Womens-Flu vs Mans-Flu

Now I know the term "women's-flu" is little know and rarely muttered, as usually we just either shrug it off or have a day in bed and then get back to the grind of daily life BUT this time I seem to have been hit for six by it.

Last Thursday and Friday, I never really left the house. My breathing was still all over the place and apart from a brief visit to mums, just to get out and get some fresh air, I pretty much hibernated away.

Friday evening the tell-tale signs of an itchy nose and sore throat began. My ears felt that blocked up, that everything sounded like it was coming to me via the bottom of a bucket. In a strange way i'm kind of relieved because maybe all this breathlessness has been due to this cold coming on over the last few days?

I decide to have an early night and see if I can sleep it off.

Saturday was, for want of a better word, ODD. I woke up and for the 1st time in ages felt fine! No headache, no grogginess, not tired, not puffy......pretty good really.

Hubby and I decide to capitalise on my good health and head out to our local farm shop to stock up on all sorts of yummy goodies as we were having friends round for dinner and my family around for lunch on Sunday. Well what a difference a good nights sleep makes. I managed to walk around the whole of the farm shop complex (it's really spread out) and not once felt out of breath. Wow things are on the up. So an hour later we fill the car with the goodies we'd purchased and headed home.

En route hubby remembers a few bits and bobs we'd forgotten and suggests swinging passed Tesco's to pick them up. He also suggests that I use my wheelchair to get around so as not to over do things and tire myself out and end up sick again. I try to argue with him that I feel fine and want to walk around but he's having none of it. After the last 4 weeks and all of a sudden everything is ok.....he's on protection mode.

So into Tesco's via my wheelchair we go and all of a sudden I begin to feel a bit rough again. Whether it has something to do with the stuffy air con in their or that I had overdone things or the pig ignorant woman who sneezed over me, I began to feel a little wheezy.

We didn't stay their too long and when we got outside I kinda felt a little better in the fresh air.

Anyway apart from the usual feeling puffy from stressing about getting dinner ready(I made chicken liver pate for starter and game casserole with Stilton and walnut dumplings for dinner) everything seem to be ok....phew!!!

A good evening was had by all.

Sunday was bad. I woke up with a pounding headache, ears ringing, sore throat, feeling pretty foggy in the head, coughing and sneezing every few minutes. Oh great, fantastic, a full blown cold. Just what I need 2 weeks after getting out of hospital. Oh and what a surprise....it seems to have gone straight to my chest....double trouble!!!!!

I'm sure there is some mystic conspiracy that throws everything at you at once to deal with.

Anyway, my hubby is an absolute star. He cooks us and our friends (who stayed over from last night......a lot of alcohol consumed, although not by me...lol) a scrummy full English breakfast which definitely helped me feel a little better.....well they say you have to feed a cold...lol

Our friends head off soon after, leaving hubby and I to get the house tidy and prep all the veg for lunch. As you can imagine, when full of cold, i'm not really that much help.

***Yuck warning - skip passed if have weak tum***
My sputum although improved in the sense of colour (no longer Aspergillus brown but a shade of indescribable green) has more that quadrupled in volume since Saturday and there's blood in it! The joys of CF lungs aarrrgghhhhh!!!!!

Anyway, I manage to sniff, splutter, cough and wince my way through the day and by early evening my lungs are beginning to feel like they're on fire from all the coughing.

Hubby is also beginning to feel under the weather.....great, whatever I have, i've now given to him....so he goes an makes us both some honey and lemon hot toddies and we head off for an early night to sleep it off.

Monday morning see's me wake up on the sofa. I had the most awful night. I just couldn't get comfortable and inbetween the coughing and spluttering, just couldn't sleep. I look at the clock and wonder where hubby is as he's usually milling around getting ready for work. I lazily shoot him a text to see if he's ok and he texts back saying he feels awful and is having a day off sick (very unusual for him...he never has sick days) I tell him to stay in bed and get as much sleep and rest as he can and i'll be up later to check on him but he was down a hour later as he was getting restless.

It was a this point that I noticed that my already steroid swollen body was even more swollen on the left side!! What is that all about? Another thing to tell the docs on Tuesday. Well, we pretty much had a PJ day. Again sputum volume was up for me, although at least the blood in it was old blood and if anything the undelying colour is getting better. The issue was more now one on pain. From all the coughing my ribs are sooooo painful.

BUT, and here's where things get really odd, at 5pm I felt ok and wondered how badly this cold/flu had affected me so I got on my exercise bike. I fully expected to be totally wiped out and breathless in about 2 minutes. Fifteen minutes, chatting all the way through and with no hint of puffiness i'm still cycling!!! What the hell is going on with my body? Another thing to add to the list of things to tell the docs on Tuesday.

So here we are, Tuesday morning and i've come to work with hubby so that we can shoot off up to the hospital when he finishes his half day. Sputum is now clear of all blood, I ache from head to foot, I'm as puffy as ever and have, as a precaution, packed an overnight bag in case they decide they're gonna keep me in to find out what on earths going on.

Will blog more once i've been through my long list of "what the hells" with my docs later

xxx

PS. Hubby is feeling a little better, just tired from being kept awake by my coughing...opps my bad...lol