A little update is in order...

[My previous post was really written on Tuesday evening, despite the Wednesday timestamp.  The posting delay was due to Blogger sucking at video.]

By Wednesday my throat was a little worse.  And my morning weight had dipped to 137#, which was the lowest since it recovered a while ago (I forget how long) and mostly stabilized in the 140-145 range.  So I think I reached the point where the throat was causing me to not eat and drink enough.  Which was starting to sap my energy.  I called Dr. Schweitzer's office hoping that if I explained the situation I could get taken somewhat earlier than next Wednesday, on a somewhat urgent basis, and the answer was no.  So I decided to try to see someone else.  I called the primary care office where Lorien just started going (on Matt and Alice's recommendation), and was able to get a same day appointment with a nurse.

I was hoping that maybe she could look down with a scope, but she said no, I needed to go to an ENT for that.  She did a strep test, which was negative (as she thought it would be).  Just looking in visually, she didn't see anything that she thought was a sign of a fungal infection.  But I think the pain is somewhat localized, and further down than would be visible.  So we decided to just try taking an anti-fungal anyway (she felt there wasn't much of a downside even if it was useless), and by the time of my ENT appointment next Wednesday, I ought to have some idea of whether or not it worked.  So far I've taken it twice -- anecdotally, I do think I feel a bit better today than yesterday, but there's enough variation that I think it's way too early to conclude anything.

Today I went back for more blood work.  It's not completely normal, but close.  Way better than Monday.  The question is why.

Dr. Wexler's only explanation is that I started taking some supplements, my WBC nosedived, I stopped taking them, it went back up.  I think it's just a coincidence.  I brought in the bottles and showed her exactly what I was taking, and while she couldn't pinpoint anything in particular that she thought was responsible, there was plenty in them that she didn't understand in detail.

We agreed that I'd start taking things again one at a time, separated by a week.

She still doesn't want to do anything about the staph.

We discussed possibly moving up my scan earlier than when it's currently scheduled (end of May), but decided to first see how things go in the next few weeks.

Nevertheless, I think it's time I get of fresh set of eyes at the big picture of what's going on with me, so I am going to go see Dr. Smith in SF.  I spent a long time this afternoon scanning all sorts of paperwork that I have.  It may be faster than getting copies from the various medical institutions, but wow was it a pain.  Our all-in-one doesn't have the most reliable paper feeder for documents that aren't perfect.  And the scanning software doesn't do a very good job recovering from errors.  Eventually I was able to piece everything that I wanted together, but it really made it clear (not that this surprised me that much) that I don't have hardware capable of efficiently scanning a large amount of paperwork, should I for example decide to get rid of the contents of all of our physical file drawers.  I wonder if once Sutter switches to electronic records (in progress and I think is supposed to be complete in a few weeks) if I'll be able to easily access everything in electronic form.

So I'm doing okay.  Sorry if my last post was a little overly negative or alarming.  I'm not really doing all that bad, but I am getting a bit impatient already and just want to get better.

In other news, my new passport came in the mail a few days ago.  It was amazingly fast -- just over 3 weeks total round trip door to door from application mailing to receiving the new passport -- regular non-rushed application, and no kind of express mail or anything.  I was pretty impressed.  Now I just need to get well enough that we feel comfortable buying tickets and committing to travel somewhere.