Is it a Regular Upper Respiratory or is it the Swine Flu??

OK. So, I had already read about the swine flu, like Friday morning. Commented to the hubby...."Wonder how they got a Swine/Aviary/Human never seen before flu...unless (oh now here comes the conspiracy theory) somebody genetically engineered that??? Not trying to be a fear flinger or something, but seems weird to me.

So I go to work Friday and the patient with the FEVER OF UNKNOWN ORIGIN who had been down attending some big MOTORCYCLE RALLY (you know the kind where they get wild and swap spit with people they don't know and will never see again) THEN TRAVELED TO MEXICO to buy his regular medications cheap....WHO HAD THIS COUGH UP A LUNG COUGH...with occasional RED OR BLOODY SPUTUM (that was actually screaming TB a little to me, but what the hell, who am I to tell all the fine doc's that maybe they need to retest the sputum?) WHO COUGHED IN MY FACE (yes it happens all the time) and whose helpful wife kept dragging out SOILED Kleenex's to the DESK to show me said SPUTUM (eewwwkkk!!!!), she was really a sweet lady...just not real bright about SPREADING GERMS.

It seemed to matter LITTLE that I practiced HAND HYGIENE RELIGIOUSLY (that's good hand washing in layman's terms). By the end of the night FRIDAY I was having a weird tickle in my throat...that turned into a HACK MY LUNG OUT dry cough.

Went home went to bed got up and went to work. The HACK MY LUNG OUT dry cough ...still present but which had also turned into a LOW GRADE FEVER, SLIGHT SORE THROAT, SLIGHT NAUSEA, AVERSION TO FOOD (me?????), almost total LARYNGITIS (do you hear my hubby praising God yet???). Anyway, I had to report this to the INFECTION CONTROL NURSE ( at home on a Sunday morning) because the CDC was at the hospital's down here yesterday looking for basically this SET OF SYMPTOMS. She decided they did not need to test me because my temp has not spiked up past 100 degree's yet. Hummmmm nobody seems to care that I always have a sub-normal temp of 96.7 or 96.8 for my ENTIRE LIFE and when I hit 99.7 that's the equivalence of anybody Else's temp being 101.7, and I FEEL LIKE SHIT... actually, pardon the language HAMMERED SHIT really describes it better.

It's probably just the change in the weather and all the wind carrying pollen...but the original cough was really strange. IT WAS EXACTLY like it felt like when I WAS GASSED at the prison...like little sharp particles were irritating my throat. I still don't have a runny nose, but it is hard to breath a little. I am going to the doc Monday to get my throat swab for Influenza A or strep. If I SPIKE A TEMP OVER 100 degrees then I WILL MEET THE CRITERIA needed to warrant a trip to the ER...and that's where I will be going.

My KIND AND CONSIDERATE SUPERVISOR has taken me off the schedule for tonight. The STAFF AND VISITORS AND PATIENTS were appreciative that I wore a MASK ALL NIGHT (my face itches like hell from the darned thing!) and DID GREAT HAND HYGIENE. IF I HAD KNOWN I WAS SICK BEFORE 6 P.M. I would not have gone to work. IF I HAD HAD FEVER before going to work I WOULD HAVE DONE THE PRUDENT THING AND STAYED HOME regardless.

So I'm going to lay down and try to sleep, if I am able to breath in the horizontal position.

Stay well.