T-1 In sickness & in health

You know that oath you take when you get married, the one with all the blah blah about ... "to love and to cherish... in sickness and in health..... until death do us part"?

I always thought it was just a load of romantic rubbish. I guess you do mean it when you say the words in front of the judge but somehow you never really think about it. You figure, heck, yeah, whatever.... where do I sign so we can get this party started!

Well... this week hubby proved to me he hasn't forgotten that oath.... at least not just yet.

After a quick last-minute appointment with a colleague's dentist on Monday morning (which had me swooshing accross town at lunch time), I thought I would be Ok. The Dr put me on antibiotics and painkillers and by Tuesday morning my tooth was feeling much better.

And then the man upstairs decided I still hadn't learned my lesson about putting off medical treatment and decided to give me another run for my money.

That evening, riding the metro back home it started again. First a little headache with some pain in the bottom of my mouth.... I didn't think much of it and took a couple of painkillers waiting for them to take effect. By the time I got home I was still waiting..... I waited all during diner and waited and waited.... three hours later the pain had not only NOT subsided, but it'd gotten worse.... 10 TIMES WORSE. By this time I was getting desperate. I took two more pills (forget the whole waiting 6hrs in between period) and an hour later knocked back a tumbler of whiskey and spent an hour doing mouthwashes with the last of the Astringosol I had left from my trip to Mexico.

During this time, hubby was starting to get really worried seeing me in such silent pain (talking was unbearable). We tried to go to bed but by 2am I was still twiching and ready to bang my head against the wall so I got up and started doing laundry and the dishes and whatnot just to be occupied and see if I could take my mind off the pain. By 3am hubby seeing I was not back got out of bed, put on a pair of jeans and sneakers called a cab and grimly announced that he was taking me to the ER.

At fist I thought this was silly. After all, who's ever heard of yummy George Clooney attending a toothache? But I was in no position to argue, so I meekly got dressed and brushed my teeth for the zillionth time and got in the cab.

The taxi took about 40 minutes to get us accross town to the only ER that takes in dental emergencies in Paris! (Btw, you know how in Mexico the stop lights on the main avenues turn to a blinking "yield" yellow after 1am so you only slow down but don't have to come to a full stop?... well, so not the case in Paris. It seems we got red light after red light and had to sit in the freakin' car waiting for nobody to pass while the lights switched to green!!).

Anyway, we got to the hospital's ER reception desk and let me sum it up in one word: GLOOMY.

Two desk clercks that looked more like half dead zombies slowly took our names and pointed to a waiting room empty of all human life except for two half drunk passed out people sleeping on the chairs. (What? No Dr McDreamy and Dr McSteamy swhoooooshing by to rush patients up to the OR???)

We asked the zombies how long we would be waiting since aparently we were the only ones there (with an emergency that is) but apprarently the official reponse in this case is "why? you're in a hurry?".

Ooooookkkkkaaaaayyyyyy........................................

So we carefully tipptoed into the waiting room (didn't want to disturb the sleeping people since at least they were catching some zzz's) and just sat there. Me with my head throbbing, hubby with his eyes droopping but stoically staying awake to keep me company.

An hour later I could stand it no longer and went up to the front desk again. This time I put on my "I'm about to burst in tears, I'm so helpless and in inbearable pain" face and asked again in the sweetest voice my aching mouth could muster when they thought the doctor could see me. Zombie clerk 1 graced me with an answer: "probably in about an hour". Zombie clerk 2 simply lifted her eyebrow as if she was surprised I even asked the question. I took a tranquilizing breath and mentioned that being as there was obviously no patients waiting in line before us how could it take so long? (I was seriously pushing my luck here, but hey, you gotta do what you gotta do). Zombie clerk 2 finally took pity of me and said that this was because the emergency doctor was .... out.

Uhmmmm...... what?

That's right... the emergency doctor was out of the emergency room. Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't this like illegal or something???

I gloomly went back to sit with hubby tears streaming down my face and waited another 45 minutes until what sounded like a voice from heaven (in reality Zombie clerck 2's voice) called my name.

The doctor (which turned out be a "she" instead of George Clooney) checked me, gave me a prescription for more painkillers and more antibiotics and sent me on my way. It took me longer to put my jacket back on! She did however reassured me that the meds would kick-in in time for me to catch my plane but other than that, hubby and I had lost 4 hours of sleep for zilch.

But... wait, it's not over yet!!!

On the way home, we decided to ask the cab driver to take a longer way home in order to be able to stop at one of the 5 pharmacies in all Paris that are open 24/7 to buy the meds and get the stuff flowing in my system... but watd'ya know? We got to the pharmacy at 5:10 only to find a sign posted on the door saying:

"This pharmarcy is open seven days a week, 24 hours a day except from 5:00am to 5:30am".

What can you do at a time like this but let out a little maniacal giggle and go back to the car?
Since the cab's clock was running we decided to go home, sleep the last 2 hours we still had left before having to get up for work and I'd get the meds on my way to the office.

Eh merde!

*************************

This all happened during the night of Tuesday.

It's Friday now and I can say, getting through this week has been something of a triumph for both of us. Hubby was a real trooper and I'm glad he was there to stand by my side because I don't think I would have even made it to the ER on my own let alone the rest.

On the tooth front, the pain is almost gone but only after three days of eating non-solid food (if someone mentions the words "soup" or "purée" again I'm gonna puke) and popping 6 pills with each "meal". In exchange I've had the great experience of dealing with such fun medicine secondary effects like nausea, dizzy-ness, throwing-up and falling asleep (in the middle of a management comittee).

Can we end this week already??????

Fned.