So a little more than two weeks ago, I came down with a fever. It was nasty - I spent an entire weekend alternating between freezing cold and boiling hot, and I had no energy at all. I also had a cough, couldn't breathe deeply, and had no appetite. On Monday, exactly two weeks ago, I saw my doctor, who said there wasn't much to be done about the fever except to ride it out, and who gave me prescriptions for prednisone and codeine cough medicine for the respiratory issues. Later that day, the fever broke and my energy came back, which made me feel much better. I was still coughing and not breathing optimally, but I figured that would get fixed as I took the meds.

Except that it didn't. By later in the week, I was coughing more than before. I still functioned normally through the week, but by the weekend things had taken a definite turn for the worse. I should have called my doctor on Saturday, but for reasons unclear to me, I didn't. After one of the worst nights of my life on Saturday, where I couldn't sleep because I couldn't lie down - it felt like there was a weight on my chest when I tried - I called my doctor on Sunday morning. He listened to my labored breathing on the phone for maybe thirty seconds, then ordered me to the emergency room.

After my in-laws arrived to watch the kids, Tiffany and I headed to St. Joseph's Hospital downtown. I didn't have to wait long before a nurse saw me - I guess "difficulty breathing" as a symptom moves you up the triage list. They gave me oxygen and albuterol to help me breathe, and took a chest x-ray, which showed pneumonia in my right lung. They admitted me shortly thereafter.

I stayed on an oxygen mask till Tuesday morning, while they gave me more albuterol and started me on antibiotics - vancomycin and levaquin, to be exact. This was my first IV, as well as my first overnight stay in a hospital. I was basically out of it all day Monday, but by Tuesday was starting to feel a little better. I switched from the oxygen mask to the little oxygen tube that hooks into your nose, which at least gave me a little more mobility in bed. By Wednesday, my doctor had me get up and move around some, checking my oxygen levels afterwards to ensure they stayed above 90%. (Normal is about 95%, though anything above 90 is okay - I was at about 85 when I first checked in.) I had a followup chest x-ray on Tuesday night, which confirmed that I was doing better, and which allowed me to be discharged on Thursday. I was sent home with scrips for levaquin, a twice-a-day inhaler, and more codeine, plus orders to rest.

Since Thursday, I've steadily gotten better. I can walk up the stairs in my house now, and yesterday for the first time in over a week I took my dog around the block. I'll be working from home this week, and I'll have a followup appointment with my doctor on Thursday. I'm still taking it easy - I really really really don't want to have a relapse - but after over two weeks of feeling bad, I'm finally starting to feel good. I can't tell you how nice that is.

I don't know what brought on the pneumonia. Maybe I tried to do too much too quickly after my fever broke. Maybe I was always going to come down with it. Whatever the case, I have been maintaining a pretty busy pace here on the blog, and whether that had anything to do with my recent health woes or not, I'm going to try to cut back a bit. There's no point in taking any chances. I've been very pleased with the guest blogging efforts of Martha, Alex, and Greg, and I've asked them to consider staying on as regular contributors for the long term. We'll see how that goes.

So that's my story. They took good care of me at St. Joe's, but it's really not an experience that I'd recommend to anybody. If nothing else, I've learned how much my presence at home means to Olivia, who's clearly a lot happier that I'm back and her usual routine is returning to normal. Though she did apparently enjoy visiting me at the hospital - my bed had buttons to push, after all, and that was a huge attraction for her. But we're all glad I'm not there any more.