Sick Day Comic 2

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I’m still sick basically. Not with the flu, or whatever, although I suspect some effects from it linger… No, now I’m sick likely because of the new foot infection that got farther than it should have if not for our criminally broken healthcare system. It had already festered for a few days, mostly unknown, because of the original sickness, possibly contributing to it. Anyway I ended up going to a random clinic in town just to get antibiotics. It wasn’t super difficult, but I was still sick and irritated, on top of having to walk on a painful foot. The teenage doctor was convinced that I was diabetic, because apparently infections like this are extremely rare if you aren’t. I will remind you that this will be my 3rd time. So they tested me for diabetes. A very surprised nurse came back in after the test and said “You aren’t even pre diabetic…”
Long story short, I got my pills.
I’ve been basically comatose 90% of the day since the antibiotics kicked in. For reasons I can’t possibly know antibiotics turn off my allergies nearly completely, so a huge swath of my everyday problems are suddenly gone when I take them. The biggest one is always sleeplessness. I have been more sleepy than I have been in YEARS. I can barely type this even now. My ability to fake my way through problems is really not helping to sell how difficult it has been typing this. Every part of my body wants me to go to sleep. I’m running on dedication, determination, and pure stubbornness.
Hopefully I’ll start to beat the bacteria and can then begin healing properly soon. I’m crossing my fingers that I don’t end up with two permanently fucked up feet, but I guess we’ll see. In any case I’ll see you back here Wednesday with something. I don’t know what, but I’ll be here.

25 Comments

She’s a fake goth girl! That’s almost as bad as being a fake gamer girl!!1!

“You aren’t even pre-diabetic.”

That’s pretty much what John Pinette got. He went to the doctor once, getting tested for something or another, and the doctor does blood work and such. Comes back and says “These numbers are good.” John Pinette, in case you’re not familiar, was a big dude. If you’re not familiar with his work, it’s all over YouTube, and you do yourself a grave disservice by not checking him out.

Anyway, Pinette’s response is basically to look at the doctor and say something like “Can you sound a little happier for me? Or at least a little less shocked?”.

You can ask my sister who is a nurse, but –

When you see and read about how much bad shit is going on with people health-wise, you become a nihilist to the core. Everyone is going to die, a third of people you see of some pretty bad things that will make you cry, the other two-thirds of less horrific but preventable causes. And when you’re bound to the health insurance system of the US, everything good is a surprise.

I find it so very fascinating that antibiotics seem to cure all of your allergy issues. Antibiotics making someone tired as a side-effect, that’s somewhat normal I’m told. But stopping allergies, that’s not something I’ve heard before.
Now, I’m no medical professional, but when it comes to my own health I tend to assume a spade is a spade; if the antibiotics are curing the allergies, then wouldn’t it make sense that they aren’t actually allergies, and the symptoms you associate as allergies are in fact all stemming from some kind of infection that the medicine is helping to abate?
Alas, I know nowhere near enough for me to be able to conclusively say. I’d suggest mentioning this oddity to your doctor, but man, you literally *just* gave us another story to add to the pile of stories about how the local medical facilities in your area seem to be troublingly incompetent. Like, I’d still inform them of this side-effect of the antibiotics, but I know that if I were in your shoes my expectations of it being listened to and acted on would be low.

I went through a similar problem.

I have bad nasal allergies. Hay fever is a bitch. I cannot breathe through my nose and I get severe congestion when certain plants decide to pollinate.

The congestion causes me to get sinus infections, which gives me severe headaches. They are of migraine levels. I can’t think, I can barely see, and I can barely move.

So I’m thinking maybe he gets sinus infections with his allergies, and the antibiotics are dealing with the sinus infections, which makes his life better. Not really curing the allergies, but the symptoms of the allergies.

Did a little bit of armchair research and thought I’d posit a theory based on it.
“Chronic Sinusitis” is a recursive condition similar enough to allergies that a significant number of people misdiagnose it as allergies. And some cases of chronic sinusitis are treated with antibiotics, which means that they *can* be an effective treatment.
So maybe that’s it? It seems like it, but its so easy to try and offer medical advice from a distance and with no training. Dunning-Kruger at its finest, I guess.
Either way, I’m glad to hear you’re able to get some much-needed rest. I have great respect for you and your art, Jackie. Hopefully things get better soon.

These sort of problems are not unique to the writer’s area. These sort of problems are built into the American health care system, especially if you’re not wealthy.

Antibiotics can suppress immunoresponses for some people, and allergies are “just” acute immunoresponses. So Jackie is likely one of those people whose immune system is messed up by antibiotics, and thus antibiotics help alleviate his allergies.

Yikes, your news of a bad foot infection is rather darkly coincidental to me. My great-uncle just died to an untreated foot infection a couple weeks ago. Apparently he had it for a while, but hid it from everyone until it started causing complications he was unable to hide. The doctors did what they could and he held out for a while, but by this point it was already too late. Be happy you’re still alive and seem to be getting treated at at much earlier point in the infection than he was.

Wait, antibiotics take care of your allergies… DUDE!? Have you ever had your sinuses scoped? My dad had a terrible time with allergies and sleep apnea and it all turned out to be fixable.

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