are we there yet.. or what happened to all the fun????

[tigger53]

after we did our three park days staying at the POR we went on the four day wonder cruise(separate trip report to follow on the cruise boards soon) and returned to the POR to do two more park days. however the vacation gods deceided to throw us a curve ball and a chain of unfortunate events began to take place. just before we were to get off the ship, like 6 hours to be exact, six long hours, my daughter wakes up in a lot of pain in her right ear. of course its obvious right away she probably has an ear infection, instead of going to the ships dr at 2am my daughter wants to wait till we leave the ship and find a dr to see before heading off to the resort. sounded easy but she was in so much pain i wanted to go to the ships dr in case something else was wrong but she refused saying she wanted to wait. i gave her advils and she toughed it out. hertz picked us up and directed us to a walk in clinic a few blocks away. so far so good. after filling out a load of forms and having her insurance cleared we sat down to a long painfull wait. after around a 90 min. eternity we saw a nice dr. who after one look into the ear pronouned that she had one dilly of an ear infection where the eardrum was so expanded he said not to be surprised if the drum ruptured. what?? that kind of freaked me out. he went on to say he had a textbook picture of a badly infected ear but hesitated to show it to us as her ear was beyond that in itself. i'm not feeling so good myself by now. what would all this mean to us as we were sailing on the magic in just two days. the dr said there wasn't anything to worry about as this was not a contagious type of thing. i worried on the other hand that something would go wrong while we were out at sea but the dr reassurred us the prescriptions he was giving would wipe out the infection and reduce the pain by sunday the latest. we could only hope. so off we go to find an eckerd drug store as thats the one we use at home. one is close by. daughter is in even more pain now because of the exam and has tears rolling down her face, this is where as a mother you feel so helpless as you'd rather it be you having all the trouble. i quickly go into the eckerd and explain the situation and i'm abruptly told i'd have a two hour wait for all the scripts to be filled(I forgot to mention the dr wrote 4 scripts out to do battle with this nasty vacation killing infection). i explain again how much pain my daughter is in but the two hour wait stands. there was no one to complain to as this was the person in charge.i'm very upset. daughter is even more upset. so we wait. after about an hour i go over to rush things along and here the meds had been filled and we were not called over, i'm really hot under the collar now. to make matters worse the total bill was for $500. i'm speechless. WHAT IS GOING ON HERE???? seems the insurance was declined. i explain this can't be as we just used it at the dr's office and it was fine there, so whats the problem here? sorry, can't help you. you need to call her insurance provider was the unenthused response. luckly we were able to use the courtesy phone to find out what was going on with the insurance.to make a very trying long story short the insurance co. said because my daughter was a college student a roster was needed to keep the insurance active, no kidding, one was sent two months ago and it was supposed to be good till aug. when the new rosters came out. they wanted a new roster now in order to cover the meds. this didn't make sense since the insurance covered the dr. visit a few hours ago and where in creation would i be able to come up with a roster while on vacation 1000 miles away from the university. after getting the all time greatest run around i finally called the university and begged, pleaded and whatever it took for them to fax a letterhead stating the daughter was in fact enrolled there as a full time student and needed medicine NOW. after another long wait she was finally put back into the system and i ended up paying just under $100. now here's the ironic thing of it all. the two sets of ear drops that were supposed to help with the pain caused even more pain when they were put into the ear. the med. sheet that comes with the script said the ear pain was part of the common side effects so now my daughter is in even more than before pain. we are all very frazzled by now and its not over yet. as were driving to the resort my son reads off all the warnings and what have you regarding the meds., other than these meds will cause even more pain when used you have to be carefull of not getting them too hot or to cold. if the color changes you must discard them and get new meds., great. you wouldn't think that would be a problem. WRONG!! when we got to POR my son took daughter to the room after we checked in and came back saying the room smelled of smoke, i had requested a non-smoking room. i don't want to unload the car and find we have to change rooms so i say i'll go and check it out myself, as i leave the car i turn back to my son to say the dreaded words of DON"T CLOSE THE DOORS...... to late. doors are closed and locked and the keys are on the backseat and the newly purchased tempermental meds are of course in the sun.ARRRRGGGGGG!!!!!!!! i'm now going crazy. will this day ever end? i call hertz and get the nicest lady ever and i start telling her my whole life's story and she's hopefull that the car will have a key code. she calls three cities in new york cause that where the car was registered and lo and behold and keeping with the events of the day there is no car code. figures. she then calls disney but they tell me the lock smith will charge me $70 to open the car , i don't care just do it, i suddenly remember that i have AAA and the disney guy says that they use the very same guy and with AAA it would be free. so i call. AAA can come within the hour, i explain about the meds and the heat and all. they'll do their best. in the meantime the disney guy calls me back and feels bad about the meds and is sending a secuirty cm to help me. i explain about AAA coming already and he says who ever gets there first is a bonus. AAA came within 25 mins and had the door opened in a few seconds. we are all really shot., and its still not over. after we get in the room its time for more painfull meds. we all fall into a restless sleep with our clothes on only to be awakened around 3am by my daughter showing me the cotton ball in her ear had blood and ozzing stuff on it. into the car we go and head for the front desk where a very nice cm gives me fantastic directions to the hospital in celebration. this is some fancy place. we were in in no time, private room, with doors and everything, tv, private bathroom dim lighting, soft music. this is weird. back home the er is nothing like this. we see a nice dr. and he pronunces that the ear infection has crossed over to the left ear, and is in the middle ear and the canal, geez, that sounded like alot of ear infection. he then gives a low whistle at the meds prescribed by the first dr. as he said it was some powerfull stuff and to continue taking them in both ears. frantic i tell of the 7 day cruise happening the next day and what we should do. he says its fine to go, the meds will kick in soon and its really a matter of her being comfortable till she felt better. i'm still very worried. dr. also says to take benedryl and not sudafeds and tylenol and not advils as the first dr had said. something about heart palpatations. we didn't want anymore bad luck. so we spent this day in the room trying to regroup. luckly my son had been scheduled to go on the backstage magic tour so at least he got out doing something while i stayed and played dr. it was a long and trying day. i did call disney cruise line to see what the policy was on ear infections and was told it was acceptable to board as it wasn't a contagious thing. that was good news but i was still worried about being out at sea. the cruise portion of this report will follow soon later on the cruise boards. to update the ear infection part, oddly enough my daughter is still having pain, not as bad but there non the less. we have been to an ENT and he said that in a month she should be back to normal. i sure hope so. it seems this is never ending.

 

[Christy93]

OH gosh! That sounds awful. I would have been so worried too. I hope your trip turned out better than it started.

 

[frndofpooh]

I'm sorry your trip started that way! Isn't being sick away from home the worst? I hope your daughter is feeling much better - FYI, a warm moist washcloth to the ear can be very soothing an sometimes work better than the pain meds. Don't be worried about the eardrum - that sounds worse than it is. Once it ruptures a lot of the pain is alleviated because the pressure is gone and it heals itself in a week or two. Poor thing! I hope the situation improved!

 

[cooldisneymom]

OMG tigger53!!! I'm so sorry about your DD!! I know how much you have been looking forward to your trip !! Sounds like you got my vacation this time!! We just got back from WDW this past Friday and my DD13 suprisingly did NOT get sick this time!! Every vacation we've taken with her it seems like she ends up with an ear infection and we have to seek out the local ER. Never fails. Until this year!! I know your DD is in pain, but the Dr. is right, it takes time, but it will heal. My DD's ears have ruptured twice in the last 2 years. It is very painful, it seems to come on very quickly (like your DD's did). We've dealt with her "golden ears" since she was 4 years old!! Finally allergy shots have been the miracle cure for her. No ear infections in almost 1 1/2 years!!

I hope you enjoyed the rest of your trip. Will look forward to reading your trip report soon.