blaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrrrrrrrghhhhhhhfffffff

If that looks like a puking kind of word to you, you'd be correct.

Went to my family doc today. (LOVE her. She knows my kids by name even though they see another doc and rarely go in with me. She was supportive of my decision to homebirth, was a sympathetic supporter in my early breastfeeding issues with Audrey, and helped me feel ok about being on antidepressants.) She listened to my lungs and pronounced them "crackly all over." Since my fever went as high as 103.something yesterday, she gave me a script for Zithromax, and another one for an extremely, wonderfully, narcotic cough medicine.

As a kid, I had a reaction (I barfed my guts out) to erythromycin, an antibiotic which is in the same family as Zithromax. I've always listed it as something I'm allergic to, but somehow, as an adult, I was accidentally given a prescription for Zithromax. This was a wonderful mistake, because not only did I NOT puke my guts out then, that drug made me feel 85% better within a couple of hours of the first dose. (Bonus: you only take it once a day for five days, good for me since I am always missing doses of the multiple times a day for 10 days abx). I didn't even realize until a few years later that this was in the same class of antibiotic, and assumed I'd grown out of my allergy/sensitivity/whatever.

Today when I got home, I immediately took the first dose of the Z-pac (which is now available generically, Super Bonus!), the one that is two pills (the remaining four days are one pill only). I also took the first dose of the cough medicine (THE. NASTIEST. tasting stuff I have ever had the unfortunate experience to taste). This was on an empty stomach. Big, big, BIG mistake. Within an hour, I was kneeling in the bathroom before the Great White Throne, making the sound you see depicted at the top of this post.

I was not sure what to think. Maybe I had not outgrown the allergy after all, despite having taken the Zithromax for years. Maybe the generic was slightly different, causing the unexpected reaction. Maybe I did indeed have the flu, which Dr. LOVE-Her believed I did not have. Whatever, I called her office back and left a message on the prescription line asking if I could get an alternate antibiotic. I waited a few hours, called the drugstore to see if it had been called in, called the script line again. This went on for several hours. (NOTE: I do not blame Dr. LOVE-Her for this at all; one of her nurses deals with this. She probably has no idea I even called back today.)

In the end, I learned that, indeed, it was probably taking it on an empty stomach and taking it with the cough medicine (a very VERY powerful medicine indeed) were my mistakes. Both the pharmacy and the nurse (who FINALLY called ME) also assured me that while puking was a common side effect, it usually only happened with the first, doubled dose.

While I'm still a bit annoyed with the nurse, I'm relieved I can continue taking my wonderful effective Z-pac when I need it.

Oh, and this afternoon? Audrey was looking puny. (I was also clued in by the fact that she put herself down for a nap, something I don't even usually make her do anymore). I took her temp. 102.something. I'm having LEO take her in to her doc tomorrow. I don't want to be messing with Immediate Care or the ER over the weekend.