7 hours in the hospital can feel like an eternity

I guess it all started Tuesday night... My tongue was feeling a little sore, but I figured a good night's sleep seems to cure a lot of things and I'd feel better in the morning... Oh how wrong I was.

Wednesday morning I woke up and felt like my tongue had doubled in size overnight.  Upon closer inspection I found a 'lump', almost pimple like on the right, underside of my tongue.  It was very sore and I wasn't feeling great in general so I took my temperature - 37.2 - on the high side, but I've been told that a temperature of 38 is when I have to go to the hospital.  I took a T3 and rested for a little while and started to feel better.  Since it was a nice day, Aunt Noonie and I sat outside on the deck to wait for Becky to arrive.

When the T3 started to wear off I started to feel again just how big my tongue was and it was affecting the way I was talking (understatement).  My sister Becky really enjoyed teasing me about my new lisp... Gotta love sisters!

By Wednesday evening the pain was getting worse and starting to move to my throat.  Between the throat pain and the size of my tongue, swallowing was very difficult.  This is not good news for a girl who likes to eat.

Thursday
2:00 am.  I am awakened by extreme pain in my mouth.  At this point I couldn't speak at all.  I  still didn't have a fever, so I didn't want to go to the hospital, so I woke Kendall up to try calling the cancer clinic, but the triage was closed.  I had an appointment for blood tests at noon anyway, so I figured if I could get back to sleep then I would just have them look at it in the cancer clinic on Thursday afternoon.  I took a couple T3s and was able to get back to sleep... for a little while anyway.

4:30 am.  I'm awake again and in unbelievable pain.  I can't speak.  Every time I try to swallow the pain gets worse and shoots into my throat and ear.  Still no fever, but with all the Tylenol I've taken, I could just be masking a fever.  The pain is so bad I can't wait until my clinic appointment at noon.  I woke Kendall up to go to the hospital.

4:50 am.  We get to the ER and everything seems promising at first.  The triage nurse takes all my information about my symptoms and they get me into a bed right away.  We ask them to call the on call Haematology Oncologist (as we were told to do if I ever had to go to the ER) and they say that I have to see the ER doctor before they'll call the Oncologist.  There's no one in the waiting room, so this shouldn't take too long, right?  WRONG.

6:30 am. Still waiting to see a doctor and now I'm getting chills.  They take my temp again.  It's gone up, but still hasn't hit the magic number of 38 so they're not concerned.

7:00 am. The doctor's here!  Well, sort of.  I get a resident who has no clue what she's looking at.  She asks me a bunch of questions.  Feels my lymph nodes.  Looks in my ears and mouth.  Then she says she'll have to talk to the 'staff doctor' and leaves the room.  On her way out we also ask her to page the on call Haematology Oncologist.

8:00 am.  Kendall left the room to call work.  The 'staff doctor' comes in.  He looks in my mouth and ears and feels my throat.  I showed him the 'lump' on my tongue.  He says its a canker sore and will go away on it's own in about 7 days.  He says can't do anything for me and I should see my family doctor or my oncologist.

8:15 am.  Kendall is back and the nurse comes in to draw blood.  Kendall asks why the doctor says he won't do anything for us so the nurse says he'll send the doctor back in.

8:30 am.  The doctor comes back in.  Kendall asks him why he's not doing anything for us and he says that he won't prescribe painkillers that I'll have to see my family doctor or my Oncologist.  We tell him that I don't see my Oncologist for another week and ask him (again) to page the on call Haematologist.  He says that he can't and that they won't come down anyway.  We tell him that we were given instructions by my nurse practitioner that if I ever had to come to the ER to make sure they page the on call Haematologist and the ER doctor still won't do it.  At this point I tell the doctor if he won't do it then we'll go upstairs and find someone ourselves.  He said 'Fine' and walked out of the room.

9:45 am.  After going up the the 7th floor (my old home) to look for my nurse practitioner, we ended up down in the cancer clinic to see Nurse Caryl.  Caryl runs the show where I get my blood work and transfusions done.  I knew she would help me.  She looked at me and said there's no way I should have been treated that way in the ER and that they have no idea what to do with cancer patients.  Caryl had me lay down in one of the beds there and rest while she tracked down my nurse practitioner and one of my doctors. 

11:00 am.  I've had some much needed sleep and my nurse practitioner and doctor come in to see me.  They say is looks like I may be getting thrush, which is a side effect of the chemo.  They prescribe some anti fungal meds and painkillers and tell me how I can reach the on call doctor myself next time instead of going through that shit show in the emergency room again.

12:00 pm.  Finally, we got my medications and are on our way home.  I am a lucky girl to have such a wonderful and supportive boyfriend to go through all of this with me on 4 hours of sleep (and sit with me awake while I get to sleep waiting to see doctors).

It's situations like this that really illustrate how amazing all of the doctors and nurses that work in Oncology are.  After an experience like I had in the ER, it amazes me that they allow some people to practise medicine.  Anyway, my mouth still hurts and it's very difficult to talk.  I can't really eat much, but it's feeling better than yesterday and will hopefully continue to get better not worse.