Saturday, April 5, 2008

Sick on Saturday

Chris and I are sick :(

I've been sick since Wednesday night; Chris has been sick since yesterday (Friday). Started with me feeling sluggish on Wednesday, then sudden tickle of a sore throat which quickly turned into what felt like razor blades stuck in my throat :P and then a mild fever along with that. I was still feeling so bad yesterday that I had a doctor's appointment scheduled for this morning--thinking maybe I have strep throat and would need antibiotics. But I canceled early this morning after waking up feeling better with no fever and sore throat not nearly as bad. Canceling is a big no-no in Japan (or so I am told) so I hope if we need to go back to the hospital at another time they won't hold it against me for canceling... Besides, why should I pay so much money for a doctor to tell me to go home rest and drink lots of fluids? Which leads me on a bit of a tangent...

Is anyone else jaded with general practitioner medical doctors? We had Kaiser back home, and whenever I would go to the doctor most all the time they would never tell me anything I already didn't know...get rest, drink water, sleep, take time to relax, stress will give you those symptoms, let me prescribe these drugs (which could potentially give you worse symptoms than you already have), etc, etc... And they give you 15 minutes at most and shuffle out to the next patient? And heaven forbid you ask very specific questions to some of these doctors, they will give you a blank stare and give you you the same answers they just spouted out...You would think either they are stupid and don't know all that much besides what pills to prescribe and basic common sense things anyone could find on the Internet, or they will literally get "in trouble" for offering advice beyond what most people should already know. I'm thinking they have to censor themselves...which makes me feel sorry for them in a way. How would you like to quickly shuffle from one patient to the next giving everyone textbook answers to their aliments? Anyone else get annoyed after paying a visit to the doctor? I think hospitals are great for emergency situations...but for general health and sickness...I'm thinking they are mostly a waist. There must be better hospitals and doctors out there that aren't so censored. Maybe holistic/herbalist type medical doctors are the way to go?

Onto other things.

We went grocery shopping a bit ago to stock up on fruits and veggies and other necessities. We came across $80 cherries (8,000 yen)! The picture is below. Who in their right mind would pay $80 for cherries? We did get some reasonably priced pineapple which was very sweet and juicy.