[Lindsey]

What a week! Tuesday I went to work and felt awful. I knew I was getting sick. My cousin and I are the only people I know who get what we call "skinhurt" when we're getting sick lol. It feels like my skin just gets hyper-sensitive and anything touching or rubbing - especially on my back - feels very uncomfortable and almost painful. The closest I can describe is like when you have hair that grows one way, say on your arms or whatever, and you push it the other way and it just feels uncomfortable... that feeling x 10.

Anyways, I got home and tried to go straight to bed, but after sleeping about 5 minutes, Scott woke me up and said we need to take Layla to the vet - she's peeing blood. Our vet thought it was a ruptured bladder and although it didn't look that way from x-ray, we should come back in a few hours after making her drink lots of water to see if urine is leaking. Riiiight.... instead, we drove her to emergency at the small animal hospital at the college in the city. I cried the whole way. Turns out, it's her mis-managed bladder infection gone bad. It's now in her kidneys as well. It is being properly treated now and we should be okay after 6-8 weeks of antibiotics.

The next morning, I had a terribly painful throat. I decided to drive in with Scott, pick up my laptop at the office, and work from home for the day. Then Wednesday night, I woke up at 3 am and it hurt so bad I couldn't swallow at all, and it was painful to even breathe through my mouth. I went to the doctor and he swabbed for strep throat, and said it would take 24-48 hours for results. If it is, I can go back for antibiotics, and if it's not, it's just a virus and I should use lozenges and take Tylenol. I worked from home again and let them know I would also work from home Friday. Thursday night - same thing, I woke up at 3 am. I gargled salt water and it took an hour for my throat to feel well enough to try to sleep again. What do you know, I also woke up at 3 am Friday night! But managed to fall asleep again despite the pain. Now it's 5 am and it was too painful. I just got up and gargled salt water and now I'm making tea with honey.

It is just not letting up! It feels sooooooooo much better during the day. I wonder if it's just because I naturally swallow more and it doesn't get so dried out? I used a humidifier in the bedroom and it hasn't made one bit of difference. The pain is just almost unbearable. I am leaning towards this being a virus, but I am kind of hoping I get a call saying it's strep throat so at least I know what will get rid of it.