Flu - Checkrides cancelled

luvflyin said:
Dayum. You like be on deaths bed and can still write perfectly composed multi paragraph posts.
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LOL. Nothing else to do while lying here in bed. Hahaha.

I wouldn’t recommend anyone touching my iPhone until it gets thoroughly disinfected though. Ha. The iThing is probably a serious biohazard right now.
 
Hope you're feeling better Nate. Last time i flew SWA i got a nasty ass cold
 
I got better. I don’t want to go on the cart! LOL.

Today was first full day without any noticeable fever all day. Now the um... “restabilization” of the gastro-intestinal system begins. Ha. Along with sinuses that still aren’t happy, and a touch of chest cold like cough, but thankfully still no signs of any massive respiratory infections or any of that.

Also extremely tired.

Did start eating a bit, but nothing tastes good/right. No smell at all yet.

Funny today was around 3 I texted Karen saying I thought I felt good enough I wanted to head into town and meet her on her way home from work for dinner somewhere because I have a little cabin fever going here after multiple days in bed. She said ok.

20 minutes later I texted her back that I had probably overestimated my energy level and maybe we should just use our free pizza coupon from the neighborhood pizza joint and bring it home.

Just walking around the house a little bit is enough to make me want to go lie down again. Haha. That’s getting better too, but it was funny at the time. All fired up to go somewhere then ran totally out of gas.
 
Been there done that.. Thought i felt good enough to go finish my debonair check out a couple weeks ago.... Got my gear together and called my CFI and said Newp.. going back to bed.
 
Hit me too.
(This got longer than I meant. If I'm derailing I can delete this and post elsewhere, just say the word)

I took off time from flying to get through ground school, exam passed, finally got med in order ready to start flying but bad weather for weeks in Oslo. Contacted my CFI, because wife and I were taking ten days vacation in Thailand and hoping to get up in the air again soon after that as weather allows.

Some here may recall me getting gassed with anhydrous ammonia, gagged, choked from it and possible damage, from a minibar leak in a Milan hotel. Was improving.

About eight days into Thailand trip I felt terrible, lots of coughing. Went to the local clinic, they thought maybe pneumonia. Sent me (talk about turbulence) in an ambulance to their clinic with X-ray equipment on a bumpy road. Couldn't reach my wife (still at the hotel) etc, etc. they were going to have me stay overnight, I had fever, headache, all that but also my oxygen was reading down in like 92 so I had to have constant oxygen.

So theydecided to send me on to a hospital. Finally got the wife on land line, she had to pack and check out, came to the clinic. they took us in an ambulance one hour, the ferries here only operated in daytime they sent us to the hospital in case it got very serious. After the ferrie they met the hospital ambulance and transferred me on the side of the highway from one to the other with all our baggage. One hour more to the hospital.

Turns out it was flu, and complications with the oxygen and lungs, I believe as result of the ammonia poisoning late last year damage to lungs. Wheezing like crazy, had cough.

Now several days later I'm ok to be checked out, oxygen is reading 99 percent. But we missed out flight home, and time diff between here and Norway, dealing with travel insurance folk, logistics (two hours from the nearest airport, not sure when a two seats open up for us) and the doctor here says I'm ok to fly, still a good deal coughing and wheezing, but oxygen is ok, but the insurance folk need to ok me also to fly. They don't want the cost of emergency landing because of illness.

I have to wear a mask, because I apparently can still get more problems from bacteria, but am not contagious.
Will be weird, when we finally get a flight to wear a mask in an airport...

Still no idea when I'll be home again.
 
denverpilot said:
Wow man! Just wow!

Feel better and hope they can get you home soon!
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Thanks Denver, I'm feeling a lot better. Think they said I had the "better" type of flu, I suspect yours is worse. Mine lasted a few days and they did antibiotics, and all kinds of stuff.

But the lungs reduced from that Milan thing hangs after. As long as my oxygen is ok, and it is, I'm happy. Just hard to get to sleep with all the damned noise when I lay on my left side. Right side is quieter, and not all the four part harmonizing wheezing, just simple tones :)

We are now kind of unwanted guests at the hospital. They don't make us feel that way but we want to get out of here, and I'm enough better. I'm still weak, and they are very nice, but we need a destination (hotel or flight) before I will leave here. No shortage of beds so we aren't in the way but I'm not up for traipsing around looking for a place to stay two hours from here.

Insurance company is helpful, but we keep on being the middle man, "we didn't get the doctors last statement yet" "I sent it" back and forth. I suggested they talk to each other since none of the things we are being told are questions.

Hope you get well soon too!

Here in Norway after one reaches 61 you get five weeks vacation a year.
They also have a law that since I was sick for several days I get those vacation days back again to use as long as I have documentation. The way things have gone on "vacations" lately I'm not sure I want, or even would survive a lot more vacations.

They don't seem as fun these days :)

Maybe they give us over 60 so much is to get out of paying retirement?
 
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Mrs. Steingar had a 104 degree fever (that's when I insisted we go to the ER, one of my better decisions). First time I ever saw anyone delirious with fever. Fun times. She got to spend week in our local hospital for that one. At least its near my office.
 
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Some sort of infection now.

Doc said after looking up my nose, “I agree. You look horrible.” LOL.

Don’t tease me doc. Tell it like it really is. Hahaha.
 
Holy cow. I just picked up the antibiotics just prescribed. That’s the largest prescription for amoxicillin I’ve ever had. 2000 mg/day for 10 days.

Doc must want whatever she saw in my nose really really dead. LOL.
 
Forgot to mention, I lost nearly seven pounds in a week, and it’s not water... I’ve been properly rehydrated for a couple of days now. I noticed the scale at the docs office and it was at 6.7 lbs lighter, virtually the same clothes as when I went in last Tuesday. Amazing.

I bet in the middle of last week, it was over 10 pounds until I drank enough fluids again, even though I tried to stay hydrated... it’d just go right through me...

Just didn’t want to eat at all, really. Last night’s dinner and today’s lunch, were the first two truly complete meals since last Tuesday. I ate some stuff in between, but not much.
 
The one and only thing I like about getting sick, I tend to loose weight. Can't much eat when I'm sick. I take it back, when I'm sick I get to watch what I want on TV.
 
Finally made it home yesterday. Slept. Got up and to a doctor (with no language barrier) who says I still have it, just mostly in the lungs now. Staying home sick the rest of this week.

It's good to be home though.
 
I hope you recover quickly and completely. It's no fun being sick, especially in a foreign country. It is good to be home. Best of luck to you.
 
Glad you made it home, Bob.

The antibiotics aren’t working all that great... definitely still crud going on in my sinuses. But they’re keeping it from moving to my chest, which is fine by me.

Feel all weird when I’m on antibiotics. Tired. Brain dead. Perfect for going to the office. LOL. Actually working from home I fell asleep halfway through the day on Wednesday. Just had to go lie down and didn’t wake up for a few hours. So weird.

Everything still tastes nassssty. Everything tastes incredibly salty even when it’s not. Gross. I did manage to find a new soul food place near the office that has fried catfish, and overly salty catfish doesn’t completely ruin that as a meal, so I actually ate something substantial today. Slab of catfish and a few fries.

Really looking forward to kicking whatever this is. Ugh. Yuck.
 
denverpilot said:
Glad you made it home, Bob.

The antibiotics aren’t working all that great... definitely still crud going on in my sinuses. But they’re keeping it from moving to my chest, which is fine by me.

Feel all weird when I’m on antibiotics. Tired. Brain dead. Perfect for going to the office. LOL. Actually working from home I fell asleep halfway through the day on Wednesday. Just had to go lie down and didn’t wake up for a few hours. So weird.

Everything still tastes nassssty. Everything tastes incredibly salty even when it’s not. Gross. I did manage to find a new soul food place near the office that has fried catfish, and overly salty catfish doesn’t completely ruin that as a meal, so I actually ate something substantial today. Slab of catfish and a few fries.

Really looking forward to kicking whatever this is. Ugh. Yuck.
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I thought I had antibiotics, but now found out it was anti-viral. When I went to the local doctor home, he wasn't sure what half the pills were, from Thailand, but told me to keep on them.
But same as you, I'm knocked out, sleeping, it comes over me like a Mickey Finn.

When we got home, to the airport, was so knocked it. Stressed too because my residency card had expired while in transit but in the end I got through. We got to the car and it was under 1.5 feet of snow, me in tennis shoes, and light coat. Took about twenty minutes to remove enough to not get stopped or cause a hazard.

Yesterday, it has snowed so much here while we were gone, I had to clear the driveway, and after that coughing fit for a half hour, knocked out again.

I don't know how you are working, no way I would make it through the day at work now. Doctor just says I have to rest, drink lots of water, and let it work its way through. Seems to make sense.

Here's to all of us getting well again! Sick of being sick! But it's a lot better being sick home than in Thailand.
Our travel insurance was at first ok. They opened a case when I was put into the hospital. But when I was ok enough to be discharged, but still had to wait for "fit for flight" from a doctor at the insurance co. They drug their feet on getting us a new place in Thailand. Time difference. They advertise 24 hour service, but took them six hours to get us a room. Also a flight.

We laid over in Doha. Man...I never want to go back there. Very weird place. We had a room because we were laying over 13 hours. The room was in what looked like a fancy hotel. Floor was warped, but the worst, they only had a long room with down lights. Turn on the light for the "living room" area and along with that came a spotlight on the bed. So my wife couldn't sit in the room and read without me laying in bed with a bright spot on me. Everything in Doha was like that.

Get well soon!
 
I suspect you were on antibiotics . The only antiviral drug I know of is methotrexate and its derivatives, and those only work on Herpes viruses. Rest, stay warm, and drink lots of liquids. Getting sick while traveling is always a pain.
 
steingar said:
Mrs. Steingar had a 104 degree fever (that's when I insisted we go to the ER, one of my better decisions). First time I ever saw anyone delirious with fever. Fun times. She got to spend week in our local hospital for that one. At least its near my office.
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Using those risk assessment management tools that come with being a good pilot. And husband.
 
steingar said:
I like to think I 'm a good pilot, but husband, well I think Mrs. Steingar might have a word or two to say about that.
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Forget about it! All wives do it to their husbands. It's part of the rules in the "Great Female Conspiracy".
 
steingar said:
I like to think I 'm a good pilot, but husband, well I think Mrs. Steingar might have a word or two to say about that.
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A case where truly the audience of one is all that counts.
 
denverpilot said:
Glad you made it home, Bob.

The antibiotics aren’t working all that great... definitely still crud going on in my sinuses. But they’re keeping it from moving to my chest, which is fine by me.

Feel all weird when I’m on antibiotics. Tired. Brain dead. Perfect for going to the office. LOL. Actually working from home I fell asleep halfway through the day on Wednesday. Just had to go lie down and didn’t wake up for a few hours. So weird.

Everything still tastes nassssty. Everything tastes incredibly salty even when it’s not. Gross. I did manage to find a new soul food place near the office that has fried catfish, and overly salty catfish doesn’t completely ruin that as a meal, so I actually ate something substantial today. Slab of catfish and a few fries.

Really looking forward to kicking whatever this is. Ugh. Yuck.
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Nate,

I've been in the same boat for the last few weeks. I don't believe is flu but have been feeling like death warmed over. I don't know what the problem is but I sure as hell wish it would go away. My get up and go got up and left without me so I can empathize. I haven't felt this wimpy in ages. Way off my feed and feeling the effects of it. Nothing tastes good. Hard to eat when everything has no taste. Just kinda stuff in what you can and hope for the best. When your favorite pizza has no taste you know you have been screwed by some invisible virus. I's easier to rid my computer of them than get them to quit screwing up my digestive system.

If it is flu I wish my Glock could get a bead on those germs and blast them into oblivion. I don't ever recall feeling this crappy.
 
steingar said:
I suspect you were on antibiotics . The only antiviral drug I know of is methotrexate and its derivatives, and those only work on Herpes viruses. Rest, stay warm, and drink lots of liquids. Getting sick while traveling is always a pain.
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Methotrexate an antiviral? You sure about that @steingar ? I always thought it was an immune suppressant, for autoimmune diseases. Could be wrong though, or it might have other uses.
 
steingar said:
I suspect you were on antibiotics . The only antiviral drug I know of is methotrexate and its derivatives, and those only work on Herpes viruses. Rest, stay warm, and drink lots of liquids. Getting sick while traveling is always a pain.
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Oseltamivir, Tamiflu, is an antiviral drug.
 
I teach high school, and the illness bug hit worse this year than in a long time. I think there was more than one strain floating around because my daughter got sick twice. Wife and I were sick over Xmas. Not really horrible like yours. Mild fevers around 101.
I don't know about you all, but I just don't get the flu shot. Haven't in more than 20 years.

Only time I got sick like you was 2007. Flu symptoms maybe. But I shedded around 15 pounds in water weight. High fever and night sweats. After about a week of feeling like I was dying but too stubborn to run to a doctor but finally went to an instacare. Doc there called it "walking pneumonia" which I suspect is very much like the flu. A few days of antibiotics and good as new.

But the flu and pneumonia aren't to be dealt with lightly. This much I did learn. Like the IMSAFE checklist, it's advisable to have a cognizant thought process on when one should seek medical help. I waited way too long.
 
Lindberg said:
Oseltamivir, Tamiflu, is an antiviral drug.
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True, I stand corrected.

azure said:
Methotrexate an antiviral? You sure about that @steingar ? I always thought it was an immune suppressant, for autoimmune diseases. Could be wrong though, or it might have other uses.
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Arrgh! Bloody senior moment. Liz, you are utterly correct. I was thinking of gancyclovir. Methotrexate is part of HAT medium along with gancyclovir, and I got thrown. Thanks.
 
Lindberg said:
Oseltamivir, Tamiflu, is an antiviral drug.
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You nailed it! I just checked out a photo I took (six different medicine) and zoomed in on the one they had hand written "anti influenza" on, and it is Oseltamivir.

The weird thing, you knew this, but the doctor I saw when I was back in Norway said "yeah...I'm not sure what this one is, but they have different drugs in Thailand" (he didn't check either) but 75 mg with seven tablets, 2 times a day.

In Thailand there was a communication barrier but at one point they gave me a solution intravenously that one of them told me was "antibiotic" (at least I heard that) but they gave it to me on the first day in the hospital and only twice. Not sure if it was, but I thought antibiotics were given always over time and several doses.

Back at work, but still pretty weak, worn out. Breathing is no longer wheezing though.
 
Glad you’re feeling better Bob. I’m a couple of days away from finishing my antibiotics and want to toss them in the trash, but I know better. Ha.
 
Co-worker of mine came down with it last week, now has pneumonia. I wonder if we should get hazard pay this time of year since our jobs have use traveling on the airlines at least once a week. Airport terminals right now look more like hospitals with the number of people wearing masks etc...
 
dell30rb said:
Co-worker of mine came down with it last week, now has pneumonia. I wonder if we should get hazard pay this time of year since our jobs have use traveling on the airlines at least once a week. Airport terminals right now look more like hospitals with the number of people wearing masks etc...
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There were three people with masks on my flight home from vacation before I came down with mine. I’d blame them, but who knows.

The entire concept of sticking a mask on my face and climbing into an airliner full of strangers when I’m truly sick, is completely foreign to me. I’d just re-book my tickets to another time.

And I thank the lucky stars that I got out of the traveling side of IT and telecom when I did. Way before anybody was sitting on airliners in masks.

Oh sure, they’d get on sick as a dog back then too, no denying that, but it wasn’t quite as in-your-face as someone with a mask on.

Plus, back then having upgrade status actually meant something. I could often ride up front away from cattle car service just because I had to fly so much. No chance in hades my flying would even touch the road warriors of today’s numbers.

I could be “Ultra-Frakking-Awesome-Platinum” level on multiple airlines and I’d still be slumming it in the back, today. For certain.

I feel kinda bad for y’all who have to travel for business these days. My company made nice videoconferencing gear so the world could mostly stop doing that silliness if they wanted to. But people still want free golf while they stress out over making a sale, I guess. Ick. :) :) :)

I just log into crap halfway across the country and do my work now from anywhere. Yay internets! :)
 
denverpilot said:
There were three people with masks on my flight home from vacation before I came down with mine. I’d blame them, but who knows.

The entire concept of sticking a mask on my face and climbing into an airliner full of strangers when I’m truly sick, is completely foreign to me. I’d just re-book my tickets to another time.

And I thank the lucky stars that I got out of the traveling side of IT and telecom when I did. Way before anybody was sitting on airliners in masks.

Oh sure, they’d get on sick as a dog back then too, no denying that, but it wasn’t quite as in-your-face as someone with a mask on.

Plus, back then having upgrade status actually meant something. I could often ride up front away from cattle car service just because I had to fly so much. No chance in hades my flying would even touch the road warriors of today’s numbers.

I could be “Ultra-Frakking-Awesome-Platinum” level on multiple airlines and I’d still be slumming it in the back, today. For certain.

I feel kinda bad for y’all who have to travel for business these days. My company made nice videoconferencing gear so the world could mostly stop doing that silliness if they wanted to. But people still want free golf while they stress out over making a sale, I guess. Ick. :) :) :)

I just log into crap halfway across the country and do my work now from anywhere. Yay internets! :)
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That is making a lot of assumptions about "masks".

For one thing, many people wear masks to protect themselves from OTHERS that are out there coughing and sneezing without covering their faces.
For another, I wore a mask (and believe me...it's uncomfortable. It's HOT with that mask on) on my flight back. My doctor said I was not contagious anymore but he couldn't say 100%, just that I should not be, but also said another reason I should wear one is I was weak from the flu, and could be susceptible to bacteria.

I had already missed my flight and had to get back home. In fact my residency card expired the day I travelled, so waiting would have caused a ton more problems, and again, the mask filters out. As I sat on the flight a guy about my age one seat back and on the aisle I noticed also had a mask on and was coughing.

It's responsible to wear the masks.
 
LongRoadBob said:
That is making a lot of assumptions about "masks".

For one thing, many people wear masks to protect themselves from OTHERS that are out there coughing and sneezing without covering their faces.
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Agreed. I would not assume that anyone wearing a mask is sick. They might be healthy and wanting to maximize their chances of staying that way.

At work, I don't wear a mask (considering what I do, I'd definitely get comments and questions about it), but I do wash my hands several times a day, almost at OCD frequencies. After classes, after grading or even just handling students' papers, sometimes just for good measure. I'd say 30% of the students in my classes have been absent because of illness so far this term. And that's not counting the ones who have shown up anyway, sneezing and coughing. I operate under the assumption that they're all disease vectors. Ick.
 
Yeah, I've had lots of sick students this semester, I'm surprised I haven't caught anything yet. Thankfully I don't collect papers at all, they submit stuff through the internet.
 
steingar said:
Yeah, I've had lots of sick students this semester, I'm surprised I haven't caught anything yet. Thankfully I don't collect papers at all, they submit stuff through the internet.
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Mine do that too, for homework, but the main class I'm teaching has a lab component, and I have 3 out of the 4 lab sections. We aren't quite to the point of doing lab reports online. And then there are exams, the first of which I just finished grading. So far, the worst I've had was an aborted scratchy throat. Knock on wood.
 
Well, looks like I have the plague too now. I've had a cold for several days, but this evening I've been running a 100* F fever. That's not too serious, but I have symptoms I've never had with any routine cold bug, like everything tasting funny, a very mild but noticeable balance problem, and my skin feeling like it's on fire. It also hurts to wear my cheaters for very long, so apparently I have it in my sinuses too. What fun! :rollercoaster:

To forestall the inevitable questions: yes I had the flu shot. Maybe this is the strain that it works against, since it's very mild for flu, but still enough to keep me home tomorrow. Yuck.
 
azure said:
Well, looks like I have the plague too now. I've had a cold for several days, but this evening I've been running a 100* F fever. That's not too serious, but I have symptoms I've never had with any routine cold bug, like everything tasting funny, a very mild but noticeable balance problem, and my skin feeling like it's on fire. It also hurts to wear my cheaters for very long, so apparently I have it in my sinuses too. What fun! :rollercoaster:

To forestall the inevitable questions: yes I had the flu shot. Maybe this is the strain that it works against, since it's very mild for flu, but still enough to keep me home tomorrow. Yuck.
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Other than the skin on fire part, that was the symptoms of the massive sinus infection that immediately followed or started while I still had my flu. Couldn’t really tell. Just ran together.
 
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