Let me preface this post by stating the fact that I'm on my antibiotics which can cause dizziness and woozinees and nausea so if this post makes no sense it's not my fault - I'm on drugs.
I got back from my doctor's appointment a little while ago. It was possibly the worst visit I've ever had. I get there about 10 minutes early, hoping they can see me quickly because I feel like crap. Besides, I've got nothing else to do today except be sick, so I've got time. Of course they see me like 20 minutes after my appointment. No big deal, I got in on a cancellation so I'll take it. Just give me my medicine and let me leave. I say hey to the girl who called me back. I've never seen her before and she looks like she could have been new, but I'm not sure, I've only been there 2 times.
The nurse tech points me to a room and says you can put your coat in there then come back here and I'll weigh you. I'm thinking ok, fine, just hurry up and give me so medicine. I walk up to the scale, which is one of the older balance beam type scales. I take off my shoes and empty my pockets so I it will be an accurate weight. For some reason the nurse tech chuckles a little bit. I'm not sure why. Maybe I'm wearing 2 different socks or she saw by butt when I bent down. Anyway, so all of you basically know what I look like. I'm 5'9-5'10, somewhat thin (although I've put on 7 lbs of muscle since starting CrossFit!) but still thin. I step on the scale. It's zeroed out. So she puts the big scale block on 100 pounds a pushes the small weight all the way to 50. The scale does nothing. So she puts the big block on 200 lbs. Scale tips all the way to the other side. So she slides the little block from 50 to 0 in one fast motion. Scale doesn't move. So she then moves the big block to 150 lbs (little block still on 0). Scale jumps all the way to the other side. Still hasn't reached an equilibrium weight. A few minutes have passed (or so it seems). So she shoots the small weight to the 50 (hello, you just had it on 200, I didn't weight that much!) Of course the scale flips back over. The nurse tech has a frustrated look on her face. To speed up the process, I tell her I should weight around 165 lbs. She slides the scale to where it reads 180 (were you listening?), it doesn't move. Then to 160. It jumps to the other side. Then to 170. Jumps again. Finally she puts it on 165 and it balances out at 165.5. Wow, that was tough.
I'm thinking in my head this girl is crazy. I hope I can get out of here so I can go home and rest. It was only beginning. We go back into the patient room and she tells me to sit down. There is a chair and the observation table, so I ask where. She says it doesn't matter, so I choose the chair because I hate sitting on the observation table. I don't like sitting on that paper and the material sticks to you. Plus, I feel like a sideshow sitting on that thing. She asks why I'm here and I tell her my symptoms - feel crappy, headache, fever, chills (sometimes both at the same time), cough, sore throat, runny nose, etc. She types in the computer under reason for visit: possible sinus problems. Ummm, no!
She begins to take my blood pressure. She tries, at least. She velcros the cup to my arm, and as she begins to take my reading the cup falls off. Wonderful. Now she puts it on super tight. Like tighter than tight. She takes my reading and it is good. She finally takes the cup off and I regain feeling in my arm. After a few more routine tests, she says she's going to have to prick my finger to get blood. Awesome. I hate getting my finger pricked. (note: I give blood every 2 months or so at work and the worst part is getting my finger pricked so they can test my iron levels.)
She comes back into the room a few minutes later with her tools of torture, aka the finger pricker. She asks what finger I want pricked. I wanted to say none, but I knew I had to get one pricked so I say my left ring finger. She starts cleaning my left middle finger. I begin to get a little worried about my safety. So she cleans it off with something, and is about to prick it. Then I hear her say to herself "Oh yea, I have to wipe that off." So she takes a dry medical cloth and wipes off the stuff she put on my finger. My concern grows. I wonder if she's ever done this before. Then she takes the pricker and test fires it about 5 times. Why must you taunt me with this thing? She grabs my hand and asks if I'm ready, and I say yea, just do it. And she does. And it doesn't hurt at all. Yet. She then proceeds to grab my finger with both hands and squeeze it as hard as she can to get blood to come out. Naturally, after you have a hole poked in your finger, blood comes out, very fast. Since she had both hand on my finger, she couldn't collect the blood right away, so she had to let go with one hand and grab the collect tube. When she did this blood ran down my finger and didn't "bubble" properly so she couldn't collect it. She squeezes some more but the hole has already clotted itself. Then she says she's going to have to prick another finger. Great.
She comes back with some new ammunition to stick into my finger. This time she decides she will do my right middle finger. Whatever works. She does the same routine, and she tries to stick my finger. Of course, the pricker thing breaks mid-press and falls all on the floor in pieces. I look at my finger. Nothing there. It didn't break the skin. She asks if I felt "that." I wonder if by "that" she meant the needle, the pricker thing falling all over the place, or her death grip on my hand. I say yes, because I felt all 3. She picks up the needle pricker and puts it back together and gets ready to prick it again. She must have thought she didn't press hard enough the first time (really, 2nd time) so she puts some oomph behind her press this time, which hurts. Same thing happens as the first time. She squeezes the crap out of my hand, blood drips, she can't really get it into the test tube, but she was able to get some, so she wanted to try to squeeze my hand again. As she was doing this the she dropped the test tube and subsequently dropped my blood all over the floor. Fab-u-lous. (note: it's not a ton of blood since it was a finger prick, but there were drops). For those of you keeping score at home: 2 fingers pricked, 0 blood collected. She gets mad and says she's going to get a nurse. I am relieved, but at the same time I just want to sit in the corner and cry. What little strength I had is gone. Just let me leave, please! I'd rather be sick at home than deal with this crap.
She comes back in with a nurse, whose night job is apparently playing Helga on American Gladiators. Seriously, they look just alike (and were the same size it seemed!) Nurse Helga says "I hear you've been having trouble giving blood." I want to say no, I haven't had trouble giving it, your nurse tech doesn't no how to collect it - look on the floor! Of course I don't say that, I only say, "yea, I guess." She asks which finger (singular) has been pricked. She picks up my right hand before I can answer and says "oh, this one." I show her my left hand and say - "and this one." She looks at my left hand, points to the one that was pricked, and says, "Oh, that one." I say "yes, and this one," while holding up my right hand, pointing to my middle finger. She says "Oh, both." "Yes," I say. She grabs my right hand again and tells the nurse tech to be ready with the collection mechanism. "Great, lets get it over with" I'm thinking. The nurse tech hands her the pricker. She says I don't need all that and puts it down, takes it apart, pulls the needle out, which looks like a thumbtack now. Without saying anything, she jabs it into my finger old school style (ouch! much worse than pricker gun!), puts it down, grabs the test tube thing, fills it up, and she's done in about 5 seconds. No death grip finger squeezing. No blood on the floor.
Thankfully, after that it is over. Nurse Helga and nurse tech leave. I'm thinking in my head I hope this is over soon. I think I fall asleep in the chair for a few minutes because the physicians assistant woke me up when she came in the room. She came back with the diagnosis.
The verdict: upper respiratory infection. I'm contagious. I have to take antibiotics for 7 days straight. I'll continue to be contagious for up to 24-48 hours after I begin my round of antibiotics, which means I won't be going to work Friday unless I want to infect the entire air force base. The physician's assistant is much nicer and she changes my reason for visit answer to everything I told her, since she asked what I was feeling like when she came in the room. Glad someone got it right. After some more poking and prodding it's over. Thankfully.
So now I'm at home telling you this story. I've taken my first round of antibiotics - 13 more to go! I figured everyone would like to know the whole ordeal I went through. I hope I never get that nurse tech again. Horrible. I'm going to sleep now.
