I got bitten by the insect hiding in the rattan chair on Sunday afternoon. By Monday morning (27th February 2012), there was a reddish patch on the skin of my left lateral malleolus about 15cm(?) in size and another patch on the underside of my left upper arm.
So I went to see one of the doctors that was on duty that day (oh the perks of working in a healthcare environment), she noted that since it was warm, I should put cold compress on it. She prescribed Augmentin (antibiotics) and Cetrizine aka Zyrtec (antihistamines). Told me to stop scratching the affected area too. Oops. Well, I did scratch the area before. A little too zealously, I might add. But it's so nice to scratch an itchy area. My face will be like the Internet meme below
Honestly I do not like this Internet meme at all. So ugly but I guess it depicts satisfaction or something. That feeling you get when you scratched an itchy spot or when you dig your ears or when you went to pee after holding your bladder for three hours or something.
Anyway, back to my story, so the doc gave me a half-day medical leave too but yours truly didn't go home straightaway. I went to fulfill my craving for Korean food first. I mean, c'mon, it was just a reddish patch (or so I thought). It's not like I was really sick like that time in January. I can still walk. I felt fine. So off I went to satisfy my gluttony lalala. On the way back home in the bus, I felt asleep and hit my head 4 times against the window much to the amusement of the people sitting behind me (I heard them laughing at me...) I forced myself awake and that's when I realised my eyes have that puffy sensation to them which instantly made me go, "Shucks...I am allergic to the antibiotics?" Fortunately, the puffiness went off after awhile and I reached home and slept from 5pm to 9pm. Woke up with a throbbing on the patch on my leg but it was still ok so I wasn't too worried.
Then the next morning (28th February 2012), the throbbing has turned into a dull, throbbing pain but I can still walk without any noticeable limp. I took a photo of my leg before I left for work-
Ohwee...it has turned into a nice shade of purple. I went to see another doctor since it was becoming painful. She gave me a cream to apply. I was thinking that maybe I can take a half-day off again on that afternoon cause it was beginning to hurt but as it turned out, that Tuesday, there was a bunch of Filipinos who came for their medical checkups and I have to do all 20++ of them on my own, with me limping my way through all the xrays. That was only in the morning. By the time I went for my lunch, my ankle has become so swollen and the pain was so unbearable that I cried in the mammo room knowing that there is another bunch of them coming in the afternoon. Oh. Em. Gee. Anyway, here's a picture of my leg taken at 2.07pm on 28th February 2012.
Inflamed! And swollen! Because I was running around instead of resting my foot. The doctor who saw me in the morning came around in the afternoon to see me again and since I wasn't able to rest my foot and keep it elevated, she advised me to apply light pressure on the foot i.e. bandaged it up. Well, it did help me to move easier when I was doing the patients in the afternoon. I wasn't hobbling that much though it still hurts though. Oh it seems that keeping my foot up doesn't help; it's making my foot hurt even more.
I was still taking the Augmentin religiously but actually, I visited my GP that night with my foot all bandaged up-
He told me there wasn't a need for me to bandage my foot up cause it doesn't have any effect on my foot. You don't say, Doc. Anyway, I asked for a jab. He gave a jab. I forgot the name of the jab. I felt nothing after that. So yeah, whatever he gave me has no effect at all (Give me back my $13.50!!). But really, I was just there for the MC but too bad, I could not even take MC the next day cause of another bunch of people who came for their medical checkups. Seriously. The amount of sacrifice a Singaporean gotta do to help Foreign Talents get their Employment Passes so that they can work in Singapore. Oh what an irony! Or shame! Or stupid sacrifice. Or whatever. Nobody's going to sympathise with me so I should stop wallowing in self-pity.
So anyway, the resident Doctor who happened to visit the washroom came by and I showed her my ankle and the next day (29th February 2012), she gave me another painkiller to take. It's Cephalexin and I have to take it every 6 hours. So far, my ankle doesn't hurt anymore. It is still looks grotesque and icky and the left foot has swell up pretty big. I don't know whether it's because I was running around and not resting or because I am wearing those cheap Birkenstock-like sandals in which the straps are constantly pushing through my foot so it's making the blood circulation flow go wonky or it's because of the new antibiotics.
But in any case, I just want to be healthy again :( You never really appreciate your limbs until you are one limb down.
Anyway, I wonder whether it was because of something I ate that causes my foot to become like this. But if that is the case, why is it that only the patch on my foot is affected and the one on my arm is not? The one on the arm is healing pretty nicely.
Oh well, I just hope the antibiotics will do its work. I don't wanna stay in hospital and get antibiotics through IV drip. No fun. I'm just going to do a picture collage to help me get a better idea of how 'pretty' my foot looks like through this episode of Cellulitis. There's always a silver lining in every dark cloud so I'm keeping my hopes up. However, there are paranoid scenes playing at the back of my head....Well, I shall not go there.
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