I don’t know about you, but when I was a kid I loved being home from school because I was sick. I didn’t get sick that often, but when I was… well, jackpot. Sure, I felt like crud, but there was something comforting about hanging out in my pajamas, watching television, and eating lunch on the couch. A great little break from the normal routine.

Now that I’m an adult, sick days are not nearly so entertaining. In the back of my head I always think, “Well, I hate being sick, but at least I get to be at home all day. That’s not so bad.” But of course, it’s never a good time. If I’ve given up and stayed home, chances are I’m lying down for half of the time feeling miserable, or at the very least moving at one-quarter impulse power. Usually the most “fun” I have involves watching an episode of something or another on the DVR, but half the time I don’t even make it to the end because the mental effort is too much and I just go take a nap instead.

(The one notable exception: when I had my gallbladder out at the end of 2008. Don’t get me wrong, I was really sore and spent a day or two doped up on pain pills. But by day 4 or so of a one-week “you must stay at home” the pain had shifted to a dull ache, and I spent the rest of the week playing Animal Crossing: City Folk on the Wii. That was remarkably fun for those last few days.)

But anyway, I do try to make sick days as “enjoyable” as one can under the circumstances. Since I’m at home today with some sort of chest crud, I tried to rally a bit. Made my favorite kale-apple-miso salad for lunch, dug out and brewed some fancy loose leaf tea that Karon gave me as a gift, read the first 50 pages of Sara Ryan and Carla Speed McNeil’s Bad Houses. It’s not high living, but it makes the overall sick experience less… well… sickly.

Really, all I was missing from my old “being sick” ritual was a big bowl of Chicken & Stars soup, which for far too long was a comfort food for when I was under the weather. (I’ve since burnt out on it.) So all in all, certainly could be worse. Anyone else have a particular sicktime ritual or comfort?

Today I had my long-delayed next step of my oral surgery, to replace two teeth that have been causing me problems ever since I cracked one of them while on a trip to Italy back in 1999. (It’s a long story involving root canals that eventually failed, got repaired, failed yet again, and finally had first one and then both teeth extracted.) Now that it had been long enough since the extractions, the order of the day was to put posts in that will hold the implants in place. In doing so, I learned three things today.

1) Dentists, when they get bored, like to dress their patients up like a mixture of Bono and Telly Savalas while telling them it is part of the prep work to apply a topical anesthetic. Do not be fooled. This is entirely for their own amusement, nothing more.

2) The lyrics to the Girls Aloud song “Long Hot Summer” are rather vapid, but the line that I’ve sneered at in particular (and there are so very very many to do so, despite the fact that I love the song) is “…and I’m shakin’ like a cool lemonade.” Well, it doesn’t matter how much I don’t feel pain during the procedure, and how good the dentist/oral surgeon is (he’s actually rather excellent), I was shakin’ like a cool lemonade the entire time. Seriously, I could feel myself trembling for most of it. I’m fine with teeth cleanings and the like, but I’ve had several horrible dental procedure experiences that I am pretty sure have mentally scarred me for life. It probably goes back to the time they were removing teeth in preparation for braces. I have been told by enough people to “never tell that story again” so I’ll spare you the details, save for the line, “and as my head snapped back, the dentist and hygenist shot backwards across the room and slammed into the far wall.”

3) It turns out when they put dental implants in your mouth, they are really putting miniature Daleks inside you. The Dalek invasion has begun! Who knew? Not me!

Now if you don’t mind, it’s time for me to take a vicodin and hang out with an ice pack…

I’ve now had nine “adult” teeth removed, although on the bright side each extraction has gotten easier. The first four removed were from back when I had braces as a teenager. As part of the re-arranging of my mouth, they had to come out. Two of them came out quickly, but the other two had double-roots and weren’t so willing to budge. I still have vivid memories of a dental hygienist holding my head in place, while the dentist and a second dental hygienist simultaneously tugged at the stubborn tooth. When it finally came free, they shot backwards across the office and slammed into a wall. Meanwhile, I had so much novocaine pumped into my face that my eyelids were asleep.

The next four were my wisdom teeth, which came out in 1993. It actually wasn’t a bad experience; the teeth came almost all the way in (and were actually cutting up the sides of my mouth) so there was very little cutting that needed to be done. A new extraction, though, happened yesterday. Years ago after a tooth cracked, I needed to have a root canal that went through two teeth. (Eek.) It started bothering me this summer, so I went to an endodontist who was able to fix the one closer in that was causing pain. Unfortunately, the other one (which wasn’t actually causing any pain) needed to come out. So after a lot of delaying, I finally bit the bullet.

I have to give the oral surgeon credit, that was much less painful than I’d imagined. I’d been warned that the tooth was brittle (as all root canal teeth are) so I “might hear some cracking noises.” Eeek. I had mental images of the tooth shattering in the process and then them having to dig the roots out of my gums. Not good, right? But I was worked on for less than five minutes and suddenly the surgeon was taking the brace out of my mouth and saying, “All done.”  You know it’s gone well when even the receptionist is startled at how fast it was taken care of.

That unfortunately meant lots of packed gauze and painkillers for the rest of today, and I’m still taking some 600mg of Motrin to ease the pain today, but it’s not that bad. (I actually just feel unusually tired and run down today more than anything else. We’ll see how the day progresses. Hopefully all will still be well.) I’m also not looking forward to the implant that will need to come for replacing the tooth, as I know that’s the more hefty of the procedures. But still, that’s a few months away.

Hopefully this is the last tooth extraction for a long while. I appreciate that they’ve been getting less and less painful, but still. I’d like to not have to gum my food down the line, right?

Well, as promised earlier, I had my allergy testing yesterday. Honestly, up until Monday being off the medicine wasn’t too bad, but Monday itself? Utter nightmare. So much sneezing and blowing my nose that two days later my nose is still tender and sore from it all. All the Sudafed in the world, it seems, wasn’t enough to stop the bleah.

Now that the testing is over, though, I’m back on my Allegra and things are much better. Most of the results weren’t much of a surprise, either. Trees, grass, ragweed, dust mites, and cats. Yep, yep, yep, yep, and yep. The dust mites in particular caused a rather alarming reaction, so much that I wish I had my camera with me. It looked like I’d burnt my arm on the stove, it was so red and puffed up. Yikes.

In a few weeks I get to start allergy serum shots, which is exciting. Over time, in theory, I should become less allergic to some or all of these things. Not so crazy about how after getting the shot you have to wait for 30 minutes to make sure there isn’t some sort of horrible reaction, but on the bright side I guess that means I’ll get some reading done.

The only real surprise was a complete non-reaction to dogs, according to the test. To be fair, I’ve been wondering if my dog allergies have been fading the past few years, it’s not been as bad as when I was younger and my eyes would get red and itchy just being near dogs. Still, I can’t see myself rushing out and getting a dog. (Mind you, my current apartment doesn’t allow them so that also makes it a bit easier. Charlie has dog allergies, which also makes the non-dog-owning decision a snap.)

Best of all, though, is that (knock on wood) now that I can start breathing again, I can also get back on the exercise bandwagon. Somehow I suspect spinning class tonight is going to be brutal. Hopefully I can hit spinning, run over to Artomatic and quickly install my business card and guestbook holders, then get home in time for Lost. Since I have to be up pretty early tomorrow, it’ll be interesting juggling all of this plus dinner…

I spent most of last week running around like a madman, trying to get tons of things done, because I knew that this week would be primary shot thanks to having my gallbladder removal surgery (aka cholecystectomy) scheduled for Monday, December 15th. It was to be performed laparoscopically, where they slide in the little wires and cameras and perform a limited number of incisions. I’m in favor of less incisions rather than more, of course.

So, Monday morning, Charlie dropped me off at Virginia Hospital Center. The surgery was scheduled for noon, which meant needing to check in no later than 10am. I was there a little early, but came prepared with my copy of Wuthering Heights, which Brook had told me I really needed to read. Check-in was painless, and I had a very nice nurse quickly get me into my little waiting room. She snapped on my wristband, then left me to my own devices for getting changed. Hospital gown technology hasn’t really advanced since my other hospital surgery back in September 1980 (an appendicetomy), it seems. They’re still ill-fitting and awkward at best. At least I got to get under the blankets after putting it on, and knocked out a good six chapters of the book before the anesthesiologist showed up.

Now, I have to say, the procedure of knocking someone out has certainly improved since 1980. I still remember having the old gas mask being put over my nose and mouth as I was wheeled down the hallway at the tender age of seven. Here, he injected something into my IV, we had a discussion about Wuthering Heights (or at least what I’d read so far), how he had one bad teacher experience dissuade him from an English Lit degree, and then suddenly I was in the recovery room. Well, that was fast. I don’t even recall getting sleepy.

My parents picked me up once I was good enough to leave, and brought me home until Charlie got off of work and headed back over. Since then, I’ve felt incredibly sore from around the bottom of my ribcage to my waist, which is really not that surprising. Percocet has helped a great deal, though, and aside from one unfortunate vomiting incident soon after I got home (but with no solid food in me, it really wasn’t that bad — just water, and no bile at all since my gallbladder is no more) it hasn’t been too bad. Although I must say that I am really glad that my super-hydrated state (I’m guessing from the IV?) has finally ended. It hasn’t been since those early days of marathon training (back when the common practice was to “drink until you slosh”) that I have had the distinct non-joy of having to pee ever thirty minutes. At least by around 3am it had slowed down to every 90 minutes, and finally returned to normality this afternoon.

Today? Just a lot of lying down on the couch, really. There are things I’d like to have done—read some books, played some games—but I’m only just starting to really get my energy back. I did watch a bunch of TV on the DVR, though; mostly shows that didn’t require too much concentration. (I whole-heartedly recommend Trader Joe’s Organic Split Pea soup, incidentally. As canned soups go it’s near the top of the list, and also very healthy to boot.) I was amused that Charlie got sucked into the season finale of Survivor: Gabon when I was watching it last night, though. Hee hee hee.

Best thing of all, though? My mom found this yesterday morning:

My sister Suzanne drew it for me when I was in the hospital back in 1980; she was only four years old at the time. I have it on the fridge, now.

I was originally hoping to be back out exercising and such next week, but now I am thinking that it was a bit of wishful thinking at my end. Hopefully before New Year’s? That would be nice. We shall see. I have a follow-up appointment with my surgeon on the 29th, and I suspect everything will be pretty clear by then one way or another. Right now all I’m focusing on is getting to take a shower tomorrow. That will be quite nice.

Well, just when I think everything is back to normal… surprise! Remember the nausea/stomach problems I’d mentioned over the past week? Well, as it turns out, the problem was not the Amoxicillin. Last night I started having really horrible stomach pains a little after midnight, and by 4:30am they were so bad (with accompanying vomiting) that I had Charlie drive me to the Emergency Room at Virginia Hospital Center in Arlington.

Turns out? It’s my gall bladder that has been causing the problems. This also explains the out-of-character-for-me bouts of indegestion I’ve been having over the past year. (I thought I was just getting older and unable to handle some foods properly.) The end result was I got my very first experience with morphine (oh, blessed relief—I was actually starting to shake uncontrollably from the pain and everything else going on), my very first prescription for Vicodin, and the plans to call my primary care doctor tomorrow morning to make an appointment to talk about treatment (which will almost certainly be having the gall bladder removed). I’m also having flashbacks to the end of January 2005, when I took Karon to Virginia Hospital Center’s ER for what she thought was food poisoning but turned out to be gallstones as well.

So, hopefully surgery sooner rather than later. I suspect this is going to be a very low-key Thanksgiving one way or another! And it’s also a real relief that I wasn’t up in Philadelphia for the marathon after all. Grammy always says that everything happens for a reason.