Yesterday I went to Horseshoe Bay and spent some time in downtown Vancouver. While in these locations I did not do the following:
Lift anything heavier than a regular sized beverage
Push or pull anything of significant girth or weight
Twist my body in a pretzel-like shape
Indulge in any sort of exercise more vigorous than walking
I mention these things because by dinner I felt a few twinges in my lower back, the kind that raise miniature red flags. In the middle of the night I awoke to considerable stiffness and discomfort in my lower back. Why? I do not know. I am not especially flexible, which makes these sorts of issues more likely to happen, but it’s still a tad frustrating to not have a metaphorical smoking gun to point to.
I initially opted out of work, then foolishly went in late, thinking a T3 would get me through the afternoon. T3s do not really work for sore or spasming muscles, alas. I spent about five hours experiencing a quiet agony, the pain persistent and unyielding no matter how I stood, sat or attempted to hover.
The best relief came in the evening when a soothing bubble bath with bonus Epsom salts allowed my back to temporarily experience pseudo-low gravity, my body bobbing blissfully in the warm, redolent water. So if I could work from a bubble bath my problems would be solved.
Failing that, I’ve opted for taking Robax, avoiding sitting, indulging laying down, and have gone to bed early, all in the hope that tg latest part of my body to declare itself in disrepair will at least somewhat mend itself overnight.
If I win the Lotto 6/49 I am going to seriously look into purchasing a robot body. I’m good with the brain but at this point I’m willing to trade in almost everything else.
On Thursday, May 3rd I went to the ER again after developing an allergic reaction to the antibiotics I was on. The reaction started on Monday and Wednesday I found myself both very spotty and fatigued. The fatigue may have been unrelated or psychosomatic. Either way, I wanted to get a professional opinion on what I could or couldn’t do for this particular reaction.
I originally planned on visiting the ER before noon, but ended up not getting out of bed until after 11, so I was actually eating breakfast at lunch. I went after 1 p.m. and foolishly assumed it would be quieter during the week than on the weekend. I’m not sure what my logic was in thinking this, but I was horribly wrong.
There weren’t many people in the ER, which lulled me into a false sense of “This isn’t going to take long.” Here is my tale, written live blog-style thanks to the wonders of technology.
1:07 p.m. Here I am again in emergency, hooray. Today’s special is spots all over the body. I ordered the full meal.
1:20 p.m .Still waiting, lots more people coming in now. No one here has any obvious symptoms or injuries, which strikes me as a wee bit odd. Maybe someone will suddenly have blood start gushing from their eyeballs or something.
Actually, a kid about 8 looks like he hurt his arm. he’s holding it in that “I dun broke it” way, but looks super casual otherwise. If I broke my arm I’d at least look a bit distracted.
1:25 p.m. I’m in at Check-in 2, getting prepped for triage. Temperature and blood pressure taken again (the latter may be increasing with each trip to the ER), get another set of those impossible-to-remove bands on my wrist. They have not added the new antibiotic to the second band. Yet.
1:33 p.m. Moved to triage. Unlike the main ER area, this room is very crowded here and everyone looks sad or quietly angry.
Every time my name is called out, they say Stanley, like they’re my mom. To be fair, it’s what my ID says. It still feels a little odd.
1:43 p.m. A woman almost misses her call as she’s wearing earbuds and rocking out in a chair directly in front of the nurse calling her name. She’s about the only one here who doesn’t look unhappy. I don’t want to listen to music and lose my place. I’d probably be here another two hours.
I’m wearing shorts today. At least the weather is nice.
2:00 p.m. Time keeps on ticking…
Some weird period abduction movie is playing on the TV, with stabbing and blood. The twist is the abductor is a woman and the abductee is a man. Some vigilante woman with a bow comes to rescue the man, but her target, in true Mike Myers fashion, pulls the arrow out of her chest and tries stabbing vigilante woman with it. As one does in these situations. This movie doesn’t seem like maybe the best choice to be showing in a hospital. Okay, I remember seeing that it was on CBC, so I looked it up and it turned out to be an episode of Murdoch’s Mysteries, “a one-hour drama set in Toronto in the late 1890s and early 1900s during the age of invention.” Apparently the mystery in this episode is how you can’t disable someone with an arrow fired at near point-blank range.
Shortly after this ends, a show called The Goods starts. People laugh a lot. It’s some home improvement thing set in a studio with an audience of about 12 people. They all seem to much happier than those of us here in triage. Before the first makeover begins, a Code Blue is called for the lower entrance. Several staff go running by. I hear a vehicle backup sound. Code Blue means someone in need of immediate resuscitation. I’m probably a Code Mauve.
2:03 p.m. I’m wondering what if anything they can do or give me. If I had a super power right now I would totally go with body spot remover.
A kid is crying over in emergency. It’s faint, though, almost subliminal. I don’t know if that makes it better or worse.
The young guy sitting across from me appears to have fallen asleep. Just as I finished writing this he sprang to life and took out his phone. His sleepy eyes now have the zombified glaze of the modern smartphone owner.
2:08 p.m. It dawns on me that this is triage and as such I may be the last one looked at. I gird myself for a long wait.
2:14 p.m. I notice my chart is gone from the chart repository. This seems like a promising sign.
2:20 pm The guy sitting next to me gets restless, gets up, raids a vending machine and is now pacing back and forth in front of me eating heavily salted snacks. It’s mildly annoying. He’s apparently not going to sit back down.
2:23 p.m. Running out of seats now. Munchies Man may be accidentally nice by refusing to sit.
Salty Snacks Guy gets his chart or whatever and is free to go–just in time, as he finished all his nuts.
2:27 p.m. I have been waiting in triage for about an hour now. I know my phone battery can hold out, but still….
2:29 p.m. A woman sits next to me and a nurse starts administering an IV to her, explaining the procedure. I don’t really want to be part of this. Fortunately at nearly the same time I finally get called in.
2:31 p.m. I’m in a small exam room by myself this time. The doctor leaves so I can put on a gown after I remove my shirt. This turns out to be unnecessary, except for some untold amusement value.
2:36 p.m. I sit on the exam bed and wait. I haven’t secured my gown very well and it keeps wanting to slip off my shoulder, like I’m trying to make myself alluring.
2:45 p.m. The doctor finally returns and has changed into a man. He introduces himself but I don’t quite catch the name. Dr. Mark Flibberman or something. He seems non-nonsense. He asks a few questions about the reaction, gets me to pull up the gown to show my spotty abdomen, makes me stick out my tongue, then says very firmly, “Never take that antibiotic again.” That seems like a good idea. He deems this a mild allergic reaction and recommends Benadryl and says Reactine is also good. It will take around 10 days to clear up (I’m on Day 7 as I write this and this seems plausible. It’s just now showing signs of fading). He doesn’t suggest I do anything else in particular, except to return if I see symptoms of a stronger reaction. These include fun things like:
difficulty in swallowing or breathing
skin peeling off
ulcers in the mouth
None of these have occurred yet, but given how things have gone this year, I’m not placing bets until the spots have completely faded.
2:48 p.m. Unlike my previous visit, I leave empty-handed, save for the bracelets. I have to pick up something from an Amazon locker at a nearby TD branch and try to look inconspicuous, even though it’s totally obvious I’m wearing bracelets from the hospital. Not to mention the spots.
I have spent nearly two hours at the hospital. I probably could have looked up the same info in five minutes on WebMD.com. Oh well. At least the news was…not bad?
This concludes my second and hopefully last trip to the ER this year.
Bonus image. This is what my right leg looked like after a walk the same day. Vigorous activity was making the spots extremely vivid for a couple of days. It’s honestly kind of gross, so I’ve put it inside a spoiler:
This morning I finished the last of my 10 day prescription of Apo-Clindamycin and mused how nice it was to not have experienced any of the side effects. I remembered, of course, that both the doctor and pharmacist warned me side effects could occur after I’d finished taking all of the antibiotics.
You know what happened next.
Around noon I went to the washroom before going for my lunch hour walk and I noticed in the mirror that I looked a little flushed. A little glowing, in fact. Upon closer inspection I saw that my neck was livid with red dots.
This is not normal.
I looked at my arms and yes, I had a rash and it was spreading. Arms, legs, neck, front, back. Everywhere below the neck, except my hands and feet. And a few hours later it moved above my face, giving my face the appearance of a sunburn. Also, several parts of my body became super itchy.
It was not fun.
I went to the school clinic. The doctor gave me a three-day supply of Reactine and couldn’t say when, exactly, I’d see the effects of it. As of tonight I am seeing little reactin’ (get it?!), but there is perhaps some mild improvement. I don’t feel as itchy.
She also told me to see my doctor soon for allergy tests and such, as this would be the third major class of antibiotics I’d be allergic to. It’s possible that this may be a one-time reaction upon first use, since I did get through the entire supply before any effects occurred. But still, not the snazziest way to start a new month.
The bad news is my weight is up for the month and up more than March. The good news is…um…April was kind of a terrible month so maybe being up 1.1 pounds is not so bad. Also, I have been jumping up and down about 1.5 pounds lately, so it’s quite possible that tomorrow I’ll have actual weight loss showing.
Nonetheless, the fat stats:
April 1: 167.1 pounds April 30: 168.2 pounds (+1.1 pounds for the month)
Year to date: From 162.3 to 168.2 pounds (up 5.9 pounds)
And the body fat:
January 1: 18.5% (30.2 pounds of fat)
April 30: 19.5% (32.8 pounds of fat–up 2.8 pounds)
My goal for May is to stop inflating. To put it less ambiguously, my goal is actual weight loss. You know, where my weight goes down instead of the opposite of down.
Also, despite all evidence to the contrary, I remain donut-free.
I do not recommend waiting 30 years between visits to your dentist.
My partner Jeff called his dentist and got me an emergency appointment today at 12:30 p.m. so they could look at and determine what to do with my infected ex-tooth (extract with prejudice seemed the only real option).
I wasn’t totally sure if they would look today and excavate later, but it became clear early on that time and tide and infected ex-teeth wait for no man.
Fortunately, dentistry has improved a good bit in the last 30+ years.
The dentist and assistant were both friendly and explained everything, especially after I voiced my unfocused anxiety that had kept me away as an adult. The chair now moves up and down with the press of a button. I’m pretty sure the last time I sat in one it was operated with a foot pedal and brute force.
Directly in front of me was a flat panel screen showing images of what appeared to be some rural area in South America. The people had nicer teeth than me, which I supposed was the point. Then an image of a steer staring into the camera came up and I was confused. I later learned the images were from work my (new) dentist had done in Central America. I am unclear if he worked on the steer. It wasn’t smiling.
The dentist acknowledged that old dentistry was pretty primitive (I think of McCoy exclaiming about the medieval medical technology seen in 20th century Earth in Star Trek IV) and carefully explained everything he was doing or would do and how it was way better than the old days.
The first step was to take an x-ray of the affected area. I was asked after if I wanted to see it and declined, because how could it not be grossbuckets? I don’t want to see gross things that are inside me, even if they are about to become outside me.
If you don’t like descriptions of dental work, stop reading now or skip to the last paragraph.
First he used a cotton swab to apply some topical numbing gel to the area that would be frozen. This helps reduce possible pain while getting the freezing shot, and indeed, I felt very little of anything as my mouth was frozen. A promising start.
After giving it five minutes to set, the work began. The dentist reassured me that it would be quick and relatively painless, thanks to the infection. Yes, this seems weird. He explained that teeth normally set their roots into the bone and used the analogy of fence posts in cement. Very tough to get out. However, the infection around my ex-tooth’s roots had basically turned what would be cement into goop. The three individual root pieces would come out easily.
And the first two did, popping out with no sensation at all.
I got jabbed with some more freezing at this point, and I did feel a little pain, for which both the dentist and assistant profusely apologized. I actually felt bad mumbling a complaint.
I also realize how super-tense my body was and made an effort to relax. I closed my eyes and couldn’t think of anything to distract myself with, so I just kept them closed and focused on not making my body an unbending board.
The third root was a little trickier to get to. I heard sounds in my mouth I don’t like hearing. I tasted something gross. I’m not sure what it was, but they apologized again and suctioned it out.
The suction was very weird. They told me to clamp my mouth on it for maximum effectiveness, but when I did it felt like it wanted to pull out my insides. It didn’t hurt or anything, it was just strange. I want to say it sucked, but I’d never do that.
The third root came out and the dentist poked around a bit more, removing some of the infected tissue, to help speed healing. He advised me I would probably want to take the T3’s I’d be given, though the assistant offered that Advil could work, too, with the bonus of not messing with my stomach or mind.
I took the T3 when I got home.
The work was complete within half an hour or so and I left with gauze clenched on the left side of my mouth. It’s out now and I don’t think it’s bleeding, but I have more gauze just in case. The freezing has mostly worn off now, so the puffy face look has diminished.
I was told to eat soft food today and be careful with hot/cold food or beverages over the next few days. I can brush tonight, but not swirl anything around in my mouth. Using a straw is forbidden in the same way turning 31 was in Logan’s Run.
Now I wait for the pain as the numbing wears off, to see how effective the T3 is, and I anticipate the soft eggs or soup or whatever it is I’m having for dinner.
And I’ll be making an appointment for a regular check-up like I should have done 30+ years ago.
Overall, not exactly a delightful experience, but definitely not as bad as I’d expected.
Yesterday my ex-tooth was causing me no end of misery in the form of a constant sharp pain in my upper jaw. It was the kind of thing where if you thought about it, if you concentrated on it, you could make it worse, get it to really start throbbing. Doing the opposite, focusing on getting into a Zen-like state of calm, would minimize it, but at best it would become a constant background thing, kind of like someone mowing the lawn outside your window, except they inexplicably do it for the entire day without taking breaks.
I was given two things to help with the ex-tooth. Tylenol 3 for the pain–remember, Tylenol 3 is not like the over-the-counter version. It’s a narcotic and enough of it can make you quite silly. The other was the antibiotic to combat the infection. I was given a T3 and an Alleve tablet before leaving the hospital, then took the antibiotics about half an hour later, after getting the prescription made.
Within half an hour of that, the pain was gone. Not just blunted, but essentially gone. The area around the ex-tooth is tender and sore, but the actual pain is gone. Today I’ve been continuing to take the antibiotics, but no T3s, and the pain is still gone.
It’s actually a little unnerving how effective the drugs have been. It makes me wonder how often they are used to similar effect for more nefarious purposes. Mostly I’m just glad we have medicine that can do this kind of stuff, because trying to distract myself from pain is something I can only manage about 50% of the time. I’m like a half-monk. One moment I’m in deep contemplation, the next I’m distracted by my own weird train of thought, like “Don’t think about the pain, you’ll only make it worse. Oh, I’m thinking about it right now, aren’t I? Yes, I told you not to do that. Right, I’ll stop. Okay, I’m thinking about kittens now, not the pain. You know, that constant ticking pain in my jaw. I mean kittens. Adorable kittens. I am not thinking about the pain I just described. I am full of lies.”
Anyway, Tylenol 3 and antibiotics are my new best friends this week.
It shouldn’t be convenient to live only a few blocks away from a hospital and its emergency room, because you should never have to go, making the convenience irrelevant. But life is nutty and ignoring the dentist because of irrational fear can have consequences.
As I am about to demonstrate.
About six years ago one of the teeth in my upper jaw cracked (oh, I should warn you, if you get squeamish about anything tooth-related, stop reading now and instead do a search on this blog for the tag “cats are funny people” and delight in the results). It wasn’t painful, it just happened. I don’t know why it cracked, other than maybe a family history of bad teeth–and my neglect in visiting a dentist regularly (or at all) as an adult. A few years after that the remaining tooth gave up and I became the owner of a toothless gap in my left upper jaw. Except it wasn’t really toothless, as the roots and a tiny bit of the exposed part of the tooth remained.
I avoided brushing this part–much like I avoided dentists–because it was generally pretty tender and an accidental brushing would leave it sore.
A few days ago it felt sore and I thought perhaps I had accidentally brushed it. Then I woke up yesterday and it was still sore and further, it felt more like a toothache, actual pain and all that. I took some Advil and Alleve. These had virtually no effect. The whole area around the ex-tooth was tender and seemed inflamed.
Weirdly (or more likely, because I’m a guy) when I woke up today and felt the same pain, I almost still went out for my run. It was sunny and mild, so I didn’t want to waste the opportunity. Sanity prevailed, however, so I promised myself to visit the emergency room first, then I could go for the run.
I did not go for the run.
Approximately an hour and a half after arriving at the emergency room, I left with:
confirmation that the ex-tooth was infected
orders to see a dentist in the next 24-48 hours (“No later than Monday” was stressed several times)
one Tylenol 3 and one Alleve (in my tummy, since a nurse handed them to me with a cup of water)
a prescription for Tylenol 3 and antibiotics
affirmation again that hospitals are a place you never want to be
Here is my visit, with timestamps where applicable:
3:50 p.m. I have arrived. I go to the check-in counter and have a hard time hearing the person talking through the glass. I am given a surprisingly hard to remove bracelet with my info on it and have a seat. I expect to wait awhile and am not disappointed.
There are a few people here, but their injuries or ailments are for the most part not immediately obvious. a guy wearing a Tool t-shirt is here with his partner and I assume he has an arm injury, as he only has his left arm in one of the sleeves. I can’t quite see the other arm. This is probably a good thing.
A nicely-dressed woman keeps walking in and out, talking on her phone and holding a tissue to her nose. She eventually goes back to the check-in desk and complains that her nose is bleeding again. She gets to cut in line and is ushered away. I’m not going to try a nosebleed. I can wait.
I try to ignore my ex-tooth, which is currently getting Straight A’s in pain-causing right now.
There is a young Asian guy with a trendy haircut. He looks completely fine.
To my left is a woman around my age or a bit older. She coughs in a loud, wet, unhealthy way. At one point someone comes up to her and says they need a blood sample, then proceeds to do it right there. I don’t remember them taking blood in emergency before. I am glad she’s at least one seat over.
A guy in his 30s shambles in slowly. He is wearing open-toe sandals, is unshaven and looks terrible, as if he hasn’t slept in two months. I can’t hear what he is saying at the check-in desk, but the tone and manner suggest ailment over injury. He then reaches down to the small trash bucket by his feet and sticks his head into it, barfing. I can tell he is trying to throw up quietly. I am not unappreciative. He’s given a bracelet and looks like he might sit next to me–still clutching the plastic trash bucket–but he decides to stand, then to just amble about. His wife and baby arrive a short time later. The baby looks like he is deciding whether or not to cry.
Eventually a staff member takes away the garbage can and gives him a plastic barf bag instead.
To my delight, the baby never cries.
4:20 p.m. I am called to Triage 2, which is…right beside the check-in desk. I get asked questions about allergies and such and am given a bracelet that reads GIVE PENICILLIN ONLY IF RASH OVER ENTIRE BODY IS DESIRED. I sit back down and wait some more.
4:27 p.m. Mr. Self-Treatment arrives at the check-in desk. In a firm and articulate voice he describes various symptoms–a heaviness on the chest, chronic tiredness, etc. and laments over how he has had to self-diagnose and treat himself, even in the presence of professional doctors. I never figured out what the distinction was with professional doctors. Maybe he originally sought treatment by actors who played doctors. He went on for a bit, spending equal time complaining about the system and then complaining about himself. I couldn’t figure out what was wrong with him. His vocal chords were very healthy.
4:32 p.m. I am finally moved to…the second waiting area. In a call-out to The wizard of Oz, you are told to “Follow the yellow brick line.” Okay, they leave out the “brick” part, but I remember this line from before. I follow it and then get confused because the end arrow is mostly peeled away and I’m not sure if I’ve actually reached the end. A kindly old woman confirms I have and also shows me where to put my chart, which is also in a yellow folder.
She seems smarter than me, for which I am grateful.
The second waiting area is more crowded, so I anticipate a long wait here. Some people are dressed in gowns or sitting in wheelchairs. Occasionally someone gets wheeled through on a stretcher. I look to my right and see I am sitting next to a Nellcor sensor. I don’t know what a Nellcor is.
I wait.
Several people get called but no one responds. This may work to my advantage.
4:55 p.m. I am finally brought into the exam room and explain my predicament. The doctor marvels over how I went so long with the tooth equivalent of a bomb in my mouth not going off. I admitted I knew a day of reckoning would come. A curtain is drawn in the middle of the room and it is clear someone is on the other side. I am glad I cannot see who or what is on the other side because I get an unpleasant vibe from it.
The visit with the doctor is done in about five minutes. She is very friendly and asks if I have any questions after explaining things. I get my first warning to see a dentist in 48 hours max. She warns that T3’s can cause constipation and affect decision-making, among other side effects. She warns against arguing with my partner or getting a haircut while under its effects. I like her.
I go back to the second waiting area and once again wait, as one does in these areas. After a short period of time a nurse comes in with my prescription and the T3/Alleve combo. At 5:15 p.m. I am heading out the way I came in, off to get the prescription filled at Save-On Foods, where I will also buy Goldfish crackers as a pick-me-up.
The pharmacist is like the doctor, friendly and informative. She advises me of one of the side effects of the antibiotics, which is diarrhea. She in unsure if the constipation from the T3s will cancel out the diarrhea from the antibiotics. I like to think they will.
I finish my shopping, come home and indulge in my new prescription drugs. The first T3 works amazingly well, almost completely masking the pain. I can take one more before bed (if needed). I’m feeling a little light-headed as I write this, which is one of the other side effects. I have no immediate plans to drive a bulldozer or other vehicle, so the neighborhood is safe. For now. I may suddenly decide driving a bulldozer is a totally excellent idea. I’ve never been on T3s before.
I need to decide if I want to find an emergency dentist tomorrow or wait until Monday and see if Jeff’s dentist can take me on as a new (emergency) patient. I’ll probably go with the former, as it seems time is of the proverbial essence.
I’m not looking forward to the dentist visit. I mean, who would? You’d need to eat a lot of T3s to think the dentist is fun. Because most of the tooth is gone, removing the rest will require excavating through the gums. I’d like to think dentistry is all lasers and painless now, but I suspect we’re not quite there yet. I’m hoping getting anesthetized is an option. I can deal with waking up all loopy afterward and then experiencing exquisite pain (provided I have my T3s).
All in all, I’d have preferred a better weekend. If it turns out I won the $26 million Lotto 6/49 jackpot tonight, I will come back to amend the preceding statement.
Although it doesn’t feel like it, March actually saw my ballooning waistline stabilize, with a margin-of-error weight gain of 0.1 pounds. I’m now up 4.8 pounds for the year, down from 5.2 pounds last month.
I remain donut-free.
I am trying to run more, but not doing well there.
I tried going cold turkey on snacks and ended up wanting to eat whole turkeys. I’m trying to ease off now instead.
If I work at it I may see actual weight loss by the end of April.
The fatty stats:
March 1: 167 pounds March 31: 167.1 pounds (+0.1 pounds for the month)
Year to date: From 162.3 to 167.1 pounds (up 4.8 pounds)
And the body fat:
January 1: 18.5% (30.2 pounds of fat)
March 31: 19.2% (32.1 pounds of fat–up 1.9 pounds)
I can’t remember the last time I had a corn dog. It was probably at a fair when I was in my teens, so about three hundred years ago. But when I think about them, they just seem weird. You take a wiener and coat it in a thick layer of fried cornmeal. It’s just an odd thing to decide to turn into a dish. I can’t even remember if I liked them. I kind of want to try one again but there’s no easy way other than buying an entire box of them in the grocer freezer. Then I’d have to figure out what to do with the rest of them. Donate them to orphans? Turn them into fertilizer? Science experiments?
But maybe this is a case where it’s better to let sleeping (corn) dogs lie.
Also, I categorized this post under Health, though I’m not entirely sure it qualifies.
The Fitbit One is a step tracker that, unlike most, does not strap onto your wrist. It comes with a clip but I always kept it in the watch pocket of my jeans where it tracked faithfully.
I am using the past tense because my Fitbit One is now dead, murdered by washing. To be more precise, when I did my last load of laundry this past Friday I forgot to take the Fitbit out of that watch pocket and realized this with five minutes left in the wash cycle. It came out dead and remains dead. It is tracking in technology Heaven now.
I’ve actually done this once before and the Fitbit One not only survived, it gave me a bonus 1400 steps from tumbling around inside the washer for 45 minutes. The difference this time is the button on it had collapsed into the unit and while it still worked fine after the button collapse, tracking just as it always has, I suspect that this created a gap for water to get in and zap everything to heck and back.
I looked into replacing my deceased device, but apparently Fitbit quietly stopped making the One awhile back. Local stores don’t stock it. The closest replacement is the Fitbit Zip, which only tracks steps and is shaped a bit like a watch, sans strap. But I have my Apple watch now for tracking and it’s on my wrist where it more easily guilts me into meeting my goals (see here for more), so I think I’ll just stick to the one device.
I feel a bit silly killing the Fitbit One like this, but I appreciate the slight de-cluttering of the technology in my life.
