When Britt and I were on our trip to North Carolina and Georgia I started to get very weak in the knees. There's been a lot going on in my life lately and I thought maybe it could be my nerves or that I had become anemic like I was in 2002 when I had to have a blood transfusion.

Last Tuesday, after a week of slowly getting weaker, I went to the doctor who told me that I was dehydrated. She also prescribed a couple of antibiotics for an infection that she "thought" I might have and an anti-depressant because of all the stress I've been under. I didn't recognize one of the antibiotics and should have been more careful since I have a lot, I mean a lot, of trouble when I take the wrong ones. But no, like an idiot and because I didn't even feel well enough to consider the situation, I went home and took the three pills with me dehydrated. Her advice for that was to just drink lots of water. She also mentioned that my red blood cell count was high but that we would hydrate and check it again in two weeks. 

Wednesday morning I could barely lift my head. The weakness had increased and nausea had set in. I left a message at the doc's office and she was out but someone was supposed to call me back. I slept all day and did not hear back from her office. 

Thursday morning, weaker still, I called her office again and was told that if I was worse than when I first went in that I should go to the ER. So, P comes home and we spend most of the day at St Vincent's ER getting more blood work and IV fluids. The doc tells me that I'm hydrated but that my red blood cell count is high. Where have I heard that before? She sets me up with a referral to a hematologist which I can't see until Monday and tells me that I should only take a half of the anti-depressant pill and leave off one of the antibiotics. 

Duh, so what does Sharon do? Just what the doctor ordered, almost. Actually, I left off the antibiotics completely but because I wasn't sure if the weakness could still be caused by my nerves I took a half of the anti-depressant on Thursday night. 

Friday, weaker still, I slept all day long. No more pills for me. A friend had advised me what he thought I should do for the depression and I'm starting to think he was right. Anyway, Saturday and Sunday I just tried to get as much rest as I could so I'd have the energy to go to work. At this point I was getting very discouraged since I was basically back to square one this morning. 

This afternoon I went to the hematologist at the cancer center who looked at my red blood cell count and after some discussion sent me to the phlebotomy department where they drained off 450 units (not sure if its's cc's or ml's or whatever) of blood and told me to go the the Florida-Georgia Blood Alliance and donate blood for the next three weeks then come back in to be re-checked to see how often they'll need to bleed me after that. Somehow my body's started producing too much blood and he's going to try to figure out what's causing it without doing a bone marrow test. Ouch!

(Now, here I have to say that there were many people there in a lot worse shape than me since it is a cancer center and it really made me stop and think. My problems seemed pretty insignificant all of a sudden. sigh)

I'm not an easy blood draw under good conditions but with the state of my blood today it took two nurses and four tries to get enough out of me. They got 200 units and it clotted, then blew out two veins so now I have huge purple patches, and finally got another 250 units from the original spot before it clotted and stopped flowing again. 

After just this one time I've already started to feel stronger but I was thinking that with all the trouble they had getting the blood...

A nice handsome Vampire might be just what the doctor ordered and lots more fun!