Gaijin Perspective

I’ve had such a shitty week. I ran out of my Effexor medication – which is THE most important one. I called ahead for refills over the weekend, and the automated system said it would be available for pick up on monday. well, I went monday and they didn’t have it. it turns out that the pharmacy ran out of 75mg doses. and my prescription reads to take 3 – 75mg pills, for a total of 225mg. but I told them that I don’t care if I have to take 10 pills, just as long as it adds up the total dose that I take. well, they said that in order for them to dispense it in different increments, the doctor would have to change it. ugh! and the doctor is my favorite pal, Dr. Woo (yuck!). well, I decided to wait until wednesday, as I had enough to get me through until then, before I called Dr. Woo, as he has up to 72 hours to respond to telephone messages anyway. and most likely, by the time he responds, the medicine will be in.

so I called the pharmacy at yokosuka on wednesday to see if they got in the 75mg pills. I was told that my prescription was already filled and was sitting on the shelf in negishi. (in hindsight, I now recognize that they didn’t tell me the 75mg was in. they just said it was filled. when I called in the automated line, it made it look like it was filled.) so then I called the negishi clinic wednesday afternoon and they said they had it! (again, they didn’t physically check their shelf. they just saw the original automated notice that said it had been filled). I was feeling waaaaaaaaaaayyyyy too tired that day (I slept ALL DAY) and said I’d go and pick it up the next day.

thursday morning comes and I feel like hell. I missed my Bible study group (again), and had to call off lunch with my friend naomi. because I hadn’t been taking the full dose, and at this point I was completely out of the medication, my body had seriously gone into withdrawals. I BARELY left the bed – only to let the dogs out, feed them once, and go to the bathroom once. in fact, catherine just came in the house to check on me (she knew I was running out of the meds), to find me still laying in bed. I was in really bad shape. and my throat was super sore (I figured I had snored a lot, and I knew I was talking in my sleep), so my throat/voice was really scratchy. just before she came over (like minutes before), I called the clinic to see if they’d let me give my neighbor my ID and pick up my meds for me, since I couldn’t get out of bed. but then the corpsman told me that the medication wasn’t there after all. and he told me I’d have to call the doctor to get him to re-write the prescription.

so as I’m hanging up the phone, catherine walks in. I told her that they wouldn’t allow me to give her my ID to get the medication AND that the meds aren’t even there. she took my ID anyway (she had to go there to get rebecca some medication anyway) and advocated for me. meanwhile, I called and left a very urgent message with dr. woo about the prescription. while catherine was there, the corpsman called the pharmacy and it turns out that dr. woo had just called to fix the prescription, but it wouldn’t be up here until the next day (friday).

so I’m super sick all day thursday because I’m not on the meds. I have a very painful headache all around my sinuses and my throat is sore. I figure it’s from all the snoring and talking in my sleep and stuff. I suddenly decide to rummage through my drawer of meds and found an old bottle with 2 – 150mg pills. I immediately downed one of them. that kind of carried me through the evening.

I decide to do some work on my photos that evening. I get stuck on this one picture and can’t figure out how to get the software to work. so jill happened to be on facebook at the time. I asked her about it and she said she could help me. great! I told her I’d be over there in a few minutes. I grab my laptop and went to grab the car keys, to no avail. NO CAR KEYS ANYWHERE. I tore the house APART looking for the darn things. I checked in every place imaginable. at this point, I’m so worked up about not being able to find the keys that I start to get physically sick to my stomach because I’m light-headed and stuff from not having the proper meds. at this point, the 150mg pill hadn’t kicked in yet. I never find the damn keys and am up all night, just waiting for the daylight so I can do another search.

friday morning comes (today). still no keys. at this point, I feel slightly better, as the 150mg pill has kicked in. however, it is painfully clear that I have some sort of cold, head cold, sinus infection, or something. my nose is runny, I’m all congested, my head is killing me, and my throat is sore. around noon I went up to the clinic to get my meds (in catherine’s car), but they said the driver from yokosuka hadn’t been there yet. he had until 2pm to get there. while I’m up there, I decided to go over to security to see if they could do something to help me with my car situation – either jimmy the car for me or help me get a locksmith. they said they could jimmy the car and that I want to try not to call a locksmith because I guess it will cost me around $100 or so.

I drove home and within about 10 minutes, one of the security guys showed up. he tried to jimmy the car open for about a good 45 minutes. meanwhile, the guy who cleans out the dryer vent shows up at the house. so I run over to the house to put the dogs in the bedroom and let him in. the security guy still can’t get the car unlocked. at this point, he’s trying to open the car with the jimmy thingy by attempting to flip over the door lock to the unlocked position. he’s trying and trying, but with no success. while he moves over to another door to do this, I ask if I can try. within about 10 minutes, I manage to get the car unlocked. I unlock ALL of the doors of the car. I immediately try to pop open the truck (this was where I guessed the keys were), but it wouldn’t open. nice. so I search over the entire car, looking for the spare key. no luck. eventually, I try the trunk button again and it finally works. not wanting to take a chance that it might not open again, I dig through all the crap that’s in the trunk like a mad person! I pull all kinds of stuff out – stuff I’ve been looking for, for a while now. LOL still no keys.

I go back over to catherine’s and tell her what happened and ask to borrow the car again so I can go up to the clinic to get my meds. but I haven’t showered in about 3 days (maybe even 4). so I shower and wash my hair first. my head cold is absolutely killing me. I suddenly remember that I have some sudafed, so I popped a few of those. and I popped some extra of my vitamin C pills, and one of my iron pills. after the shower, I go to the clinic and they finally have it! thank goodness!!! but still no keys!!!

tonight the elementary school up here had a fall festival that was free. so I went with the neighbors and we had a nice time. as soon as I walked out of there, I felt the sudafed stop working. my head is killing me again. and still no keys.

now it’s a little after 10pm, my entire head (temples, eyes, nose, throat, etc) hurts, and I have had one shitty week. and still no keys.

please pray for me.

love,

kristen 😦

p.s. and now i can’t get the stupid “returns” to work on this post to properly separate my paragraphs. UGH!!!!!
p.p.s and this is all in addition to learning about very sick loved ones, and the death of someone i went to high school with. very sad.