OK, People!
So, I’m sitting here having a lovely time experiencing the finer attributes of developing pneumonia and really taking the time to appreciate the “finer sides” of modern medicine and health-care.
In order to combat those nasty, yucky pneumonia germs, one of the medications that I’ve been prescribed is an antibiotic that could take down a young Clydesdale, weaken even the strongest among us and cause a lovely myriad of maladies ranging from sleepiness, dizziness, and yeast infections, to the ever-popular back-door trots and hurling, to the more exotic of ailments like tremors, seizures, mental mood changes, confusion (hm…what was I saying?) and a host of other alluring side-effects.
So, why, pray tell, do I find these side effects so humorous?
Maybe because I’ve been prescribed a dopamine medication to alleviate the leg tremors and sleep deprivation of restless leg syndrome that can cause a host of health issues (among them- increased sexual urges and unusual urges to gamble!) and prescribed a pain medication that can cause dizziness, twitching muscles, hallucinations (rarely, but possible with certain charmed individuals) and CONSTIPATION (most likely!).
As I’m sitting here waiting for a bag of prunes (that I stumbled out to buy this morning) to counter the effects of one of my pneumonia medications and work their magic on my newly acquired bunged-up dinglebungus, I’ve got an unexplained eye twitch and having visions of men in starched white coats picking me up in a little white van to chauffeur me to the ever popular St. Jude’s Laughing Academy that a number of us have been (voluntarily and involuntarily) asked to join.
Damn!
To think this whole, wonderful little adventure (of getting diagnosed with pneumonia) only cost me/my insurance company THOUSANDS of dollars to have the privileged entitlement of lying on an antiquated, lumpy bed, (with an attractive view of the ER entranceway) in the middle of the drafty, shabby-looking hallway at our local (soon-to-be totally renovated) hospital’s ER!
I guess the ER personnel figured it wasn’t enough that the urgent care doctor that sent me there suspected that I had heart problems and pneumonia. They wanted to make sure that I was thoroughly sick and deserving of such swanky accommodations.
After being “triaged” in the loveliest of intimate, comfy spaces (a 2 by 4 area with an open, thread-bare curtain used for ones privacy from the other sickos), I was whisked away in a squeaky, rickety, (wobbly) wheel chair, to the “guest area” of the hospital to hack my pneumonia germs on other unsuspecting mortals waiting their fait accompli, before being assigned “bed #1” in the ER’s drafty, dingy hallway.
(Yes, People, you read correctly – bed #1 is located in a drafty, air-conditioned hallway!)
In their defense, however, I do need it noted that after an hour of body chills and various tremors that I (hallway patient #1) was kindly offered a warm blanket to stop said body chills and newly acquired tremors.
Whoo hoo!
Lucky me.
I hit the jackpot and was assigned bed #1 in front of the smelly homeless guy that wreaked of smoke and God knows what else and the pajama-clad woman who recently stopped taking her psych meds and kept asking me if I were related to Tiger Woods.
(And, “No People, I assure you – Tiger and I are NOT– in any shape, way or means – related. And I’m sure Mr. Woods is more than grateful for this”.)
Lord! Lord! Lord! How I miss my mind!
Please keep me sane and my humor in tact, God, ‘cuz I need these dam prunes to start working their magic soon or my sunnier than usual disposition is not gonna be so sunny when the Princess gets home.
(And beware my wacky cats, ‘cuz you may not want to be howling at me any time too soon!)
Have a good one, People! And don’t take yourself too serious. Life’s too short not to laugh at it once in awhile. Be well.
Catch ya next time, looking at life from my shoes.
Life in Lucie's Shoes 