For me it started Tuesday around midnight… an ahem throat-clearing, post-nasal drip, followed by a slight cough.
My fever peaked at a little over 101 last night, and my entire body feels like it’s been dragged over 8 miles of bad road, so I feel confident in wishing everybody a…
HAPPY FLU YEAR!!!
Dammit, I had the cutest dress to wear tonight, and new shoes that are totally going to waste. And New Year’s Day brunch is a washout as well.
snif
I’m feeling peaked…anyone have a fainting couch I could borrow?
Girlfriend, I hear ya. I’m sittin’ here, yet again, with a tissue shoved up my nostril. Good Lord.
I’ve decided that I really like Puffs over Kleenex. I can’t believe how much softer they are.
What a way to ring in the New Year, huh?
I have to say, though, it sure beats the hell out of the last time I was sick on New Year’s Eve. I was running a temp of 102-ish, and I spent an inordinate amount of time with my head bowed over a lovely porcelain throne wishing that death would come quickly and be swift. Oy. It was so bad that I couldn’t walk from my bedroom to the bathroom, oh no. I had to crawl.
Let’s see… I’ve been desperately ill on:
[ul]
[li]My birthday.[/li][li]Independence Day.[/li][li]Thanksgiving (and it was at my house. I cooked it all, and didn’t eat a thing).[/li][li]Christmas.[/li][li]New Year’s.[/li][/ul]
Wow… I’m only missing Memorial Day and Labor day to round out the set (these are the holidays I’ve typically gotten off of work in the past).
Thank you for the soup, Zoe. It really hit the spot. Easy on the throat and nice and warm in my tummy.
Small consolation, but at least SciFi has the Twilight Zone marathon on.
My biggest problem right now is the side effects of the medication the doctor gave me. It’s sad when you can’t decide which is worse - the illness or the treatment
Gosh, so many of us are sick. Maybe you can spread germs through the board. We should have Unca Cecil look into that for us.
If your nose gets sore and raw from the constant tissue attack, here’s a big tip: Go buy Kleenex with lotion. Actually, more of the tissue manufacturers make products with lotion. It makes a BIG difference.
My wife has been sick for almost three weeks now. Never seen her like this. First, her eyes started weeping so bad that she’d wake up with them almost crusted shut. Then it got in her throat, and she completely lost her voice for about four days. Along with it came a raging fever. Whatever it was, it wiped her out worse than any illness I’ve seen her get in the last 15 years. So it’s a bad one, whatever it is. Y’all rest now!
Having been in the oh-my-og-I’ve-wiped-my-nose-so-much-it’s-RAW club more times than I want to remember (allergies and a predilection for sinus/bronchial infections are not a happy combination), I can heartily recommend the following:
Soaking up mucus is much, much better than blowing, because when you blow the nose just makes more of the damned stuff. Tissues sticking out of your nostrils ain’t pretty, but are effective.
Hot & Sour soup will not only clean out your sinuses (at least for a while), it will, if spicey enough, completely strip away the crap building up on the back of your throat from the drip. Your throat will feel less sore and oogy with the stuff gone. Probably any spicey food would work, but the steam from the soup also helps, and being liquid it’s easier to swallow if your throat is feeling clogged. Also, the liquid helps wash stuff away. No, water won’t work just as well. I’ve tried it.
Neosporin + Pain Relief antibiotic cream is a wonderful, wonderful thing. I put a bit on the raw areas about once an hour or so, and inside of a day the skin is well on the way to being healed. Also, the topical pain relief helped a lot.
Sleep and/or rest on an incline. The stuff will go down your throat (I know, I know) instead of down your nose and across your lips and dripping off your chin . . . errr, ok, maybe that’s enough description. At any rate, I find that if I’m on an incline, my sinuses tend to be clearer.
Hot, Steamy Showers will make you feel better.
A vaporizer/humidifier with an evaporative medicine tray is a nice thing. Eucalyptus oil in the air may help clear your head. If nothing else, you’ll likely be able to smell it, which has to be better than not being able to smell anything.
Don’t forget the standard “drink lots of clear liquids”. I’ve found that when I like the taste of Gatorade, it’s time to drink a lot of it. Although the fruit punch flavour isn’t so bad even when I’m not sick.
Unless you have a ton of carbs to soak it up with, avoid acidic foods. Actually, just avoid acidic foods (citrus, tomatoes, etc.). Your stomach will thank you, because it already has more than it wants to deal with with all the crap dripping down from your sinuses.
Finally, decongestants are a wonderful thing, and they come in non-drowsy formulas these days.
…because of this damned cold. Holy flying fuck, but I had forgotten what it’s like to be sick like this. Not that I’m dying or anything… bless everyone who feels like they are, you poor things… but this sneezing and the drip, drip, drip - AAAAIIEE! Even in my sleep!
Morgyn, sweetie, I’m already doing steps 1, 3, 4, 5, 8, 9 and 10. I don’t know where number 6 went, but I don’t care right now. I’m afraid to do number 7, as the snot is already flowing freely - but I love the smell of eucalyptus, so might do some of that, too.
I had fallen asleep in bed and was doing okay until the little trickle began and I started to cough. I immediately headed out to the sofa, and have been dozing off and on all night.
I took a nice hot shower yesterday evening, but the steam didn’t do much for my head. Plus, it wore me out so bad that I asked Ian to dry me off. ::hangs head in shame::
Between long naps during the night, I was up pumping myself full of NyQuil (at this point, I don’t care about OD’ing), drinking water, reading my new copy of The World According To Garp, and ridding my nose of mucus. I was hoping to prevent the crud from settling in my chest, but now I’m wheezy and congested. My head is still plugged up, but not so bad I can’t breathe. Still can’t smell or taste anything.
I have one of these little jobbies on my bedside table, and it helps. We’ve had the humidifier going non stop since we turned the furnace on months ago.
Sigh… Here’s to hosting a grand New Year’s party for some nasty beasties. ::raises NyQuil shot::
Loopydude, my sick comerade- seems we’ve have taken over your thread. Are you gettin’ any better?
Here’s the thing: I did something really stupid. I loaded myself up with anti-sick drugs to suppress symptomatic illness, and went to a New Year’s Eve party. I was gonna be damned if I was going to sit at home sick and bored on New Year’s so I went, hung out, tried not to breath on anybody, ate a couple hors d’oeuvres, and drank a little champagne. It appears whatever Hell Scourge I’ve contracted has afflicted many others as well, according to the testimonials at the party, so I think it’s unlikely I’ll be seen as the Typhoid Mary days or weeks from nows and have to fear acts of retribution.
Well, the party was fun, but soon after Midnight, I was feeling not-at-all-OK, my wife sped me home, and I proceeded to worship at the porcelain alter once again.
Now I feel a tad better, but mostly because I’m drugged up again, and I’ve been sleeping for ten hours. Fever’s down around 100, which is progress, to be sure. My New Year’s revel may have cost me a day or so in recovery time, but maybe it was worth it.
As for hijacks: Please do! I hate being the center of attention at the pity party. My best wishes go out to one and all coping with these hellacious bugs that are floating around. Be well, eventually!
Add me and my hubby to the list of sickos this New Year’s. Actually, I had the Creeping Crud last year at this time, too. Merry fucking Christmas and goddamned New Year.
Not too bad this time around - I’m blowing snot that looks sort of like lemon orange jello, the occassional dollop of tapioca pudding, with the odd lump of teeny blood clot. Mostly, I’m exhausted and my throat is sore. I’ve lost my voice. I looked everywhere for it - under the bed, behind the bookcase, in my shoe… it’s not anywhere. I am currently using a borrowed voice, which is also threatening to leave me at any moment. I’m sure the original owner is a very nice young man who’s wondering where his voice went for the day. Or maybe a nice young bullfrog, it’s a little hard to tell.
What really pissed me off was that yesterday was an excellent day for flying and I couldn’t go. So I laid in bed most of the day listening to other people fly over the house (I live under the approach to the local airport). Torture! Torture!
And so much for the breakfast out on New Year’s - even if the hubby and I felt like going out we don’t think we should be sharing our germs with others.
Hell, I went to sleep last night at 9 pm - screw the New Year, wake me up well after 2004 is gone and good riddance.
I broke with a cold on Thursday, I’ve got the coughing, sneezing, congestion, headache and post nasal drip thing going on. I am breaking out in zits on the tip of my nose and upper lip probably from all the snot in my pores there. I also have painful joints from a different medical problem and am showing signs of a possible kidney infection (dull pain in kidney area and occult blood in urine)* so I am having a lovely new year so far.
*yes, I will see a doctor but not until after the weekend. No way I’m going to the emergency room.
Ugh, yesterday I felt like shit all day, but I figured it was due to lack of sleep. This morning I woke up with a raw throat, runny nose and a headache. Plus I have that icky both too hot and too cold feeling-it’s like I’m cold, but my skin feels flushed and overheated.
Kids, I have discovered what medicine works best for me and my cold: Alka-Seltzer Plus® Cold Medicine. This stuff worked like a charm for me… I couldn’t believe it!
I have saved my nose and upper lip from the chapped doom that they were sure to suffer!
Since this is the Pit and since I already posted on this subject, let me add this:
FUCK YOU, BODY! You worthless piece of, well, flesh!
This cold wasn’t enough for you, was it? So damn greedy, aintcha?
Friday night The Headache begins. The slow timpani beat inside my skull. Take a Tylenol. By Saturday night I can’t see due to the BLINDING FUCKING PAIN. I can’t move my head. I can’t cry in pain because of, well, the PAIN.
But THAT wasn’t enough for you!!! No! You decided that on Sunday you’d involve the gall bladder. Thank you very much, bitch. So I got the joy and privilege of spending ALLLL of Sunday curled into a ball. I’d sneeze, which would send the warhammers of hell going off, which would make me wince, which would cause shooting pains under my ribs. A mothereffing trifecta of pain.
No, I didn’t go to the hospital, which would’ve of served you right, being poked and prodded by numerous sleep-deprived doctors. I went to the Nice Doctor instead. Nyah! She gave me migraine meds! She made you deal with an MRI for 90 minutes! Clausterphobia? Too bad! Let’s shove your head into a cage and bombard you with loud noises through your now partially recovered head.
AND! Tomorrow YOU get to deal with a sonogram! That icky cold goopy stuff, obviously kept in the freezer on purpose being dolloped on your empty stomach since you can’t eat or drink after 8pm tonight. So THERE!!!
I’m not sick, but my boyfriend’s sick, which is a big big surprise. Neither of us have been sick in a long time, me four years this Christmas and him seven! And his colds are AWFUL, hacking, coughing, etc. It’s left both of us short on sleep since we started work again.
And I’m not sick, and usually I get sick if he does. We joke that he doesn’t have an immune system, just one GIANT white blood cell called “Tiny” - and now it seems like I have Tiny.
I don’t know where number 6 went, but I don’t care right now. I’m afraid to do number 7, as the snot is already flowing freely - but I love the smell of eucalyptus, so might do some of that, too.