Spring 2015 - Day 53: The Lost Day
Random Note: Today is a lost day because we originally were supposed to have 6 days in Myanmar, and this would have been one of them. Because of the tides, we had to leave at a very specific time. It ended up being noon on this day, day 53. We couldn't leave at any other time, it was very strict. So to make sure we were all on the ship and able to leave, they changed on ship time to 11pm on day 52. So this day was now unscheduled. It wasn't a study day or an A or B day. It was a lost day.
Today I woke up to the phone ringing. It was Jessi. She had gone to the clinic in the morning and they had put her on crutches so she needed help getting food and water and other things.
I rolled out of bed and went to her room. They had wrapped her foot in such and intense bandage I thought it was a cast at first. They had put her on two different antibiotics and a pain killer. It was still hurting her a lot and she was feverish on and off. Her dad was freaking out back home. She had been sending him pictures; he's a doctor and he was afraid the infection might be mersa, a staph infection.
I went up to the snack bar and got her a muffin, an apple, and a water. She then had me go up to the pursers desk with her ID to get her a phone card. We were still docked in Myanmar but her phone wasn't picking up service and she wanted to call and talk to her dad.
The conversation ended in tears because he wants her to come home. He is worried about the infection and wants her to be in a hospital and he wants her home to do it.
The mood was very somber at that point.
That was also when she started breaking out into hives all over her body. It was clear that she was reacting to one of her meds.
The clinic hours were over but we headed down there anyway. It was slow going, she was fully on crutches and had never used crutches before so we made our way down deck 3 to the elevator and then down to deck 2.
When we got into the elevator I told Jessi that this would be the one and only time that I would break my stairs pact. I refuse to take the elevator on the ship, I only use the stairs. But I broke that rule for her.
We knocked on the clinic door and the nurses answered. Jessi told them what was going on and they had her go into one of the rooms while they contacted Jeff.
Jeff took her off one of the antibiotics. Jessi is allergic to penicillin and apparently 10% of people who are allergic to penicillin also react to the antibiotic she was put on. So she is part of the 10%.
One good thing that came out of going back down to the clinic was that Jessi asked Jeff to talk to her dad. So we made our way up to deck 5 where Jessi could get cell service and she called her dad. Jeff definitely reassured her dad and made him more comfortable with the care she was getting.
After Jeff left, and right after Jessi hung up the phone, Dirk, the head of security, came out onto the deck. He saw her on the crutches and asked what happened. When she told him he basically said that she needed to go to the hospital. He wanted to her get off the ship and go to the hospital right then!! She told him that she had already seen Jeff and that seemed to make him happy and now, when we look back on it, it was pretty funny.
When we got back to her room things were little more upbeat. It was just about time for lunch and I was really hungry. We called mom Shelley and arranged to meet her in her cabin after lunch, she had said we could lay out and tan on her balcony. Jessi wasn't that hungry so I went up to lunch and when I was done I changed into my bathing suit and went back to her room.
We sat in mom's room and talked to her for a long time. She needed an update on Jessi's foot and also wanted to know about her time in Myanmar. I then set up the lounge chair for Jessi and we sat out in the sun for a while.
It came to a crashing halt though. I went to the bathroom and when I came back Mom was helping Jessi back inside and she was laying down on the ground. She had a sudden rush of nausea.
She was pretty sure it was because she had taken meds and hadn't really eaten much for lunch. I ran to the pool bar and got her a smoothie. The smoothie seemed to help but she spent a better part of the next two hours just laying on the ground of mom's room. Mom even left to get a massage and I just sat on her couch while Jessi laid on the ground.
It wasn't exactly what we planned for the day but it worked out. I read a lot of Harry Potter and I can never complain about that.
When mom came back from her massage Jessi reassured her that she was feeling better and then we left so Jessi could take a nap until 4:30 when she needed to go back to the clinic.
I went back down to the clinic with her and mom met us there too. We were there for moral support but also because we were curious about what exactly was going on with her foot.
I will tell you this, it is not pretty. She has pustules all over her feet. They are clustered mostly around her toes and there is a giant one in-between her big toe and second toe. It is multiple different colors from red to black to purple and her whole foot is swollen so big that she doesn't even have an ankle.
Not good, and it definitely looks painful.
She begged Dr. Jeff to drain the giant one but he refused because he wants to keep the infection contained. She was not happy at all.
They decided to keep going with the antibiotics they have her on and told her that they have been consulting with everyone possible to try and figure out what it was that caused the infection.
One of the nurses, Christine, cleaned it all up and wrapped it back up again. Mom and I decided she shouldn't have to walk up to dinner so we asked Jeff if he could sign off to have Jessi get food delivered to her room, at least for dinner.
She left the clinic with new bandages and more pain meds. I hung out with her in her room until her dinner came so that I could help her with her tray. Then I left and got dinner myself. I found everyone else eating dinner and I updated them on how Jessi was doing. When we all finished eating we went down to visit her and I cleaned up her tray for her.
The rest of the evening passed very uneventfully. So uneventfully that I can not remember what happened. I may have watched a movie, or possibly blogged. Probably one of the two. At any rate, it was an eventful day and now we are on our way to India!! Let's hope Jessi can walk by then and I get all of my blogs done by the time we get there.
