Poor, Pitiful Me

Greetings to my weary readers. As you may or may not realize, I only have five more weeks in Alaska. I will have to think of a new name for my blog. My last two weeks have been blighted by my being ill. I started out with a lovely sinus infection. Nothing unusual for me. I get at least three really good ones a year. I decided to try to use some home remedies to treat myself. The symptoms began two weeks ago on a Sunday. One reason I decided on home treatment is because we don't have a doctor here in the village. We DO have a clinic that is staffed with health aides who try their hardest, but it is hard to diagnose something when you only have aide training. Usually, they go through your symptoms, call the doctor, and try to help. Most often, if you have any kind of sore throat they give you a strep test. Now, being a frequent strep throat flyer, I knew this wasn't strep. I just figured it was a sinus infection that would slowly go away. That was until I started coughing up something green and solid. That was a cause for concern for me because, at this point, I had been sick for ten days. I made my appointment for 2:30...that's the latest appointment they take???? I went over there Thursday afternoon around 2:20. I got to go right back because I was the first of the 2:30 people to get there. I had a GREAT health aide named Andrewski, who really seemed to know what he was talking about. He didn't even try to give me a strep test...the first time that I had been in without getting one. He asked me the general questions from the book and then several more. I had a sneaking suspicion that he has a sneaking suspicion what might be wrong. He looked into my sinus cavity and said that he "didn't see much infection." Which was bothersome to me because I had just coughed up a lovely little present on the way to the clinic. THEN, he wanted to listen to my lungs. His sneaking suspicion was confirmed. He was fairly sure I had pneumonia; it had been going around the village. He said that he would call the doctor and for me to go home. He would call me when he knew something. It was not 3:00 so I went home and took a little nap.
He called back at 6:30 and said that the doctor in Anchorage said I could have an antibiotic but I couldn't get it until the next day because they were already closed.
Friday at lunch, Carol, one the aides at the school, was kind enough to give me a ride to the clinic and back on her four-wheeler. I was SO glad that she did that because it was snowing like crazy, and I didn't want to make my slight pneumonia worse. I took my medicine on Friday.
Saturday I woke up with a cough that would make any smoker proud. Every time I took a deep breath, I coughed. This was a painful cough. It lasted most of the day and night. By bedtime, my chest hurt from coughing so much.
Sunday, still coughing. No more green stuff, but my chest is SO sore from coughing and coughing and they are DEEP coughs. I have decided that I will go back to the clinic tomorrow for my follow up. If things aren't looking up considerably, I will be flying out to Bethel tomorrow to see the PRN at the clinic or try to get into the ER at the Native Hospital. Flying on one of those tiny little planes with pneumonia won't be fun, but it beats the alternative. Waiting around too long and having to be picked up by the National Guard Helicopter. Boy, the whole village turns out when that things flies in.
I will keep you up-to-date.
Coughingly yours,
Debbie