Two Stories That Do Not Appear To Be Related But Are

Story 1 - When the seasons change I am prone to pretty killer sinus headaches that make me useless doing anything that requires the slightest head movement. It feels like my brain is rattling in my head. When this happens I have to act fast and I have two options. Benedryl or some kind of drug with Psuedophedrine in it. This is the stuff that meth is made out of.
I get jittery if I drink a Soda. This stuff makes me feel like I'm on crack. But unless I can spend my whole day sleeping then I have to pick it over the Benedryl.
It leaves me impaired. My brain jumps all over the place, I get hot and sweaty, my stomach feels weird all day, and I just don't function at the normal level that I've come accustomed too as a moderately intelligent adult.
But it's better than the sinus headaches.
This morning I got a sinus headache shortly before I had to go to work. So I took this -


Story 2 - I own deodorant and Icy Hot. They are both in a roller ball type dispensary.


Guess what I put on my arm pits after I came home from work and was feeling uncomfortable hot and sweaty?

Stand up and be strong

In college I got strep throat a lot. 4 or 5 times a year, 4 years in a row. Usually, people have their tonsils taken out when that's the case but I mean, whatever...I haven't.

So, I'm pretty familiar with how my body reacts to strep. I also know that when I was in college, every time I would go to the doctor for this they would give me 2 test; the 10 minute rapid strep test and the 24 hour culture. They would always explain to me that the if the 10 minute test comes back positive then it is in fact positive. However, it has a very high false negative rate so if it comes back negative, they do the 24 hour test just to be sure. I have never had a 10 minute test come back positive in all the times I've had strep throat.

With that being said, I went to the doctor yesterday morning with all the painful symptoms I have grown so accustomed to.

As the nurse is swiping my throat for the 10 minute test she tells me that yesterday she alone had 15 people who came in with strep throat symptoms but all of their test came back negative. 15 people!
"A few of them even had those white spots on the back of their throats, but their tests were still negative!"
Ok, I can see if 2 or 3 people come in with strep throat symptoms and it turns out they don't have it, but 15 people?? No way. No way in hell. And, I'm no doctor, but look, if you have white spots on your throat, you have strep.

So, she comes in, tells me the test is negative and the doctor will be right in.

He comes in, doesn't even look at my throat and says "test is negative, you probably just have the cold virus and your throat hurts."

"Well, could you do the 24 hour culture, please?"
"We don't do that here"
"But the 10 minute test often gives a false negative"
"I don't know about that"
"I do, and it does, see - here's my story..."

and I tell, him. I'm very careful to try and not hurt his ego because he immediately seemed to be on the offensive which really bothered me. I mean, he may be a doctor and knows a lot about medicine, but I'm me and I know a lot about me. And I also know that this test always gives me a false negative, this is not a personal attack against him. It has nothing to do with him. I wasn't asking for a second opinion, just a more reliable test.

He gets so ticked off, however, that he actually leaves the room and doesn't come back for five minutes. He comes back and tells me "ok, I find your story entertaining so I will write you a prescription for an antibiotic".

I decide to take the high road and interpret his comment as "I will entertain the idea that you might have strep" as opposed to "you're a fucking idiot and I want you out of here now so I will humor you with a script for drugs."

A friend of mine who is a nurse was appalled but not surprised. "It's not like you were self diagnosing yourself with a torn back muscle so you could con the doctor out of xanax, you wanted amoxicillin".

But here's the thing, this isn't the first time I've been in a situation like this. Unless it's a routine checkup to the gyno or something, I'm not gonna go to the doctor unless something is wrong and I'm either very concerned about it or I know I need prescription medication to take care of it. I don't want to waste my time or money or the doctors time unless I really feel like the doctor can help me. When I go to the doctor, I've done my research. I pay attention to my body. I know the difference between a normal kind of "this feels different" and a not normal "this feels different". So why is it that when I go to the doctors they treat me like I'm an a-hole? Because I'm prepared to give them a full run down of whats afflicting me? Because I know what tests don't work on me? Because I know myself better than they do?

I don't go on web-MD, type in my symptoms and come into the doctor and tell them that I have either a brain tumor or Alzheimer's because I've been having trouble finding my car keys lately. But I will look on web-MD to see if I can treat my symptoms from the comfort of my own home with out having to go to the doctors. (Ok, granted, I totally self diagnosed myself with strep, but that's different. I also self diagnose UTI's for the same reason. You just know.)

I will never stop being my own strongest advocate, and I'm sure I annoy the hell out of these doctors, but the moral is, a few hours after taking my first pill I stopped feeling like every swallow was a gulp of fire and I can feel myself getting better. I couldn't say for certainty that I had strep, but if I hadn't stated my case, I would still be in a lot of pain with a bag of cough drops and some liquid lidacaine, spreading strep to every one I came in contact with assuring them that it was just a cold, the doctor told me so.

The post in which nothing is said, but a lot is written

Yesterday was such a better day. Hell, even the night time after I wrote the last post was so much better. I guess I just needed to throw myself a little pity party so I could get back on with my life.

We saw Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull which I absolutely loved, despite all of it's "even for Indiana Jones this is ridiculous" ridiculousness. We went out to dinner and I ordered salmon (I hate fish) and ate half of it and was very proud of myself. I want to want to eat fish (got that?) and the salmon wasn't terrible. At one point in my life, I hated beer, but I drank it anyways and now I love beer. Why can't the same be true for fish? Debbie Downer Jeff quickly reminded me that people don't have parties where the main point is to eat grouper, but so what. Dude quit trippin, you're ruinin' my high. (5 bucks if you know what thats from.)

I also might have made the whole "quitting my job" thing more dramatic then it actually was. My last day was supposed to be this coming Sunday...I just pushed up the date.

Yesterday I made a list of things to do, I got everything done on it. Jeff came home and I had made a delicious dinner of Lemon Thyme Chicken and Roasted Potatoes and then we laughed all night. Poking each other and joking and just laughing. Despite the fact that my head was pounding, and then my throat started burning and then...here I am at 6:30 in the morning, been up for 2 hours, waiting for the doctors office to open because I'm pretty sure I have strep throat and no amount of over the counter drugs I have in my cabinet, cloriseptic spray, throat lozenges, or hot salt water will make it stop even the slightest.

Despite this, this will be a good day. If I don't get put on antibiotics, you'll find me at the beach. If I do...you'll find me anxiously awaiting the 2 hour finale of the best season of Lost ever.

Yes people, I've really been waiting for this night for 2 weeks!