My Trip to the Hospital

As you know, I spent most of last week quarantined in my room because I was sick with strep. Well, my doctor apparently wasn't very bright and only prescribed me 5 days of antibiotics when he should have done 10 days. So although I got better and felt stellar all weekend, Monday, I started feeling a little sore throat again and by Tuesday I was practically walking death. I tried to see the doctor but they didn't have any open appointments til noon Wednesday so I stuck through my classes and tried to survive until I saw the doctor. By the time I woke up Wednesday, my tonsils were so swollen they were stuck together and I could hardly swallow water let alone advil or painkillers.

The doctor refused to admit that this was potentially his fault and tried to write me another 5 day antibiotic prescription plus order a mono test. When I told him I could hardly swallow my own spit he became slightly more concerned and immediately wrote me a referral to the emergency room, told me to find a friend (Alex Mai is a saint by the way) and get a taxi pronto. So, after going back up to my room and crying for a good 30 minutes because I had no idea what to do or expect without my parents there, Alex and I got a taxi and headed out.

After checking in, we waited for a solid 2 hours before we heard anything. We were surrounded by puking people, bleeding Mormon missionaries, and kids with bizarre skin rashes, which was not comforting. Although the two hours seemed like a long wait, we overheard some other people talking saying that the wait for the Gold Coast City Hospital was 7 hours, and the wait for the Melbourne hospital emergency room is a whopping 17 hours. Soooo, I was very lucky to have been sent to the Robina Public Hospital. Once I got a bed, I sat there for another solid 30 minutes before any doctors or nurses came to talk to me. It's been a while since I've been to an American ER so I can't really compare the wait times... you tell me. Anyway, the nurses finally came and started asking me a million questions. Then they put in an IV, took some blood and started me on fluids. Don't worry, I only cried a little bit. When the doctor came to talk to me, he dropped the bombshell. I had to stay the night in the hospital. I was under the impression that I would be in, get some IV antibiotics and get out. But no. They moved me and my lovely IV pole into the short stay unit and where I got a bed along with 7 other people in the big open room. The bed across from me was occupied by a man who was bit by a scorpion and then had a tick crawl into his scorpion bite. It was alarming.

After about 5 hours, the doctor finally came to tell me my blood test results. Not mono and probably bacterial. So they started me up on antibiotics, steroids to shrink my tonsils and more fluids. I also got some pain killers distributed to me in an unpleasant manner. The best part is that my doctor kept sending in nurses and med students to check out my tonsils because they were so big. I was like the freak show bearded lady in the circus or something. Throughout the evening, Alex, Christy and Rachel all stopped by to visit and brought me food, which I was finally able to eat. Aside from nurses coming in every so often to check my pulse and blood pressure, I literally saw no medical staff. I switched between watching the Olympics and sleeping through most of the night. Every so often they would come in to give me antibiotics or check my vitals some more. Finally this morning, I talked to a different doctor who prescribed me a much more effective and longer dosage of antibiotics and I was free to go! I survived my night alone at the hospital! I'm feeling so much better already and I got the okay to still go to surf camp this weekend! All in all, the whole thing could have been a lot worse, and the best part is that all my services were free because of my student insurance. However I also saw the downside to that because my waits were longer and I got significantly less medical attention and they always felt rushed when I did see a nurse.

Happy Valentines Day everyone and have a great TEC weekend to all my girls on team!! Praying for ya! Love you all a ton!! <3 <3 <3

As cute as a picture of me in my hospital gown would be, you get this beauty from our trip to Moreton Island last weekend instead. We found STARFISH, my favorite animal! We tried to steal the ones that we found dead but then our tour guide yelled at us and made us feel bad so we had to put them back. Major bummer.