My 1st Trip Report~ The good, the bad, and the yucky! Finally FINISHED!

[Eeyoresgal78]

I know how it feels to be sick at Disney. I got sooooo sick I had to go back to the room (POFQ as well) midway second day. DH had to call the disney medics since I have asthma and had a hard time breathing. When they came I had a fever over 103. All I could swallow for 3 days was water/powerade mixture. The fever was up for 2 1/2 days so I HAD to stay in my room It was awful but on the 4th day we were back in the parks. The Emergency medical guys were great.

I do hope the end of your trip was better.

 

[maxiesmom]

I don't meant to sound heartless, but please stay home (or in your room) if you are sick. I feel sorry for you, but I also feel sorry for the people who rode the bus you were on, touched a railing you touched, sat in a seat you sat on. And I cant believe your DB let you leave the room as sick as you were. I do hope you are all better now.

 

[chipper10]

Same thing happened to me on my Honeymoon at Disney last year. Hope you are feeling better. Can't wait to hear how it ends.

 

[byoung]

Thanks for the reports.

 

[IwasatWDWforamonth]

Please dont judge the op, I cant count the number of sick,,,, half dead people I saw or felt spit on my neck from their hacking coughs.
I spent the last 2 days of my trip sick and I spent them in the park, im not going to be the one keeping my germs to myself.
this trip airborne let me down.
I do recomend going to the hospital though disney will even come pick you up,,, I got really lightheaded the first day of our trip and ended up there.

 

[Monki]

Posting, because I have to find out what happened!

 

[disney1fan]

Me too!

 

[DisOrBust]

Just an FYI for thoose who find themselves ever in the same position.


GO TO THE ER!

9/10 times your insurance, if you have some, will cover it.


I found this outthe hard way in Florida and I'm an RN. Did the Urgent care at Coooa beach with my 18 month old. It was filthy and filled with prositiutes etc...The MD (Maybe he was) was filthy!!

Submitted my bill Nope not cover and I was asked Why didn't you go to the ER???

 

[Glorydaz]

I understand the people who say you should have stayed in but on the other hand, I understand what it is to book a dream vacation , finally have it come and you truly want to make the best of it....I feel so bad for you because this sounds incredibly serious! waiting to hear the rest.....and while this is your first post - it's awesome!!!

hoping this finds you much, much better....

 

[THE HAT]

anxious to hear how things turn out!!

 

[OhMari]

Please tell us how you are! You sound like my dd. She insisted on going sled riding 2 days after she started her meds. You sound like you were almost having an allergic reaction with your throat swelling like that. I also gave my dd her allergy medicine to help with her swelling of the throat.

 

[hentob]

I am also subscribing. You write very good and detailed reports.

I will also say in the OP's defense, if you are going through chemo and/or have a weakened immune system, I am sorry, but WDW is the not really the place for you if you want to remain germ-free and healthy. People come from ALL OVER the world, carrying various strains of Who-Knows-What. Please wear a mask if you have a weakened immune system, b/c most of the time, people aren't even showing symptoms when they are already contagious.

 

[CherylDan]

Just count me as one of the many who are waiting to see how this trip turned out!

 

[PIRATEGIRL007]

I promise I will finish the report tommarrow. Work has been so hectic I've been doing good just to keep up with the pace. By midnight EST Sat I will have everything posted. Thanks for everyone's support.

To all who have wished me well, thanks I really appreciate the good thoughts. I am all better now, too.

 

[THE HAT]

whoo hooo we will know tonight....though i do think i might have fig it out
happy writing pirategirl!!! glad to hear you are feeling good now!!!

 

[hentob]

I promise I will finish the report tommarrow. Work has been so hectic I've been doing good just to keep up with the pace. By midnight EST Sat I will have everything posted. Thanks for everyone's support.

Heck on work We're waiting

 

[VanniGirl]

YAY!! An update is on the way - glad you are feeling better now

 

[PIRATEGIRL007]

Day 8: December 11th – The last straw

Saturday night was a pretty restless night for me. We were up and down all night, and didn’t get much sleep at all. I spent my hours awake trying to decide whether to go ahead and go to the ER or if I was just wimping on a little sore throat. As you can tell by now, I don’t want to give up on the Disney Dream, but it became “enough is enough” about 6 am. I awoke scared because I was having problems breathing again. My throat was completely swollen shut and I headed for the bathroom area to attempt a warm salt water gargle to open it up a little. By now Chad has taken the litocain solution because it is not helping and we have a feeling I may have a mild allergy to it. Each time after I use it my throat has been getting worse, so warm salt water is the only option left. Chad woke up and checked on me a few times, but stubborn me swore I was ok and sent him back to bed. I spent the next 3 hours in the bathroom and lying in bed trying to drink/gargle/spit. I had a full blown case of the “glue” mouth and nothing was easing it up. At 9:30 am I decided to try to call the doctor again, while trying to be as quite as possible; because the least I could do for Chad was let him get some sleep after this disaster so far. This did not work out because I had almost no voice whatsoever. I was screaming into the phone and the receptionist still couldn’t hear me. I woke up Chad at 10 am and signed to him what was going on; he called the dr. and set up an appointment to come back out to the room again. He was not going to let me get away with not seeing a doctor for another day and was very concerned because my skin had taken a yellowish tone.

By now we were deciding on trying to get a flight back home today, a quick check with the airline and we couldn’t get a flight home until Tuesday afternoon and at quite a pretty penny, too. Our original tickets were for Wednesday, so there was no way I was spending that kind of dough to get home 1 day earlier. Within 15 more miserable minutes and some frantic calculations, I decided I definately wanted to go home. It would be cheaper to drive home than have the doctor come out again. Home is in Virginia a good 12+ hour drive. I wanted to go see my own doctor and be miserable in my own house for a while before I had to return to work at the end of the week. Only one problem with this plan was we didn’t have a car. I started looking thru the UoG and phonebook for rental car companies. We live in a relatively small city and rental places are limited. Every company we contacted didn’t have a car for 1 way travel. I finally got a hold of Hertz and they had a car. We reserved it and I contacted the front desk. Chad called the doctor back and cancelled my appointment. We were checking out 4 days early. It was 11 am by now, normal checkout time. Chad and I frantically started throwing clothes into our suitcases and called my cousin at home to get directions on how to get home. I hopped in the shower, and we were packed and ready to go by 11:45 am. World record for us, but I was ready to go!

Of course when we arrived at the front desk it was absolutely packed, I stood in line to check out since the reservations were in my name and Chad worked on getting a cab to take us to the airport. The great CM at the front desk looked taken aback by my state but was very helpful and immediately got us checked out and on our way. The line for concierge services was huge and I had dinner reservations that evening and reservations for breakfast at Cindy’s on Wednesday that needed to be cancelled. I couldn’t stand any longer as I was too exhausted. I decided that I would try to call 407-WDW-DINE asap to cancel the ADR’s. As soon as we stepped outside the skies opened up and it started to pour down rain. Good, the weather matched my mood: miserable! Bell services called a cab and about 10 minutes later we were on our way. I have never ever ridden in a cab before so this was a first for me. I always had heard that cab rides were expensive, but I was intrigued by the little timer/counter thing. There are literally only 2 cab companies in the city we live in and you don’t see them in use often. On the way to the airport my cousin read me directions from the internet and I jotted them down just in case we got lost on our way home. Since I still wasn’t able to say more than a word at a time I knew calling dining to cancel my ADR’s was out of the question, so I texted the ressie numbers to my cousin and she called and took care of canceling. By the time we arrived to the airport our little cab ride was nearing $50. Our cab driver pulled up and asked an airport attendant where the Hertz counter was and the attendant said that Hertz wasn’t located at the airport, which puzzled me. That is what the Hertz people had told me, I didn’t understand what was wrong now. Since we had already spent $50 and were at the airport, Chad and I were a little skeptical about the attendants’ directions so we went ahead and got out of the cab and collected our luggage. We entered the airport and searched for the rental car counters. We luckily found them and Chad settled me in with our entire luggage as he went off to find Hertz. Chad wasn’t gone 2 minutes and I saw him coming back and waving at me to look out the windows. Exactly behind me was a Hertz shuttle to take us the office. Yeah! This was the best luck we had all day. We boarded the shuttle and in less than 5 minutes we arrived at Hertz. We were greeted with a small line so I made a beeline for some chairs and tried to stay alert while Chad got our car. I felt like we were at Hertz forever. I sat and contemplated how long before we would arrive home and hoping that our ER’s 25 minutes guarantee would be still in effect. A really nice salesman that was working at the counter for timeshares came over and tried to talk to me, but he kept looking at me like I had two heads. It must have been when I opened my mouth and croaked “going home and sick” that scared him. By 1:30 pm we were all packed in the car and ready to go. Hertz had also given Chad a map and directions to get out of Orlando, which turned out to work quite well. The car we got was a Mazda 6 and it was really cute and I would have probably enjoyed it if I weren’t so sick. I tried to keep my eyes open and help him, but it was getting harder by the minute. By the time we were out of Orlando I was laying down trying to sleep. I didn’t get much sleep and since swallowing was still out of the question, I was back to spitting in a bottle.

It continued to rain as we drove thru Georgia and Chad stopped to get a bite to eat. McDonalds never looked or smelled so good to me, but there was no way I could eat anything. My grumbly tummy would have loved some, but I kept praying I would just make it home to the hospital and maybe tomorrow I could drink and eat again. My neck and back were so stiff and painful that I couldn’t get comfortable and when I was able to sleep it was out of pure exhaustion. My ears were hurting again and my neck swollen, so laying my head down in any position wasn’t all that great anyway. We drove pretty much straight through in the rain. Nearing South Carolina Chad’s mom called to check on us and reminded us to be careful as the mountains on the way home were expecting snow. I though “just great, I’m never going to get home”, then we contemplated heading to the hospital in Asheville instead of home. It’s only about 1 ½ hours from home, so at least we would be closer than in Orlando, but luckily as we neared the NC mountains it was still rainy and in the upper 30’s, so no snow. We didn’t stop again until we were on the TN side of Asheville at a rest area. By now it was midnight and cold. While Chad took a break I wondered around (ok really I was just standing outside, spitting, which meant no bottle, gross but it’s the best I could do (it’s funny how small things could make me so happy)) and it hit me that I hadn’t had to stop to use the bathroom once all day. For me 1 1/2 hours is a small miracle, much less 10+. I mentioned this to Chad and it clicked that my tight skin and yellowish tint could have been a sign of dehydration. Like I didn’t have enough problems already! I hadn’t had more than 6 oz water the day before and no more than 2 oz today. I climbed back in the car and tried to sleep some more and wondered if the hospital beds were going to be comfortable.

We arrived at our hospital at 1:15 am. Not bad, that means we made it in less than 12 hours. Chad must have been speeding when I wasn’t paying attention. Upon arriving in the ER I checked in and had to attempt to describe my symptoms while Chad parked the car. I was yelling as loud as I could and I sounded like a whispering croaking frog. The nurses don’t understand my simple pitiful sign language and luckily Chad arrived to interpret. My temperature was 100.1, but I felt quite good at this point, fever wise, I am pretty confident at times during the drive it was higher. My blood pressure was a little high, but not enough for them to be really concerned. After about a 10 minute wait I was taken back to a room. My mom (a former nurse for 20 years) arrived to check me out and wanted to of course know the story as well. She was happy to hear it from Chad, no talking for me! Another nurse arrived and kept asking me questions again. Chad tried interpreting, but for some reason they wanted to hear me try to croak and sign it out instead. The doctor finally arrived and (surprise) here come the questions again! After a quick check of my ears and my throat, some aaahhh and hmmm- ing, the doctor diagnoses me with a tonsillar abscess. He gave me a shot of antibiotics and a shot of steroids. Unfortunately the shots could not be given in my arms like I hoped (think lower....much lower) . Like most people I am not fond of needles and wasn’t to keen on getting stuck multiple times, but I was in so much pain and agony that they could have said they would have to give me 10 shots and I would have been all for it. I start to feel a little better and woozy after a few minutes.

Then the doctor breaks it to me that they are going to stick a needle in my throat and drain this thing. Excuse me? Needle IN MY throat?! I don’t think so. This guy is nuts. So he sends in a tech that keeps spraying this cold, nasty tasting numbing stuff in my throat. It tasted like bananas. I hate bananas. They are the second worst food on the planet, right behind mayonnaise. So the tech, Chad and my mom keep laughing at me gagging over the bananas spray. I’m glad its funny to someone, sure isn’t to me! After 20 or so minutes the doctor comes back in with a huge needle and syringe. I am looking at it thinking this guy has lost his mind if he really thinks that I am going to let him poke around my tonsils with that. Really he needs to be admitted to the Looney-bin. I guess the medicine (still don’t think it was antibiotics, but hey it was good, so I won’t complain) must have kicked in, and my defenses were worn down, so I caved and prepared for the worst. Another squirt of the rotten banana spray and we were ready to go. Supposedly the rotten bananas were to numb me, well I hate to break it to the doctor, but he might want to try another fruit, the bananas suck.


WARNING: THE NEXT PARAGRAPH OR SO ARE A LITTLE GROSS, IF YOU ARE SQUIMISH, PLEASE SKIP THIS, AND IF YOU STILL READ IT, YOU CAN’T SAY I DIDN’T WARN YOU.





I felt the needle stick in and wanted to scream (and punch the doctor). He drained a near full syringe of puss and infection out of the abscess. I only caught a glimpse of the syringe about 90% full of neon almost glowish yellow fluid, but Chad and mom were looking quite green. It takes quite a bit to make my mom sick, so I was shocked. As soon as the doctor pulled out the needle I began gagging and spitting massive amounts of blood, which the doctor seems to think was normal. I quickly filled two bedpans with blood and a dark brown (almost black) gooey looking spit mixture before it stopped. The vomiting that followed was certainly unpleasant and still full of blood, but deemed normal. This only lasted for about 5 minutes and I was finally given some water to rinse and spit some more. This spitting stuff is getting old and fast. I am ready for this to be over!







FOR THOSE OF YOU HEEDED THE WARNING, WE ARE NOW RETURNING TO OUR REGULAR SCHEDULED PROGRAMING, SO READ ON!

The doctor sent me home with some pain pills, high dose antibiotics, and some steroids. I was particularly happy with the rules the nurse gave me which was lots of rest which included no housework! I also had strict orders to return to the ER asap if I began throwing up blood again. We walked out of the hospital at 2:45 am and were greeted by falling snow with the ground already covered. Chad was relieved that the snow held off until now and took me home and put me to bed. It was the first night I was able to sleep more than a few hours at a time in a few days and it was just great.

So this is how my long awaited once in a lifetime Disney in December trip ended. Horrible I know, but I was just happy to not be admitted to the hospital and I had hope that when I woke up the next day I would be better. I think of all the things I wanted to and planned to do and didn’t get to and it makes me want to cry. So are you waiting on the happy ending I promised so long ago? Its coming,I promise! Tommarrow.....

 

[tweedlewtwinsmama]

Wow. What a trip. I don't think I would of made it through the needle in the throat thing. I didn't even like getting an epidural when in labor with twins. More power to you for being such a brave soul. Hope your next trip is happy and healthy .

 

[THE HAT]

oh my...you poor poor thing!! i can't even imagine, but i am sure you would have taken anything just to feel better!! glad you made it home b4 the snow fell!
really looking forward to the happy ending that awaits us!!!!!