Like Water for Zithromax

I know how annoying it is to listen to someone complain, in detail, about how they are sick. I really do. I even know how it's that much worse when the kvetching is about a cold, and your friend is relaying symtoms as if you've never had one before and have NO IDEA what suffering one is like.

We all pretend to be sympathetic to one another, but let's be honest - nobody really cares that much about someone else's sniffles and sneezes, and it's just about the most boring thing to discuss, particularly when on the receiving end of the conversation. Hell, doctors go through something like ten years of schooling just to nail the coping skills required for listening to people complain on a regular basis.

I know all of this. And so I've been good all week. I haven't so much as mentioned to you, my pretty friends, that I've been dealing with THE COLD FROM ABSOLUTE HELL that came and ate me alive on Monday night, after the whole Kodak Theater soiree.

In fact, I believe I've been super-efficient in handling the situation. I suspect it's a sinus infection, which I get a few times a year, and I'm guessing that the bizarre spikes and dips in body temperature are due to fever, as it's a tad early for menopause. But I haven't taken my temperature, because I'm not a baby. And I haven't asked my doc for antibiotics, either. I'm being really responsible, and am taking nothing more than Tylenol Sinus during the day, and around-the-clock doses of Mucinex, an expectorant my father swears by.

Because doctors nationwide seem to have come to the unanimous decision that antibiotics are being way over-prescribed, and they do tend to give women nasty infections that I know you brothers out there don't want to hear about, I'm game in taking the longer road to recovery. After all, I work at home, so it's not like I need to take a paycut just because my throat stings and my nose is running a marathon and my head feels like someone is simultaneously pounding on the inside just above my eyes while drilling a hole from the outside in and I keep breaking out in cold sweats and chills and I can't sleep because of the congestion and my muscles and joints ache incessantly though I've yet to join the gym.

Crap. Did I just let the details of my ailments slip? TOTAL accident, honestly (but dammit, that felt so good to put on someone else).

So let me tell you about the treatment now. Everybody loves talking about medicine, comparing notes or whatever. So Mucinex is this over-the-counter chalky horse pill that you take every twelve hours, and on which - to Y's delight - I always gag. I was not born into a family of smooth and cool pill-takers. Ask my brothers.

Mucinex loosens up any congestion from excess fluid you've got goin' on, and makes it ALL come out. Through your nose. Kind of non-stop. So you feel a little better, and after a few days, your infection is gone entirely, but in the meantime you go through tissues like my children do babywipes. For the past three mornings, I have had to spend the entire first hour after rising blowing my nose. Sometimes I swear a baby is going to pop out through there, the experience is so intense. And before you go, "Oh, gross!" on me, tell me you haven't been there yourself. Go ahead: look me in the eyes, and swear you have never wondered if maybe just a little bit of brain fluid was mixed in with that post nasal drip because if one more person told you that misery to such a degree was nothing more than a COLD, you would lose your mind entirely. Yeah.

I'll write again in a few days. When I can see the computer monitor again.