I'm not a big Valentine's Day person - haven't actually written about it before, but I don't want to spend it by myself in an emergency room. Unfortunately that's just what I did this year. Remember those allergy tests, and that getting sick? Well, they all hit home and my throat decided that it was done with it all and swelled right up. I could breath just fine but I couldn't swallow, so I headed into the closest place that was open on a Saturday afternoon. Seems that the local stand alone ER was the place that fit the bill. And yes, I drove myself. Four kid and a bunch of life later I realized that I wasn't going to expire, but that I needed to have someone take a look and there was no need to drag the whole family down there. Tom stayed home with the kiddos and all was well with them, and they were none the wiser to what was going on.
And all was well with me in my stand alone ER (what a cool concept - no hospital but all the features of a regular ER!) - they even had bull riding on when I walked in the door. I was seen very quickly after I was triaged (only got to see two riders go - it was that quick) and then the trouble started. By this point I hadn't eaten anything in a good eight hours, and then it was only a really small something that I ate - pancakes. Apparently I hadn't been drinking enough so I was dehydrated. And let me tell you - when you are somewhat dehydrated and have also just had allergy testing done, your skin and blood vessels roll up the welcome mat and go on vacation. Something about not wanting to be pricked any more - can totally understand that one. But the result is a horrible, horrible image - me the human pin cushion:
What you can't see clearly is that I also have holes on the inside if each elbow joint. That's the first two that this nice young man did before fleeing and claiming that he'd never had this much trouble. (I was claiming that I hadn't either, which was true - not so sure about this side of the story!) The second nurse that came in tried her best to hit the big veins in my arms - and they not only didn't take, but once they removed the needle they left lovely BIG HUGE welts on my arm, and now big bruises. Then she tried the left hand and finally settled on the right hand - with a teeny tiny butterfly needle. So I was getting fluids, had some x-rays taken, and then a doctor peeked down my throat with a rather long stainless steel instrument to see whatever she could see. and all she saw was a very irritated throat. So, they loaded me up with a steroid, filled me full of fluids, and deemed me fit for duty. Took the steroid a few hours to work, but by the time I got home I was in much better shape. So I spent a good five hours at the stand alone ER on Valentine's Day, and I don't have allergies.
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