Like I mentioned before

I got wicked sick over the weekend. On Sunday morning, we had an early morning flight back to Chicago from San Antonio. The night before, we went to dinner with friends (and ironically one of them got sick during dinner- hope you fared better than I, Kev) and out to a bar to have one last hurrah with a bunch of old friends, which was really fun. I was mega-excited at the time because there was no smoking in the bar we were at, which is a hard commodity to come by in SA. We had to have last minute breakfast tacos at midnight because at some point during the week I kind of said suck it to my WW goals for the rest of the trip.

At some point in the middle of the night, Adam woke up and wasn't feeling all that well and he was pretty yucky when we left. I was also pretty nauseous but figured it was just due to staying up late, eating super late, and getting up so early. I don't do too well on no sleep and I wasn't sleeping much for our entire visit, really. But by the time we landed in Chicago, I was definitely the worst between the two of us. I seriously considered taking a cab all the way from O'Hare to home and if you know how insanely cheap I am about taking cabs, that should tell you right there that I was not feeling well at all. When we got to the condo, I made Lipton Noodle Soup and we both got a second wind and managed to unpack and wait for my mom to land from her delayed flight. Her birthday was Sunday and we'd planned to go to Maggianos but kind of nixed the idea because it was freezing and they had no reservations left. We watched a movie when she came in but I fell asleep during it and woke up feeling something foul. I remember saying at one point that I felt exactly the same way that I did when I had what we suspect was H1N1 in May.

Adam's mom and brother came in to the city for awhile and we ended up ordering in Chinese because I was in no position to go anywhere. I ate some rice and green beans because I really couldn't stomach any of the meats. Took Nyquil at about 8 p.m. and went right to sleep. I woke up at some point in the night and I was feeling absolutely terrible. I woke Adam and we called the nurse hotline which is the best way to get a last minute drs appointment with my HMO. I should also mention that on Christmas Eve my eye was incredibly itchy before we went to sleep but I took out my contacts and didn't give it much more thought until Sunday night when I woke up and it was all crusted over. Pink Eye! But that was nothing compared to my fever and body aches. I felt about 15 times worse than my flu in May. I couldn't even get comfortable and back to sleep. We made my drs appointment for the next morning and I continued to toss and turn for another hour or so before we woke my mom. At some point, I finally decided to bundle myself up like the kids in a Christmas Story and go to the Emergency Room. I think I've adopted a policy that if I am too sick to even sleep it's time to seek immediate help. I also was having some pretty bad nausea issues.

I have to say that our experience at the ER was pretty seamless. We got right in (into a nice little Negative Pressure Quarantine room) where I was diagnosed with Pink Eye and the flu. They hooked me up to an IV and gave me some super strong ibuprofen and I was feeling better after about 30-45 minutes.

*note, at the present time I want to kill our crappy internet provider because I was done with this post but our internet went out and this was all it had saved but it will probably end up being less long winded so that may or may not be a good thing, you decide*

Anyway, they made me feel better at the ER, which lasted for about 5 hours after I got home. Yesterday almost every bad symptom was back, only worse. I was also unable to keep any sort of liquids down. Sometime during the third quarter of the A&M bowl game, we decided to head back to the ER. Another day, another prick in the arm for an IV. At least I have matching arms now and so far, the bruising has been shockingly benign. They gave me fluids and more strong Motrin and decided to do bloodwork instead of chest xrays like the night before. All the stuff came back indicating I had the flu instead of meningitis or something more serious, phew. I was not excited hearing words like "spinal tap" being floated about. After that, they gave me the choice to go home or be admitted as observation. Obviously, I chose to go home because I have major issues getting comfortable and sleeping in hospitals. Who doesn't, right? I also have mega IV issues, both night I was feeling like they were leaking and made multiple people check them because I could have sworn I felt it dripping, on both arms.

I also managed to give myself pink eye in the other eye. I'm telling you, I was a complete (and still am a partial) disaster. Today, I'm at a normal sick person level and can function enough to type all this so I feel a vast improvement. However, I have to throw out all my eye make-up, which is SUPER annoying because I just bought some expensive mascara from Sephora 2 weeks ago. Luckily, I had already earmarked a significant bit of Christmas money towards new eyeshadow at the MAC counter, as I was completely out of my favorite color. Que sera, sera.

I am also missing the Addams Family musical tonight with Adam and Mom and a nice dinner. Plus, this also means no New Year's Eve party for me so it's looking like we'll be watching the VT bowl game and Dick Clark from home, which is probably better so I don't infect the world with my diseases. That's been basically my post-Christmas ER extravaganza of experiences. Hopefully your post-Christmas has been better!