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The germs have got me 🦠

Being on azathioprine, influximab and prednisone is helping to control this recent Crohns flare up. But unfortunately they work by wiping out my immune system making me more susceptible to all the bugs doing the rounds. I refuse to stay at home and be held hostage by these meds though- for me they are there to give me my life back, not to make me a prisoner in my own house, so the inevitable has happened and I’ve got a cold. 

‘It’s only a cold’ you might think, but with no immune system to fight it off this cold has made me pretty poorly. Yesterday I couldn’t get out of bed and felt so, so ill. I was coughing and struggling to breathe so I’m pretty sure I’ve got a chest infection too. But I can’t confirm that because apparently even being immunocompromised with a suspected chest infection is not enough to see a GP these days! 

I spoke to the receptionist at the GP surgery this morning who told me that all the urgent appointments for today were gone (and this was at 8.25am, after they opened at 8am). He suggested I ring back at 10.30am for a non urgent appointment. When I asked when these appointments were for I was told the next 7-10 days!! Pretty sure I will either be much, much better or really, really sick in 7 days!! 

So I called the specialist IBD (inflammatory bowel disease) nurse at the hospital and left a message on their answerphone asking them what I should do. She rang back a couple of hours later and told me to stop taking my immunosuppressant medication while I’m poorly in order to give my body a fighting chance at getting better. And that if I felt really unwell I would need to go to either the walk in treatment centre or A&E. 

Why is it that whenever there is a bank holiday weekend I end up getting poorly? It’s just so frustrating that if I could have seen the GP this morning I could have been checked out and given antibiotics if necessary and then spend the weekend getting better. As it stands if I feel worse I’m going to have to spend hours sitting with other sick people in the treatment centre or A&E, picking up goodness knows what other bugs while I’m waiting to be treated there. So I think I will dose myself up with lemsip, get myself another box of tissues and just hope that I don’t end up really sick over the Easter weekend 🤞🏻 

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