I may need a lung transplant soon
Walking pneumonia. Not as bad as it sounds, but it's sure getting old.
The past month has been quite the blur. On Halloween, Beth and I traveled to our nation's capital to celebrate with Coldplay and it was amazing. The next week, I took a personal day to extend my weekend so I could go to Atlanta with the core Crossroads girls from junior year to see Amy get hitched. Another amaaaaazing time with some good friends. Ever since that trip though, I've had this ridiculous cough. A chest-rattling cough. A cough that rears its ugly head whenever I start laughing at something, take a deep breath, blink, etc. It started on the Atlanta trip, but I was hoping it would quickly go away.
After 5 days, I decided I should go see a professional and get some hardcore medication, with the bronchitis and walking pneumonia spreading like wildfire. After listening to my symptoms, the doctor at the walk-in place I frequent told me it was just an "upper respiratory infection" and that some Mucinex would do the trick. She even prescribed some cough syrup laced with codeine to help me sleep through the nights. I specifically asked her if this was walking pneumonia or bronchitis, and she assured me it wasn't.
A week later, the cough didn't get any better and I was still hackng like an old man every 30 seconds. It got to the point where instead of me having to send students out to get cough drops for me, they were bringing them from home themselves. I think they also started to tune out the choking in between sentences. The nurse made me hot tea and told me I better go back to the doctor. Great. Another 40 bucks down the drain.
This time I made an appointment with my regular doctor, who decided that because I hadn't seen her since before college, she was going to have to treat me like a new patient. Which means I would have to come to see her at 8:30 in the morning. I have a thing against taking sick days (it's not worth the hassle to get a sub, in my opinion) so needless to say, she's not my doctor anymore. Luckily, there was somebody else in the practice who was willing to take me on and wasn't so snobby about what time I could set up my appointment, so they signed me on for the next afternoon.
Lo and behold, as soon as I told him I had been coughing for 2 weeks straight, he pulled out his prescription pad and started hooking me up with a z-pack, prednizone (steroids??!), and an inhaler. Apparently I did have walking pneumonia after all!
This comes at a great time when I'm crunched in my lesson plans, trying to cram in a ton of information before Thanksgiving break so I can test the kids on Tuesday rather than waiting until after the break. Wonderful. I was also supposed to stand in for the band director at tonight's playoff game so he could attend a conference, but after my frantic emails to him with the news, he had to leave early to let me stay home from the game. I feel like such a letdown. I'm just hoping they win this game so I don't end up missing the last game of the season.
Anyway, my kids are now full of questions about pneumonia and if it has anything to do with ammonia since we've been talking about that in physical science. They also want to know if I'm going to have roid rage (some have unlocked that side of me in their refusal to take it easy on their sickly teacher). I'm just praying that I can sleep through the weekend and make it through two days of school before Thanksgiving break.
I can do this. I can do this.
The past month has been quite the blur. On Halloween, Beth and I traveled to our nation's capital to celebrate with Coldplay and it was amazing. The next week, I took a personal day to extend my weekend so I could go to Atlanta with the core Crossroads girls from junior year to see Amy get hitched. Another amaaaaazing time with some good friends. Ever since that trip though, I've had this ridiculous cough. A chest-rattling cough. A cough that rears its ugly head whenever I start laughing at something, take a deep breath, blink, etc. It started on the Atlanta trip, but I was hoping it would quickly go away.
After 5 days, I decided I should go see a professional and get some hardcore medication, with the bronchitis and walking pneumonia spreading like wildfire. After listening to my symptoms, the doctor at the walk-in place I frequent told me it was just an "upper respiratory infection" and that some Mucinex would do the trick. She even prescribed some cough syrup laced with codeine to help me sleep through the nights. I specifically asked her if this was walking pneumonia or bronchitis, and she assured me it wasn't.
A week later, the cough didn't get any better and I was still hackng like an old man every 30 seconds. It got to the point where instead of me having to send students out to get cough drops for me, they were bringing them from home themselves. I think they also started to tune out the choking in between sentences. The nurse made me hot tea and told me I better go back to the doctor. Great. Another 40 bucks down the drain.
This time I made an appointment with my regular doctor, who decided that because I hadn't seen her since before college, she was going to have to treat me like a new patient. Which means I would have to come to see her at 8:30 in the morning. I have a thing against taking sick days (it's not worth the hassle to get a sub, in my opinion) so needless to say, she's not my doctor anymore. Luckily, there was somebody else in the practice who was willing to take me on and wasn't so snobby about what time I could set up my appointment, so they signed me on for the next afternoon.
Lo and behold, as soon as I told him I had been coughing for 2 weeks straight, he pulled out his prescription pad and started hooking me up with a z-pack, prednizone (steroids??!), and an inhaler. Apparently I did have walking pneumonia after all!
This comes at a great time when I'm crunched in my lesson plans, trying to cram in a ton of information before Thanksgiving break so I can test the kids on Tuesday rather than waiting until after the break. Wonderful. I was also supposed to stand in for the band director at tonight's playoff game so he could attend a conference, but after my frantic emails to him with the news, he had to leave early to let me stay home from the game. I feel like such a letdown. I'm just hoping they win this game so I don't end up missing the last game of the season.
Anyway, my kids are now full of questions about pneumonia and if it has anything to do with ammonia since we've been talking about that in physical science. They also want to know if I'm going to have roid rage (some have unlocked that side of me in their refusal to take it easy on their sickly teacher). I'm just praying that I can sleep through the weekend and make it through two days of school before Thanksgiving break.
I can do this. I can do this.