If I were to get an infection while Neutropenic I would bet on myself to get it either at the weekend or on a bank holiday. Of all the hospital bound infections I have had I can only think of two that were Monday to Thursday affairs. My Point?
Janet has had a cough for the past four days or so… nothing really bad and she hasn't been ill with it but a cough nevertheless and quite prolific during the night. She has tried her best to keep it away from me – washing her hands and using hand gel before and after preparing food, avoiding getting too close to me with an occasional kiss on the top of my head sufficing for intimacy where we are usually very tactile… and doing without cuddles, on top of being housebound, is a real bugbear.
Anyway, my point. This evening I have had a slight headache and didn't feel 100%… nothing I could put my finger on, just a general malaise. My temperature was 37.40 at one stage but I put that down to not having much to drink between 4pm and 8pm (a couple of glasses of squash and 2 cups of tea) where usually that would have been about 4 glasses of squash and 3 to 4 cups of tea (1 glass of water and 1 cup of tea/decaf coffee per hour being the usual rate of intake).
I took my temperature at 10.15pm and it was 37.09, perfectly fine but my slight headache persevered so I took 2 paracetamol at 10.45. I followed up by taking my temperature again (every 30 minutes when monitoring) and it read 37.43. Now that isn't too bad but I've been drinking quite a lot since 8.30 and usually that does the trick but now that little rise has me wondering and I wish now that I had held off with the paracetamol because that may well bring the temperature back down but it could be disguising a real rise. My headache has eased but I'm still feeling a tad off.
I have set my alarm for 2am in order to check my temperature (if I get to sleep that is) after the effects of the paracetamol have completely worn off. I'm hoping it will be okay or just mid-range 37s at worse.
This is the world of the neutropenic… silly perhaps, over reacting, possibly so but I don't mind being or looking silly or being guilty of over reacting, as long as my temperature stays more or less normal and this 'off' feeling goes away.
Neutropenic and paranoid? Not a good combination and both new to me… I hope that the first is not true (that my 0.88 of Monday has now risen above 1.0 and that the second is no more than a understandable over reaction and, under the circumstances, 'allowed'.
Roll on 2pm and the relief of being 'silly'.:-)
Dai.
