So Friday night I was supposed to break ground on Project M…but instead I got really bad stomach flu. My husband had started dozing beside me in bed, with his shoes on, ready to take me in the second I’d be convinced to go in, which was around 5 AM. There’s a lot of throwing up in this post. You might wanna look away now.
I can remember my first time seeing someone throw up in nursing school. (I was a cowed, unrowdy child, who still avoids alcohol to this day.) I had not seen throwing up very often before. I remember feeling — however odd (and commonplace at work!) it seems now — that I had unlocked an achievement, some small step on the path to becoming a newly minted nurse. I gave report to my nursing instructor that day, a shrewish elderly woman, who informed me that what I had seen was “emesis”, not puke.
Whatever. It’s puke.
So I’m there on Friday night, so bad that I’m throwing up on the way into the hospital (that we live five mins away from, not the one I work at) and in the lobby, and in the room that they put me in. They seen about getting an IV into me pretty quickly, but by then I’m very dehydrated. The kid poking me was young. I try not to let on that I’m a nurse in these types of situations (my husband and me are quite the malpractice team, the RN and the lawyer) and I tried to remind myself that even new ED RNs poke more people in a month than I ever have total in my whole nursing career. (Most of my patients come with deep lines, thank god.)
He found a vein. It took awhile. I’m gonna have to wear a long sleeve undershirt next time I go into work so I don’t look like I’m a really stupid/opportunistic junkie. But after that I got the miracle that was 8 mg of IV Zofran, and 2L of saline. I’d never taken zofran before. It is an excellent medication. After that, labwork (which they let me keep a copy of, which is nice because I’m nosy) and out the door, hooray.
I had a pounding headache yesterday, and felt like my brain was jello. Today, after 14 hrs of recuperative sleep, I just started feeling better enough to play L. A. Noire. I still wasn’t well enough to think. Then my husband ate some of the leftovers that we were pretty sure we’d ruled out of sick-causing, and no, we were wrong, and now he’s ill.
So I got to take the prescription that I’d gotten for Zofran to the all night pharmacy 20 minutes away. I’m not saying I drove like I was in L. A. Noire on the way there and back at 12:15 on an open highway in the dark of night, but I’m not saying I didn’t make record time, either. (I love my husband. I return with meds, and he’s all, “Wow, that didn’t take long. The pharmacist must have been fast.” Yes, dear.)
Anyhow, now it’s my turn to stay up with him, like he did with me. The meds seem to be working, so just another hour or two. I’m going to nerd for a bit, and then crash out, if the coast is clear. We’ll see how far I can get tomorrow, but I won’t beat myself up.