So It's Been a Bad Week...

The above picture is cute, but my week certainly wasn't!  It started out fine Sunday morning, but had already begun devolving by the time 8 PM rolled around Sunday night.  I went to the gym but had to leave when I started experiencing 'tummy troubles.'  These tummy troubles turned into a full force assault on my somewhat fragile body.  By 8:30 PM I was trapped on a toilet holding a trashcan while my entrails were being ripped from my body (at least that's what it felt like). 

I was no better by Tuesday morning so I went to the doctor.  The doctor suggested that I might have strep because my throat was really red and I had a fever and a headache.  He said only about 1% of patients present with the severe GI symptoms of strep, but he'd like to do a strep test anyway.

I snorted.  "I never get strep.  I've been tested for it a hundred times and not once in my entire life have I ever gotten strep. It's the one thing I don't get.  I don't get strep," I said. He insisted upon taking the strep test anyway. 

Good thing too.  Turns out I did have strep and strep is incredibly dangerous for people who have certain heart issues, mine included. 

He loaded me up with medication and sent me on my way.  I barely made it to the pharmacy to get said medication, and I went home to continue vomiting profusely until Thursday evening.

Wednesday, still feeling terrible but no longer contagious, my husband calls me from work and informs me he is on his way home slightly early.  Then he tells me "Don't panic."  He proceeds to inform me that my grandmother has been rushed to the hospital and is in the Intensive Care Unit.  This is the woman who reared me, who cared for me every time I got sick as a child (and I was a sickly child so that was quite often), who took me in when she did not have to.  Don't panic indeed. 

I cried the entire 45 minute drive from my home to the town where I grew up.  I pulled myself together before walking into the hospital and going up to the ICU.  Her pulse was incredibly low and her blood pressure was incredibly high.  She was very pale but conscious.  I spoke with her doctor and asked millions of pertinent medical questions.  I was very upset.  I was also still making trips to the restroom to be sick.

On Friday the doctors at the hospital decided to put a pacemaker into my grandmother's chest.  It seems her natural pacemaker is not functioning properly.  At one point her heart rate dipped to below 30 beats per minute.  She has improved since they implanted the pacemaker.  I am grateful for her improvement.

My body has not had adequate time to recover from my own illness.  I am still unable to hold down most foods.  I still have a low grade fever and a very sore stomach.  It has been a very bad week.  I hope that means next week is going to be amazingly wonderful.