Less specific birthday wishes - or how not to spend Valentine's Day

So apparently when wishing not to spend my birthday in the emergency room, I should have been a little broader - like say avoiding the ER for the whole month or at least a full week. My allergic reaction is fine and under control but sometime on Thursday I started running a low grade fever.

Thursday was in part a bad day because it was the day after the day I stopped taking steroids - the down side of the steroids is I crash. I was pretty spacy and out of it and my main activity was going to get blood work done - of course the only time I walk into the hospital and they don't take my temperature (and blood pressure and weight) is when I get my blood work done. I checked in with Dorothy my case manager who thought the rash looked good and I didn't feel hot and haven't run a fever at all.

That night I started feeling warm - took my temperature and it was 100.4 and 100.7 and was over 100 degrees for about a half hour. Being the rule follower I am and the fact that my book tells me to call for a fever of 100.4 or higher - I called in. The oncologist called me back - checked my blood work (which was done that afternoon) and said my counts were great (I had gotten a Neulestra shot which boosted my blood counts and had a white blood cell count of 50K.) That oncologist, thought it was nothing to worry about offered my a prescription for an antibiotic and seemed not at all concerned about the fact that i was supposed to go to a meeting the next day. I of course was nervous because I was talking at a conference.

I went to the conference, managed to do a good job in the presentation and made it through the day, saying things that seemed to make sense. I actually felt pretty good during the conference though the coughing was probably somewhat disruptive to others. That night I got home and ended up with a higher temperature of 101.0, called G-town again and the oncologist wouldn't even check my file or prior blood work and insisted she couldn't tell me anything and I should head to the er. At that point I mainly wanted permission to take some tylenol or a nyquil and go to sleep rather than spending Friday night at the ER.

I ended up ignoring the doctor and just taking some drugs and going to sleep. Partly - it seemed like she should at least be willing to look at my blood work - At that point I had blood work done 3 times in 7 days. I figured if I was still feverish Saturday I could go in during the day - which seemed like it would be less crazy than at night.

Well after sleeping off and on much of Saturday I ended up with a fever in the afternoon and after checking with a friend who is a doctor (out of state) who said it was worth getting checked out I headed to the emergency room.

Saturday afternoon wasn't very crowded at the ER and BoSoxFox came with me - the doctors and nurses and staff were very good and didn't seem to think it was nuts for me to come in. After more blood tests (from 2 different sources of my body) and a chest x-ray everything was fine. Of course I am a little worried of 3 hours spent in an emergency, even if not busy did have sick people. My white blood cell counts are 32,000 - still plenty high and I have permission to take tylenol (was given a prescription for tylenol with codeine -narcotics are good for coughs, who knew?) and now don't have to call in unless my temperature hits 101.5. I now have had blood drawn 4 times in 10 days - we should at least be able to make some pretty graphs.
Though do I have to worry about how much blood they are taking?


I also seem to have night sweats the last couple of nights - but it could all just mean that the chemo is causing some menopause-like side effects. The ironic thing is besides being tired from not sleeping particularly well what with the night sweats and all - I actually feel reasonably good. I understand they need to be vigilant but I do feel like I just used a lot of medical resources confirming that I seem to have some sort of infection but should be able to fight it. Of course this morning I started wondering whether the fever could just be another menopause like side effect rather than the cause of the night sweats.

I'm hoping now that I've moved on to the tylenol with codeine maybe the cough will go away and maybe this will all get back to normal. Apparently I could have used my other narcotic drug (which I was prescribed in case I had bone pain) to deal with the cough.

So we'll see what happens next, I'm hoping the fevers will stop.

Anyway - so I can give the Georgetown ER a thumbs up and to recap - I seem to have actually experienced none of the expected side effects of Taxol (bone pain or neuropathy).
Yet managed to get a rash and have a fever.

We'll see what the next treatment holds, though maybe I shouldn't be allowed to speak to the public if i stay on narcotics.