Saturday 10 November 2007

Flu jabs and other things

MS is one of the list of illnesses which demands that you go and get an annual flu jab. Annual because the flu changes every year. I had one last year with no ill effect, so off I went again on Wednesday for this year's dose. The nurse decided that as I was there anyway we might as well kill two birds with one stone and do a pneumonia jab at the same time... one in each arm. The flu jab didn't hurt at all, I think that the pneumo jab might have had a bigger needle as that one did sting a bit. Didn't give it anymore thought and went home again.

Thursday saw another dose of physio. My Physio is very pleased with my progress... he's given me some new exercises and we experimented with one of those big rubber exercise balls... I got one several years ago, just need to find the pump for it now. We agreed that I could try going back to work next week. Just a couple of days with reduced hours, which is exactly what my Nurse said. I had to assure them both that I would follow their advice, as the last thing that I wanted was to undo all the good work and end up back in bed again!!!

After Physio I met a friend for lunch... we had a very nice afternoon, after which I had to go to Asda and pick up all the things that they had missed from our order or given unreasonable substitutes for. Seriously - if you ask for screw cap lightbulbs why would you be happy to receive lightbulbs with a bayonet fitting? It was drizzling a bit when I got there, but by the time I was going home it was chucking it down. Question - with a stick in one hand a shopping in the other how do you hold an umbrella?

I don't know what brought it on, a combination of the after effects of the flu jab (I don't care what the doctors say... there are after effects) and getting caught in the downpour but on Thursday night I was not well. I felt like the first time I took Avonex and had the side effects... all flu-ish. Shivers and aches, temperature the whole enchilada. Passed a most unpleasant night, and felt only marginally better in the morning. Continued to improve through the day... although still quite feverish. The oddest thing was, and most people who have MS will tell you this, symptoms get worse with heat - exercise, hot baths, hot weather... fever; and suddenly I could almost feel my nerves being fried... symptoms that had almost gone away were suddenly back - I had no feeling in either foot or my right hand! Thankfully as soon as the temperature started to go down the feeling came back. Weird, huh?

So, back to going back to work. I'm obviously quite excited. My brain has been slowly stultifying this last month or so... and I'm sure my readers are eager to have something other than my four walls to read about!!!