Update on my undeath...

[seawasp]

I do finally appear to be recovering. The gut symptoms are less and I ate stuff which seems to be giving me back SOME strength. Still, by way of comparison, I became dizzy and sick to my stomach when I had to bring a roll of toilet paper up the stairs this morning.

I've lost 10 pounds (yet my gut is still apparently swollen, at least to my eyes). It does seem that what happened is that the triple sequence of antibiotics, one after the other, plus prednisone (two sequences) killed off my gut flora and wonked my immune system to the point that it's now having to slowly rebuild.

I have reluctantly decided not to go into work again today in order to have enough strength to make sure I can do the whole rest of the week. I HATE doing this -- I have no sick time remaining (given that I only get about 2 sick days a year that's not saying much, but what it means is that I've eaten up a large chunk of my vacation time) and we have stuff that's supposed to be getting DONE at work, but I have to be reasonable and acknowledge that if I go into work today there's probably a 50% chance that (A) I'll have to leave early anyway, and (B) will find myself feeling WORSE tomorrow because I didn't give myself that one more day to go from "barely functioning" to "passable".  I can survive on "passable".

Comments

[queenoftheskies.livejournal.com]

Hope you feel better SOON!

[usdutchkitty.livejournal.com]

As a person who has permanent bowel problems, I can totally understand. What is ailing you?

[burger-eater.livejournal.com]

Take care, man, and best wishes.

[kjn]

Not fun at all that. Get better!

One thing that helped my daughter after a severe bout of a stomach bug, was lactose-free milk, if you can find it.

[shana.livejournal.com]

I deeply sympathize. I am fanatical about taking acidophilus with antibiotics, but I had a nasty gut reaction to the first antibiotic the doctor gave me last time. [The second one, no problem, so it was side effect rather than inadequate gut flora.]

I'm very glad you're giving yourself the time you need.

[jamesandbluejay.livejournal.com]

I've seen diverticulitis and I've seen stomach colony bug population wiped out by antibiotics, but a triple dose of both is too much. Hang in there, man. If you must go back to work immediately, I hope Simon Legree... oops, your kindly boss... will allow you to let up and rest periodically during the day. Drink a ton of liquids, but do get better.

[muirecan.livejournal.com]

Ouch ouch ouch ouch ouch.

And that sucks that you only have 2 days of sick leave. The thing it took me time to learn was to use a sick day if I wasn't feeling good so that I didn't get really really sick. :p

[arcadiagt5.livejournal.com]

Nasty. I hope you get better soon.