Spoke too soon!

As is the nature of such things, I spoke too soon :) Perhaps next time I should knock on wood.

It's 4 a.m. and I'm awake, curse of a slight fever and raw throat, courtesy of a sinus infection/cold that just kicked my patootie in. I started feeling the onset late last night around 8 p.m., and by 10 p.m. it was full-on.

I've had chronic sinus issues my whole life, with a record 16 sinus infections in the winter of 2005/2006. It was at that point I went to my doctor and said doc...wtf! Fix me! Faced with several options including sinus surgery, I opted to try a nasal spray and he gave me a prescription for Flonase. Lo and behold the next year my sinus infection problem vanished almost completely. I've been down to only 2 or 3 a year now, max.

However, I've been getting lax on using the nasal spray, and that could be a contributing factor. I generally only use it once every 2-3 days, which for the last couple of years seems to have worked just as well as once a day. But I have to admit in the past couple of weeks I kind of forgot to take it on a regular basis and I think I only used it 3 times. However, the weather here has been crazy as well, and yesterday could be the cause. I went out to get my ID card renewed and wore pants, a long sleeve + short sleeve T-shirt, and a sweater because I thought it might be chilly due to the wind. Before long I was sweating like a banshee, and after a couple hours of that we got home. I immediately changed into shorts + a t-shirt and we went back out to get something to eat from the suvleki stand up by the park. It was windy, and it started cooling off considerably, and by the time we got there I was quite cold...chilly, even. A few hours later...bam.

I can tell when one is coming on. Where other people might feel the symptoms over a period of half a day or so, I go from feeling absolutely fine to full-on sick within 2 hours. The first sign is the tickling in my throat which signals the sinuses draining, then it gets raw, and one side of my nasal passage starts to get stuffy. Within 2 hours my throat is like sand paper and within 4-5 hours I have a fever. Sometimes it's worse than others, but I haven't had a serious case in nearly 4 years now.

Apparently I have a buildup of scar tissue and/or some sort of blockage in my sinus cavity that prevents it from draining like normal. Mucus builds up and acts like a holding tank for bacteria, which causes sinus infections. I've been terrified of letting a doctor probe my nasal cavity because the idea of sinus surgery terrifies me. I have this mental imagery of a plumber with a rotor rooter tool inside of a pipe system, clearing out the blockage. Flonase has worked for me quite well because it acts as a steroid anti-inflammatory, which brings the swelling in my nasal passages down and allows my sinuses to drain properly.

But, I have to admit, I think I may opt for the surgery in the next few years if I can get over my fear of it. It's not that the nasal spray doesn't work...it works great, as long as I use it 3 or so times per week. It's that I am continually stuffy, and as I get older I've been thinking ahead to the time when I'm 65+. Do I really want to deal with sinus problems that far down the road, or do I want to deal with the issue now, while I'm still young and heal up relatively fast?

In either case, this is my first sinus infection in over a year. Getting out of the construction industry helped a lot, mostly because I am no longer around all of that dust. I did have a slight cold last winter, but other than colds/sinus infections, I rarely ever get sick. Just my time of the year, I suppose :)

In either case since I'm up so early, going to get some work done since I'll likely be sleeping this off during the daytime hours at some point today. I have a cup of hot tea brewing, and it's calling my name.