Sunday night in the Emergency Room (everything is ok)

I was feeling tired on Sunday which seems to be the new norm. I took a nap and woke up at 3 pm feeling achy and had the chills. I took my temperature and it was 99. I continued to take my temperature obsessively and found that my temperature was rising about 1/2 a degree every hour.

A little after 6 pm my temperature was 100.5 which is the magical number. That number means that you are supposed to call the doctor. So, I did. He told me to go to the Emergency Room and have them take my blood counts. So, I went to Illinois Masonic around 8 pm and waited and waited and waited. They did lots of tests. They checked my counts, they did a blood culture, chest x-ray, urine sample and flu test. Everything was fine except for my counts. My red blood cell count was 490 and it should be 1000. They said they start to worry around 500. Also, my white blood cell counts were very low. It was 0.5 and normally should be 10.

So, at 1:15 am they admitted me to the hospital and took me up to my room. Because my counts were so low I had to wear a mask while they transferred me to my room so that I would not get sick from any of the germs of any of the sick people in the hospital. I had to stay in an isolation room which meant that everyone who entered had to wear a mask. There was a sign on my door that said that Neutropenic and another sign that said that you had to wear a mask. That part scared me. While I was in the Emergency Room they started an IV and gave me antibiotics.

When I got up to the room more doctors and nurses had to see me to get my history and to take my vitals. I wonder if staying at Good Shepherd would have taken less time because they already have all of my surgery and cancer info. I didn't get to bed till 3 am and the first nurse came in at 7 am to do my vitals again. Doctors and nurses came in throughout the day about every twenty minutes for some reason or another. It was usually right when I had started to doze off. So, eventually I stopped trying to sleep. They gave me antibiotics three times throughout my stay and also gave me an IV with Sodium Chloride.

On Monday morning they took another blood draw to check my counts and they went up from 0.5 to 0.7. So, since they were going up they released me. They told me not to work for the rest of the week, and to wear a mask when I was around Daphne. I called my Oncologist at Good Shepherd on my way out of the hospital and he told me that my counts should return to normal in a couple of days. He said that I could go back to work when I felt up to it, that I needed to listen to my body, but that if I went back to work in the next couple of days I had to be really careful to avoid anyone who was sick, and that I must be very conscientous about washing my hands frequently. He said that I did not need to wear a mask around Daphne, but that again I needed to be careful about washing my hands frequently.