Of Sickness and Sinus Irrigation

Yep, I irrigated sinuses today.  And yes, it was rather disgusting. But let me start at the beginning…So around Tuesday night of last week, I came down with some sort of winter sickness, some sort of sore throat turned head cold turned sinus infection.  What that really means is a whole lot of yuk has been inconveniently occupying my sinus cavity now for almost a week.  I hate being sick.   I know everyone does, but for us highly social-active folks, being sick is like a prison sentence, like being banished to a small triangular area between the bed, couch, and bathroom.  Call it the triangle of infirmity. And I really hate taking sick days from work.  Not only does it put me behind on my projects, but it makes me admit, “Yep, it’s pretty bad.  I can’t even sit at a desk.”So today I go to the doctor, which I also hate.  I always feel like they view me with suspicion, like they’re secretly thinking, “She’s not really sick…She’s just trying to get Pseudoephedrine so she can use it to make Meth!” So it turns out I have a sinus infection, but the doctor won’t give me any antibiotics.  Instead, I got some nice spiel about how germs are becoming resistant to antibiotics, “so we really can’t prescribe them for sinus infections anymore, and after all, studies have found that sinus infections don’t clear up any faster with antibiotics than without them, yada yada yada.”  And what does Medicine Woman tell me to do?  Try the neti pot.  What is the neti pot, you ask?   Observe… Here we have some poor woman demonstrating the neti pot on Oprah.  How they got her to do this on national television, I will never know.So yes, I did this today in the comfort of my own bathroom.   It’s really rather simple: in one side, out the other.  What happens is you rather unnaturally pour a solution of salt and water into one nostril.  It then fills your sinus cavity (which is the weird feeling part) and then comes out the other side.I will admit that it did make me feel better, for about 30 minutes.  For a few glorious minutes, I did not feel like I had a machete in my forehead.  The relief lasted just long enough to type out this blog entry.  Now my head is back to feeling like it might explode at any moment. So, that being the case, I’m returning now to my triangle of infirmity, until I get up the nerve to once again use the neti pot on my infected sinuses. Lovely.