Hopeful

Still over here recovering from the plague that was bacterial tonsillitis plus a viral infection of some sort. I finished antibiotics this morning, and my throat is mostly not sore anymore, but I’ve got a lovely lingering dry cough, that is particularly activated when I talk, which is a problem, since as both a counselor and a telehealth nurse, I talk for a living. I tried to go back to work yesterday and only lasted about four hours before I’d coughed so much that my throat felt sore again.

I had a pre-booked follow up to my emergency room visit with my family doctor this morning, and she prescribed an inhaler to help with the cough and told me to take today to use the inhaler regularly, and then try and return to work tomorrow. So that’s the plan. One more day of resting and medicating, then hopefully back to regularly scheduled programming!

Every stage of this silly illness has had moments of despair and moments of hope. The first two doctors I saw, who dismissed my symptoms left me feeling rather despairing, as I dealt with the intense pain from the throat infection. The third doctor who took me seriously and ran some more tests gave me hope. The emergency room nurses, who were all so kind, despite being in the midst of a busy night shift during Stampede gave me hope – one was so apologetic that she couldn’t give me pain meds that she offered and found me a popsicle for my aching throat! The fast action of the steroid that they gave me in the emergency room gave me hope as I found relief from pain for the first time in a week. And the doctor today, who told me in her own way that I wasn’t crazy, I was really very sick, and has put in some referrals to hopefully prevent this from happening again in the future, and then listened when I said a particular inhaler wouldn’t work because it aggravates my anxiety and depression, and found an alternative that will work just as well – that gave me hope too.

In a season that has felt hard, where I’m dealing with a lot of life transitions and stressors, and generally just feel a bit out of control, the glimmers of hope are so good for me to notice. And today, maybe for the first time this week, since I’ve still been feeling crummy, and coughing near constantly, I feel hope.