taken any drowsying medication), so she called up Dad. Apparently she hadn't brought her medical insurance card, but she could get her account number and such from him. In the morning, I got to talk to her insurance to figure out where she could go.
After a ridiculous 2+ hour wait (I guess the place felt it necessary to x-ray her TWICE), she was pronounced as having whooping cough, of all things. Of course, given my mother's still-pretty-damn-strong accent, it took a lot of teasing to sort out what the diagnosis was. She declared the doctor had said she had "hop-co," whatever that was. I eventually figured out that "co" was "cough," and after hearing variants like "hope-co" and "hoop-co," I eventually asked if the doctor had said "whooping cough," and she thought that sounded like it.
The pharmacy this place chose to send half of the prescription to (half was a paper prescription and half was electronic, supposedly due to some of these things not being able to be sent electronically...) was CVS, and the reason I know half of the prescription was electronic is because of the stupid communication issues. The doctor had told my mother she would be getting cough drops and an antibiotic. The prescription she took with her to this pharmacy produced a cough syrup, no antibiotic. A call to the clinic is made and of course, I get handed the phone and I get to straighten it out with the doesn't-give-a-damn-and-can't-be-bothered-to-check-the-computer clerk (bad day or something, dude?).
I should point out at this point that I've been doing a lot of explaining this morning, and talking (or swallowing) feels like I'm having a knife jabbed into the right side of my throat. Not talking means it just feels like there's a toothpick stuck in my throat, which is better but only marginally. Either way, I'm feeling pretty irritated about the whole thing.
Anyway, we get that straightened out and then we wait for the prescription to be filled. I'm pretty well bowled over by the price of this stuff (curiously, it's the special cough syrup thing that's super expensive, the antibiotic is cheap), and now I really REALLY feel for folks who don't have medical insurance D: I thought, since the clerk mentioned that they had access to the account info put in by the clinic for Mom, that they'd use the medical insurance from there (because I don't think Mom has a separate pharmacy card thingy like I do), but I was mistaken. And somehow it's all my fault. So here I am, exhausted and aching because I've tried to help my poor Mom out, and she's practically screaming at me the whole way home. Like the saying goes, no good deed goes unpunished :/
Either way, she seems to be somewhat better now. I got an hour or two of naptime before it was food time (ugh, swallowing, but the food is so tasty~! T_T) and I've taken another Tylenol for the pain... which only makes it a bit more bearable, really. Perhaps I will get a stronger painkiller (nurse practitioner suggested Aleve) when the Tylenol runs out.
Thus, in a word, BLAH. T_T