Tag Archives: vaccine

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The American Mole Virus

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It all started a week ago when I woke up with a raging headache. It wasn’t the headache that lasted five weeks and from my neck. It was actually on the opposite side of my head. It was a Saturday and I had to go in at seven for a case so I thought I will take Alleve and sinus medicine and I would be fine. Wrong answer. I’m really not even sure how I made it to work but I had no business driving. I had to call a co-worker and she agreed to cover my case and call. I could not drive home so I thought if I laid down for a bit I could. So I parked myself in one of our before surgery rooms and laid down. It gave me nice flashbacks to the headache on Women’s Health when the charge would have to watch my patients the last hour and I gave report in an empty room laying down. It’s no wonder I ended up in the hospital for a week. Anyway after about two hours I realized I wasn’t driving home anytime soon so I called Brian to pick me up.

I then proceeded to puke so I dug out my four year old zofran and after two doses at least I was no longer nauseated or vomiting but my head was still killing me. That evening Brian put his famous deer jerky on the dehydrator and I went to bed. When I woke up the next morning I realized I could not smell the jerky. Normally it wakes me up in the middle of the night because it is so strong. I seriously thought he forgot to turn it on and actually checked. If I got right on top of it and inhaled deeply I could barely smell it. I then drank the only coffee I had at home which is mocha which I hate and it really tasted ok. It was then I realized I needed to call the employee covid hotline for advice. After a virtual visit I received and email saying I needed to be tested. The girl on the phone said I could go to total access urgent care today or wait and go to one of our testing sites on Monday. I waited until Monday.

I was tested back in May when I threw one of my neck headaches at work and had to leave at 11am. It was only one of two times i have left in the middle of the shift. The other time was when my sister called me at 8am to say her husband had a massive stroke and my co-workers made me clock out and go to the hospital. Anyway that test was horrid. I thought I was going to come out of the chair and I stopped myself from grabbing the girls arm. It all made sense as to why most of the patients when I did that to them (same stick as a respiratory panel) they wanted to punch me. I was better prepared this time and sat on my hands. The gal that did it was super nice. It was a drive up tent and they have little building with some heat but they all wear coats so I knew they were freezing.

My test results were back the next day and negative but my symptoms still yelled covid so the hotline said reach out to your primary and call us back at 6:30 am and we will let you know if you can work at 7. So my primary does a tele visit and says you really should have been positive but you are weird and hard to diagnose. So he puts in for another test on Thursday and tells me to stay off of work. In the meantime the employee health nurse for my hospital is unavailable this week with limited voice mail access. So I will be dealing with the covid hotline for the rest of the week.

So back to the testing site and it’s the same girl. I asked her how she got stuck with this job. She says she applied for it. I told her I wouldn’t mind swabbing people all day but the weather is horrible. She agreed and said once the testing sites are done she will have a clinic job. I have decided that sometime in the next couple weeks I’m bringing them hot chocolate and maybe some donuts or something.

So my second test was negative as well and I call the covid hotline back. They are beyond wishy washy but tell me I can return to work Monday if I don’t have a fever. Advised me not to take anything for a headache on Sunday so I don’t mask a fever. Also told me to contact my primary about my headache. So I sent him a message through Mychart and told him what they said. I said over the counter medication is keeping this headache under control so I am not sure what you are supposed to do but good luck. I actually do not have a headache as I type this so maybe I’m at the end of this mole virus.

I am going to get the vaccine on Monday. They started giving it out this past Thursday. This may have indeed been covid and I am one of these weirdos that test negative. It may be something else. All I know is I never want to feel this bad again and if a shot can prevent that, sign me up. I also want to see my father and my in-laws again. This isolation has been horrible for them.

Mole Moral~ If I ever need an NG tube please use my left nostril because the covid test was way more tolerable in the left than the right.

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The Second Patient I Keep in Touch With

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Here is the story of the second time I broke the no keeping in touch with patients. It is a little lengthy but amazing.

It was December 31, 1999, and Y2K was coming up fast. I was at a wedding reception with most of my family. My friends Denise and Dennis decided to get married and risk the fall of the world which did not happen. At the same time T was admitted to another hospital with flu-like symptoms that would quickly be diagnosed as meningococcal meningitis. It is the bad kind, the really bad kind with a not very high survival rate.
Sometime in February T was transferred to Mercy burn unit for would care. He had survived the meningitis but the vasopressor medicines he needed to keep him with a blood pressure to stay alive had destroyed the circulation to his hands and feet. They were pretty much black when the burn unit met him. I believe he may have still been on life support as well as dialysis for kidney failure. He was twenty-nine years old and had a picture of himself crossing the finish line of the Chicago Marathon in under four hours. I can still see the picture as if it was yesterday. I was not a runner, never planned to be but was so impressed by this.
He wasn’t with us long before it was apparent the only thing to do was amputations and we started with his legs. I will never forget I was his nurse the night his mother had to sign the consents. She asked to talk to the doctor and others were like she already talked to him once. Looking back and being a mother myself I totally understand. I had a really hard time witnessing the consent because he just ran the Chicago marathon and this would most likely prevent him from ever running again. By the time the surgeries were completed and down to viable tissue T was left with one leg above the knee, one below the knee, one hand gone and the other arm mid forearm. However he was alive and it wasn’t too long before he peed on my best burn unit buddy. She was never so happy to be peed on! He was out of kidney failure and soon off of dialysis.
He then was transferred to rehab which at the time was still in the hospital on the third floor. I worked three to eleven back then so would often stop by and see him. I will never forget one day when we were talking and I told him I would rather be dead. (Leave it to me and my brutal honesty. I can still see the look of utter shock on his face) He said “not me I still have plenty of things I want to do.”
He was discharged on May 5 and started outpatient therapy. I would stop in and see his progress from time to time. He was learning how to walk and use both prosthetic arms. I visited one day when he was trying to button a shirt. I was so frustrated just watching him but he never gave up. During this time I would mail him crazy stories of my life. (Foreshadowing for this blog I suppose.)
My nephew was born in August and T sent me a hand written sympathy card. He was only three months home from the hospital. I have it in my scrapbook on Andrews page. It blew me away and his prosthetic hand writing was better than mine with real hands.
The 2002 Winter Olympics were to be held in Salt Lake City Utah and T set a goal to walk and carry the Olympic torch when it came through St. Louis. He met that goal 1/6/02 and I took Emily and Kayla out of school. I even had my scheduled changed and my manager was thrilled I went and asked to see the pictures.

Kayla is hiding behind Emily in the picture. This was before the day of my digital camera so the pictures are not the best but they still make me smile when I look at them.

 

T was a Pharmacist with a doctorate degree and decided to go back to law school in the fall of 2002. He decided he wanted to fight for disability rights. So he applied, attended, graduated summa cum laude and passed the boards. He then taught pharmacy law at St. Louis College of Pharmacy for a few years. He then moved out-of-state to practice law and then eventually moved back to the midwest and again taught law at a pharmacy school. It seems he may be the dean of the school but I’m not positive.
I have received a Christmas card every year from his as well. He always has a small hand written note for me. This year his mother said to tell me hi! That so touched my heart. I have not seen her since he carried the torch.
I find myself thinking of T when I’m running and it gets really, really hard. For a full marathon that is somewhere around the twenty-mile mark. When I ran the fifty mile it was the last ten miles. I often tell myself I am running for him. He had hoped one day to do the Chicago marathon again but that never happened. I think it takes a lot of energy to walk on prosthetic legs.
Currently there is such an anti vaccine movement in this country that I am going to take this opportunity to say that when T came down with meningitis there was not a vaccine for it. There is now and although it is rare I would bet my house he would tell everyone to get it. The only reason he survived was because he was in top shape from marathon training. (I remember the doctors telling him back in the day.) I am pretty sure he’d rather risk autism, big pharma getting rich, government poison and mind control over waking up two months later after thinking he had the flu to discover he had meningitis and now would have to learn how to use four prosthetics and relearn how to take care of himself.
Mole Moral ~ I’ve taken care of some amazing people over the years but T is by far the most incredible person I have ever met, that taught me a lot, and I’m so glad I reached out to him with my first note when he was in rehab.