My name is Jenn, and I'm a 27 year old married and babied chick. In addition to a husband, a seven year old daughter, and a five year old autistic son, I also have four cats, three hermit crabs, two frogs, a few fish, and one snorty little Pug. I work from home doing a variety of writing and even some web design. I love blogging, digital photography and web design.
Since Wednesday evening I have been battling a fever that bounces between 100° and 103.3°. It’s accompanied by a cough that is sometimes dry and raspy, and sometimes wet and semi-productive. A fever in this range is enough to make me tired, dizzy, lightheaded, out of it, and generally “feverish”, but it’s not high enough to be a life threatening emergency. Yet my husband, who at the moment has me convinced that he is the most uncompassionate human being I have ever met, seems to think that it’s either a life threatening situation that I should act upon by going to the hospital, or that I’m faking it. Obviously I’m not faking it, as he’s been around me all weekend, has felt just how hot to the touch I am, and Danielle and Matt have been around me as well, and have also seen just how miserable I am. He even knows I’m not faking it… so WTF he would say that to begin with is beyond me.
But I don’t think it’s life threatening. I would be more concerned about calling a doctor over the weekend or even going to the ER if it was 104, 105 or definitely if it was 106. But 100, 101, 102 and 103? Not so much. I haven’t called my physician’s office (they have an on-call doctor on the weekends), because I know what they’re going to say: plenty of rest, plenty of fluids, alternate between Tylenol and Ibuprofen every 4-6 hours. I’m doing all that, minus the medication alternating, because 1) I can’t take Ibuprofen (it’s an NSAID, and it can cause stomach irritation — a definite no-no for gastric bypass patients) and 2) even if I could, I don’t have any in liquid form. They’d also tell me to call them first thing Monday morning to get an appointment — now that I definitely DO plan on doing.
Sorry, but I’m not going to drag my sick ass out to the hospital, simply because I’m not sick enough to warrant wasting my time, the time of the hospital, and valuable medical resources. But just because I choose not to avail myself of a hospital does not mean I’m not horribly miserable and wanting to just curl up in an unconscious ball somewhere until I can get seen by someone in a lab coat. It simply means that I’m making the better choice — keeping my sick, cold, miserable self at home, where it’s warm, instead of dragging out in the cold to a hospital that would most likely not bother to admit me anyway. And besides, my car is still blocked in by snow from the back (I think, unless Dan or Matt shoveled it out), and I’d have to take Alyssa and Ryan with me to the hospital. Yeah, I can see that going over really well!
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