It's Been a Rough Week...

In stark contrast to the cheery, wine-and-roses nonsense from last week, this week hasn't been so great. Since I last posted, I have had two rather profound reactions to my nebulized antibiotic. The first occurred last Wednesday night. I did the dose as usual, went down and ate dinner and was rather shaky - an expected side effect of the albuterol. I woke Thursday morning after a night of badly interrupted sleep - short of breath and coughing all night long and knew it would be a bad idea to take the oxygen off, so I left it on and stayed home from work - meanwhile refraining from nebulizing anything. Friday morning I felt marginally better (I didn't need oxygen) and I got in touch with the doctor and explained my situation. I was advised to use the albuterol just in the morning before taking the antibiotic and the antibiotic alone at night. Friday night I took another dose, just antibiotic. Saturday I ran a couple errands and was kinda more tired than usual but functional. Saturday night I took another full dose of the antibiotic sans albuterol. A couple hours later the fun started...

They're called bronchospasms, but it feels like a baboon sitting on your chest. I have been unable to breathe freely since Saturday night. Fortunately, I did discover that I wasn't reacting to the albuterol other than the jitteryness and that it did relieve the situation to a degree. I use it every few hours when the tightness and discomfort starts to return. I haven't removed the oxygen for more than about five minutes, and that with some degree of discomfort. I've obviously been unable to go to work. For the first couple days, it was difficult to eat because I'd get badly winded chewing and swallowing. Things have been improving, but very slowly. Realistically, it would be pleasantly surprising if I can function without the oxygen by sometime this weekend.

In the meantime, I am back on Cipro (oral antibiotic) and Singulair until the culture comes back to see what else any lingering infection will respond to.

On another note, the Vita-Mix came today, but I haven't used it for anything yet.