misdiagnosis?

October 19, 2009

immune dialogue

starring:



head T-cell and brain (the lead neuron, i suppose)

again, from giantmicrobes.com

head T-cell: [exasperated] again? really?? what do you DO all day, just bathe in the juices of contagious 3 year olds??

brain: well, essentially, yes. sometimes.

head T-cell: what would you do if we just got tired of cleaning up your viral messes?

brain: i’d be very, very sad. come on, you know i don’t do it on purpose! and it’s all for the CHILDREN. think of them!

head T-cell: think of your poor, overworked T-cell troops. we never get the time off we truly deserve!

brain: oh, come on. it’s been a good seven weeks since the last fight!

head T-cell: [indignant] you know, european T-cells get to rest for MONTHS on end.

brain: sorry. anyway, can you just make this battle quick ‘n’ dirty?? i’m trying to train for a race, here.

head T-cell: oh, whatever. fine. you won’t enjoy it, but i’ll rage a storm to kill these buggers like you asked.

brain: thank you. i’ll try not to do this again so soon, but . . .

head T-cell: don’t TELL me you’re going back to same day clinic!

brain: no . . . the ER. in a week.

head T-cell: i hate your job. prepare to suffer.

brain: [resolute] i know, i deserve it. bring on the cytokines . . .

24 hour bug?
whatever happened, it happened hard and it happened fast. because while saturday night i was a complete mess, i feel much better now. i didn’t even register a fever today (which was only a slight shame, because with our flu policy in effect it would have bought me a free day off for tomorrow. and i certainly could use it).

thank you ALL for your get-well wishes — maybe that’s why i beat this virus down so quickly! so, was it H1N1? we’ll never know! maybe it was just a super mild case. we are seeing TONS of it in our clinic (where i worked earlier in the week), so it’s not out of the realm of possibility. i’m hoping that maybe that was it so that maybe i can just NOT BE SICK for a while now.

i’m still going to get the vaccine when they release it to health care workers at duke, though. better safe than beaten down by the flu. this brief viral affair was enough of a reminder that it is pure misery to live under cytokine siege.

laid up
so while i spent the entire day laying around in recovery mode (and i really MEAN this — i was 90% horizontal), josh spiffed up our apartment. behold, it’s our first finished IKEA-furnished room!


new table and lamp, built/installed by josh, furniture-hacker extraordinaire

i don’t have a great before picture, but trust me — this is an enormous improvement from the card table (with ripped vinyl!) that used to be our dining surface. and i especially love the new lighting! our food is bound to taste even better when we can actually see it. i think.

digging for treasure
when i finally moved from my horizontal position, i started on a bit of cleaning. my favorite part is unearthing random treasures! like this list of goals from 2006 (omg, nothing ever changes):


and this card that josh gave me for my 23rd birthday:


okay, he really DID buy me a mop! he claims he thought that i wanted it (and i did, just . . . not for my birthday.) in his defense, he also got me a framed movie poster of magnolia, which still ranks high on my top movie list. and he is cute enough to get away with things like that.

once, anyway.

life recovery
so this week is going to start on a bit of a messy note: no laundry is done, no groceries have been shopped for. i didn’t even get to do my long run (this is the #1 reason i hate being sick!). but it looks like monday is just going to happen anyway. hopefully i can catch up before the week is over!

10 Comments

  • Reply Anonymous March 10, 2019 at 7:28 pm

    glad youre feeling better! i&#39m sure that youll be able to catch up with everything, but thats definitely a reason i hate being sick (that and missing running haha)

  • Reply JennyN March 10, 2019 at 7:28 pm

    Oh, I can assure you that my European T-cells have not had a day off in months. Immunosuppressants + small kid = being sick *a lot*! I just tortured them with running a marathon while hacking up, eh, stuff. Ha, take that T-cells!

  • Reply claire March 10, 2019 at 7:28 pm

    I&#39m glad that you&#39re feeling better! Your IKEA dining room looks very sleek.

  • Reply Anonymous March 10, 2019 at 7:28 pm

    Glad you are feeling better!
    I love finding old treasures and reminiscing. I found all these old high school pics this week. I felt so old!

  • Reply Meredith March 10, 2019 at 7:28 pm

    Love that Ikea dining set + light! I covet nice furniture that matches. Maybe next year when I move…

  • Reply Claire March 10, 2019 at 7:28 pm

    Too bad that decimal point wasn&#39t two tenths higher! Hope you feel MUCH better soon. Do you do Vitamin C before an ER month? I&#39ve bought some to start taking in December…we&#39ll see if it works!

    I do love the dining set, so nice. I&#39d love to have something that style, but my table is one that my grandfather made, so you can&#39t really get rid of that!

  • Reply Chelsea March 10, 2019 at 7:28 pm

    Glad you feel better. Magnolia is one of your favorite movies? If I&#39m thinking of the right one, it was very long and very strange…

  • Reply Sarah Hart-Unger March 10, 2019 at 7:28 pm

    jenny: oh wow, i that must be awful! the small kid is what does it. good thing you don&#39t see as many of them as i do — and the selectively the sickest, mucousy-est ones! ughghgh!

    re: iKEA: yay! i&#39m glad you all approve. i really like it!

    resident Claire: hmm, our cutoff is actually 100.0! but i didn&#39t have a fever sunday, only saturday. thisclose to a required sick day off . . . but not quite.

    chelsea: YES that is the one! love it 🙂

  • Reply Kristan March 10, 2019 at 7:28 pm

    Well, according to Sue Sylvester of Glee ( http://twitter.com/S_SylvesterGLEE ) you can fight H1N1 with WILLPOWER, teehee, so I&#39m sure you are just amazingly strong-willed. ;D

    Glad you&#39re feeling better!

  • Reply Claire March 10, 2019 at 7:28 pm

    AH…just saw your response. We always say 100.4 but I suppose that if my temp was 100, I&#39d call in sick. 🙂

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