On Baby A's birthday, the c-section surgery went as planned. I walked into the OR around 9:30am and was pushed out around 2 hours later. W was instructed to wait outside while the team was getting me prepared for anesthesia. He then got invited to come in and sat next to me while the team worked on getting Baby A out of me 😂. W was a good DJ and Baby A was born while Taylor Swift's Shake It Off was being played. So...did I feel any pain during this life-changing surgery? No, I didn't. I had a spinal block. I never felt any type of pain during the surgery. Getting the anesthesia injected - however - was the most uncomfortable part of the surgery. There was a lot of pressure. I felt my back being pulled or pushed, or something. It just felt very uncomfortable, not painful, but very uncomfortable. It was also hard to try leaning toward the source of that uncomfortableness. Learning to relax while being uncomfortable was a very hard thing to do. But it was necessary. Once it...
Last Friday, we had an unexpected road trip to Eugene! Eugene is not exactly a far drive from Beaverton, but if considering the fact that we drove 5 hours round trip mainly just for receiving the 2nd dose of COVID vaccine, then it became a "long trip." Long story short, our provider (Kaiser) and OHA didn't realize we were in limbo where neither system had our names in. We were first told to follow instructions to schedule for 2nd dose appointments online. That didn't work out because policies kept changing every few days. Then, we called to find out our provider no longer accepted scheduling 2nd dose appointments online and told us to wait for them to contact us. A week passed and we didn't hear back so we called back, but only just to find out they were no longer giving out 2nd doses period. It was then, our provider told us to call OHA to schedule for 2nd dose appointments instead. We called OHA. OHA told us our provider should give us the 2nd dose of the vaccine because they gave us the 1st dose, plus our demographics didn't match OHA's priority list. After hearing that our provider told us to schedule appointments with OHA, OHA's response was...our names were not in their system and they redirected us to CDC for guidelines. A CDC specialist reached out to us and was surprised we still couldn't make an appointment for the 2nd dose even though it was a week past the recommended guideline. She said we should get the 2nd dose asap and urged us to follow up in-person with our provider (honestly I was like "yes I know but everyone we spoke with from the provider's covid vaccine hotline told us they couldn't help us" 👀), though she admitted there wasn't much she could help us with. After hours of phone calls to multiple agencies and an in-person visit to Beaverton Medical Office, finally, we were scheduled for a next-day vaccine appointment in a location 2.5 hours drive away from our home, 5 weeks after the first dose. This was the only location within Kaiser's network that still gave out 2nd dose vaccines. Caution: this post was written after long hours of frustration, so there may be some rants!
So, last Friday, we took I-5 and headed south for Eugene at 8:45am. The traffic was nice, and the weather was great. Well, I actually slept most of the way to Eugene, thanks to Hubby's much-improved driving skills 😆 Our appointment was at 10:50am. We were told to arrive no more than 5 minutes early. We arrived at the parking lot at 10:40am. Waited 5 minutes in the car and readjusted our masks. We walked into the building at 10:45am.
When we first walked through the doors, I was looking for something like a front desk but what I saw was more doors! We opened the door that was immediate to the left side of the building upon entrance and it turned out to be the right door (now I don't remember what was written on that glass door, perhaps short term memory loss could be a reaction to the vaccine, or it's just me, probably just me 👀). There was a medical staff sitting behind a small desk just a few steps behind the door. She checked our names, temperature, and had us fill out a page of info (a short list of questions, we answered no to all). To be honest, even at that point I was worried she might say something like "I don't see an appointment made for you." 😕
The medical staff double-checked with us that we were there not for the first dose, but for the second dose? We weren't surprised by her confusion because the appointment name was "first dose" but we were really there for the second dose. This appointment was made by Kaiser through the Kaiser COVID vaccine hotline after they realized we were in limbo for completing the vaccine series. We looked too young and our medical records showed no pre-existing conditions, and we've been working from home for more than a year. Even if we were there for the first dose, that was still quite ahead of the newest policies and guidelines on priority criteria.
After the medical staff checked off our temperature, we were directed to check-in at the kiosks behind her. Out of precaution and kind-of-like-a-developing-habit, I picked up a disinfect spray bottle next to the kiosk and sprayed it onto the kiosk screen because I didn't want to just touch the screen without knowing if it's been wiped. I was just about to wipe the screen with a tissue, a nurse quickly grabbed the bottle from my hand behind me and said "no, don't do that" and grabbed a tissue and wiped off the screen quickly while saying something like "it's been disinfected already, we disinfect it after each use" and went on explaining the liquid could leak through the gap between the cases and damage the kiosk. I replied I did what was out of habit to disinfect before touching any touchscreen and sanitize hands right after. His response was "we disinfect it after each use, there's no need for you to disinfect it more and that can really damage it." I'm not sure what the key phrase was, or the tone, but I felt like I was being scolded for doing something horrible. So I said nothing else and waited until he was done wiping the screen then entered my information on the screen.
During the short 15 seconds or so of entering my personal info, I felt I was being watched by the same nurse that wiped the screen. Then, there was a question on the screen that asked if I wanted an appointment slip and whether I wanted it by print or email. I pressed "yes" and was just about to proceed with choosing my preferred method, the nurse showed up from behind and said, "it's just what you see on the screen, you sure you want it?" I was startled by his sudden approach (like really, and I was already suspecting that I was being watched just a few seconds ago). I said, "yes, I would like a copy for record-keeping." He even told me to press "back" to get back to the previous screen as if he thought I pressed "yes" unintentionally. It was as if he decided for me I didn't want it. Then he re-emphasized "it's just what's on here" (referring to the screen) and asked if I still wanted a copy of the appointment slip. I said yes and proceeded with the screen. The nurse then said, "well, then you press yes and it'll ask you if you want it by email or print." My preferred method was by email, he saw me press email. Without giving me seconds to read (or better yet, leave me alone to finish my check-in in privacy), he said it's going to ask me to create a password blah blah so only I can access this in the future blah blah. He stood by me and stared at the screen while I stared at his reflection on the screen that was prompting me to enter a password. I did not like the idea of him looking at me entering a password. I pressed "back" and went with the print option instead. The fact that he interrupted me and triple-checked if I wanted a copy was - as if he questioned whether it was my interest to get a copy of it, despite that the machine asked me if I wanted one. It was in my full intention to get a copy of that for my own record-keeping, not that it should be explained to anyone? If the nurse was trying to be helpful, I only felt being treated as if I didn't know how to check-in at a kiosk, or that I didn't know how to read.
At the time, I was thinking "duh, it's not my first time at Kaiser, and I can read just fine, and why are you even here watching me pressing buttons here??" But now, 3 days later, as I write down my experience here I just realized it took me this long to process because, on one end, I felt like I was doing something I wasn't supposed to do while on the other end, I didn't want to voice my frustration because I was afraid that could somehow jeopardize our appointments (a delay, or be asked to leave).
After I was done with the kiosk, I walked toward where Mr. L sat and we waited until our names were called. I was up first. The person who administered the dose for us was a retired surgeon. His name was Tom. Tom brought up an interesting research article he had just read about. It was an article published by JAMA on associations of reactions to Moderna vaccine by blood type. The study found people with "O" blood type showed the least likelihood of reporting severe reactions to Moderna's COVID vaccine. Tom and I chatted about this study and at one point I told him "Hey, that's cool because I have O blood type!" Tom's response was "Oh yeah? Then you probably won't have anything to worry about" and he injected the dose with one hand, without warning, while his other hand was still on his laptop. I froze and he kept talking on and on about the study. I guess a major difference between surgeons and non-surgeons is precision with lightning-fast speed. Then it was Mr. L's turn. Again, speedy, precise injection without countdowns or warnings whatsoever. Mr. L was in awe of Tom's skill and talked about it for days with me and friends/families 😂
Following the instructions per Tom, we waited 15 minutes just outside the room where we received the dose. This was just in case either one of us developed severe allergic reactions. Since we showed no signs of allergy toward the vaccine, we were set to go!
We went straight to a Chinese eatery in the downtown area for lunch take-out. The eatery didn't have dedicated parking, but there was metered parking. One funny little thing was that we finally used the "emergency fund" (aka a ziplock bag of coins) my good friend Brittney gifted many years ago. I mean, it was around $5 in coins. Brilliant! It was a "carwarming gift" 😂 She said "you never know when you need cash to pay for parking" haha boy wasn't she right?! Anyway, we found this place on Yelp. The pictures drew us over. We decided to try their Shanghai pork buns! We got 1 order and it included 6 of their juicy pork buns. While waiting for the buns to get ready, we took that time as our opportunity to walk around the park block.
Just about a block away from Bao Bao House, there was a small square filled with 4, or 5, food carts. One of the food carts was Conscious Coffee. I thought the cart was very cute and was feeling thirsty so I got a 16oz herbal tea (mint). It was refreshing! I only took one sip and saved the rest for the picnic later 😄
Oh and I saw this funky pineapple-looking pole next to the food carts. I wonder if there was any story behind the design of this fun shape?
With our fresh buns (and my refreshing iced herbal tea), we took off to Skinner Butte Park for a picnic. Next to the parking lot where we parked, there was a group of people preparing for a protest...? We saw many held signs and posters, also heard people shouting something, but couldn't make out what they were saying. We noticed most of them were on bikes. Some brought children and pets. We continued walking alongside Williamette River, in the opposite direction of the parking lot, and eventually found some dry wooden table and benches to have our picnic at. The buns were yummy. JUICY was all we could say about them. We each had three and we were surprised they were actually pretty filling more than they appeared!
I took notes of our reactions just for the sake of it. Also because we're TTC so I wanted to document symptoms in case we want to look back on something.
Timeline of our reactions to the vaccine
1st dose received on February 11th, around 5pm
Mr. L: Fatigue for 2 days. Intense sore arm for 3 days, noticeable pain even just by typing on a keyboard. Soreness lessened by Day 4. The injection site was a bit swollen for a few days. No other symptoms.
Me: Sore arm for 2 days. I could lift my arm without discomfort by Day 3. No other symptoms. My period flow was normal. I was on Day 2 of my period when I received the shot. Ovulation happened per usual according to the OPK test strips.
2nd dose received on March 19th, around 11am
Mr. L: Sore arm for 4 days. Started developing a low-grade fever after dinner on Day 1 (highest detected at 99.8°). The fever broke by the time he woke up from a nap on Day 2. Chills and hot flashes on Day 2. Fatigue from Day 1 to Day 3. Mr. L believes his reactions lasted around a week even though symptoms like fever and sore arm were gone by Day 5. He said he was feeling more tired than usual up until Day 7.
Me: Felt fine on Day 1. Sore arm for 4 days. Had a hard time catching sleep between 2am and 5am on Day 2 because I started having chills. Fever on Day 2 (highest detected at 102.2°). Chills throughout Day 2. Headache in the afternoon on Day 2. The fever broke by 10pm on Day 2. Fatigue from Day 2 to Day 3. I think, in total, the reactions lasted about 4 days for me. Period came and went per its usual timeline. Ovulation happened per usual according to the OPK test strips.
3/31 updates: we feel fine and detected no other reactions to the 2nd dose!
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