I get sinus infections from overblown allergy reactions at least 4 times a year - sometimes more. Usually it starts with icky nasal drip, and within a week has progressed to a full-blown, green snot, chest congestion, sinus headache mess. I generally try to avoid antibiotics because I get these infections so often that I don't want to become desensitized to the antibiotics; it's only when I am really desperate that I resort to going to the doctor for meds.
Today I got desperate.
I'm not the only one who is sick. Braeden has progressed with the same thing I have at about the same time. The reason I gave in and took us both to the walk-in clinic today is because in the wee hours of the morning, I woke to find two things: 1) Braeden was standing by my bed, bawling his eyes out because his ears hurt; and 2) I had no idea how long he'd been standing there, because my good ear hurt so much I could barely hear a thing. It took me several minutes to realize that Braeden hadn't had a bad dream; he had a raging earache. We spent the next two hours medicating with ibuprofen and heat pads to no avail. I eventually told him to play video games at 3:30am in a desperate attempt to distract him from the pain. That lasted about 30 minutes, then he came back with me. Finally I hit him with a heavy dose of Benadryl, which blessedly knocked him out.
By the time I woke up, both of my ears felt like someone had jammed plugs into them, and pain was radiating from my ears to my jaw to my neck. It hurt to chew, it hurt to stand up, it hurt to hiccup, and it hurt to blow my nose. Incidentally, I was also so incredibly congested that I could barely breathe through my mouth; thank goodness I have a prescription inhaler, or I'd have been in trouble.
So off to the doctor we went. At clinic #1, we waited 15 minutes because the desk lady was ignoring us, only to find out it's not a walk-in clinic until 4pm. So we drove halfway across to the county to the only other walk-in clinic available, where we waited three hours for a doc to tell us what I already knew - that we both had raging ear infections and I had a sinus infection to go with it.
I got in the car to leave... and it wouldn't start. No surprise there; it always does this to me at the worst possible time. I have to turn off all the electronics in the car, turn the key over as if I was starting it, and wait for ten minutes for the security system to reboot. It is a total and complete pain in butt. After the allotted ten minutes was up, I started the car, put it in gear - and it promptly died. Guess what? It wouldn't start again. So I got to wait another ten minutes, with a cranky kid in the background begging for something to eat or drink (by this point it was 1pm and neither of us had anything except a few sips of my coffee).
I finally get the car going and we head to Wal-Mart with the prescription. I dropped off the script and took B to Taco Bell. We came back to for the meds, only to find that 1) they still weren't ready; and 2) one of the scripts for B was out of stock.
By this point I was ready to throw something. My ears were hurting so much I was almost in tears. We went home with 2 of the 3 meds. Then I had to work for a couple of hours... I missed school tonight because Jeff is working and by the time I got finished with work, I wasn't going to make it anyway. I logged into eLearn to find that my last test score went from a B to a C because they dropped questions I got right.
Seriously... I'm halfway expecting the house to burn down. Given the day I've had, that would be about right.
However, I am also struggling to be more content and thankul, so after this (very long) ranting post, here is what I am thankful for:
1) my eardrum was not ruptured. Hopefully I won't experience any permanent damage (I've already lost a good bit of hearing and can't afford to lose more)
2) we were able to get antibiotics for me and B. The one I have to go back for is just a prescription combo med for B.
3) The car did eventually start
4) I got a nap and felt a little better
5) I also had to have a steroid shot, and now my jaw and neck don't hurt.
6) Being at home tonight instead of in school means I have time to work on my clinical stuff from Monday that has to be turned in
7) I have friends from school who are sending me notes and audio from class tonight.
8) I have Grannie & Peepop! They were ready to come all the way down the mountain just to bring B some food at the doctor's office (didn't, though, because we couldn't have food in there.)
Maybe tomorrow will be better, eh?
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