Currently day 10 of whatever sickness has been going around. Spent all of last week with constant nausea, then last weekend in bed. Been popping ibuprofens and paracetamols for the last few days just to get through. Still getting a bit of nausea, but head and ears are feeling lots of tension and throat is swelling up, but now combined with the fun being unable to sleep through the night for the last few nights! To top it all off can't get a doctor's appointment for more than a week. I guess I'll just resign myself to either being better or dead by then.

[–] liv 4 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Ugh that sounds gross, I hope it goes away soon!!

[–] eagleeyedtiger 3 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Thanks, luckily managed to squeeze in and get a doctors appointment this morning, so now have some extra antibiotics and steroids to take. She is thinking either strep throat or glandular fever, also did a blood test so they can confirm.

[–] liv 3 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Hopefully it's the least worst option!

I know it's not really my place to say this but if it does turn out to be glandular fever/mono/Epstein Barr I'd suggest you get a second opinion on whether to use steroids during the acute phase of a viral infection (unless it's just a throat spray or inhaler or something like that).

[–] eagleeyedtiger 3 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Well they haven't got back to me with the test results yet, but I already started taking them and the antibiotics. It's definitely seemed to help me yesterday and I managed a much better sleep last night without as much pain on waking up. What should I be concerned about with the steroids with glandular fever? I understand antibiotics wouldn't do anything as it's not a bacterial infection.

[–] liv 3 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Glad you got some sleep! I'm not a doctor and obviously they know best. I was mostly thinking about how part of the way anti-inflammatory steroids work their magic is by dampening down the immune system.

[–] eagleeyedtiger 3 points 3 months ago (1 children)

I see. The doc at first was going to prescribe amoxicillin, but mentioned if it was glandular fever it would make it worse. But she changed it to roxithromycin which should be safe according to her.

I think I'm getting better, but I'm still taking a few pain killers which makes it hard to tell if I'm actually better.

[–] liv 3 points 3 months ago

That's a good sign, fingers crossed! Hopefully it's just strep and the antibiotics are giving it a kicking.

[–] Dave 3 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Lots of flu going around at the moment. Our house feels like it's been in a low-level sickness state for weeks. Everyone is drained and grumpy (and also having trouble getting a good night's sleep).

[–] eagleeyedtiger 2 points 3 months ago (1 children)

The stupid thing is I know exactly how I got it too. My wife had it for around two weeks previous and lost her voice and everything. Then a couple weeks ago I stupidly grabbed her cup from the night before which hadn't been washed yet (I usually wash them up in the morning) to quickly get a cup of water to drink. I remember thinking "it'll be fine.."

[–] Dave 2 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (1 children)

In my experience, there's not much I can do to stop myself catching it. I just try to eat lots of oranges.

[–] eagleeyedtiger 2 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Does it do anything? I've been drinking a lot of lime/lemon juice

[–] Dave 2 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (1 children)

Well I get sick all the time so who knows 😆.

I have previously read that vitamin C is important for the body before you get sick, but not that helpful once you get sick. As in if you regularly have plenty of vitamin C you are less likely to get sick, but once you are sick no amount of vitamin C will make you get better quicker.

Edit: Turns out even the pre-cold effect is minimal:

Taking vitamin C every day to try to prevent colds won't protect most people from colds. It only slightly shortens the amount of time that they're ill. Starting to take vitamin C once you already have cold symptoms won't have any effect on your cold. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK279544/

[–] eagleeyedtiger 2 points 3 months ago

Well at least you’re supporting your local orange seller