We read about this spot in a tour book of the island of Hawaii and knew that we wanted to find it. It is a natural swimming pool by the ocean that is formed by volcanic rocks. It is fed by warm water from steam vents and cooled by the influx of ocean water. It is the lovely warm temperature of 90 degrees. Yes, like swimming in a bath tub! We spent two idyllic hours floating and relaxing. "This is heaven", we thought. We reluctantly got out and towelled ourselves off as it began to get dark. As we we were leaving the spot, I noticed a warning sign! "People with open wounds should not swim in thermal ponds because of the rick of bacterial infection". We weren't too concerned as it was after the fact. We just filed away a memory of a "perfect day in Paradise". We were at
Ahalanui on Friday, January 18. We returned to Portland on Sunday, January 20. I returned to work on Monday, January 21. On Tuesday, I began to not feel very well at work and barely made it through my shift. I came home and begged Ken to massage my feet. (I won't let anyone even touch my feet!). I woke up feeling better on Wednesday and went to work. As the day progressed, I began to feel terrible. My head hurt, my muscles ached, and I could not function. My coworker, Rico, was so sweet to push me back to the ticket counter from the gate because I couldn't even walk! Thank you, Rico! Sam came by the airport and picked me up and took me home. I kept thinking, "This is one wicked flu!" I made it through Wednesday night with the help of Ibuprofen. Thursday, I felt a bit better but stayed home from work. As the day progressed I began feeling bad again and noticed that my left leg was very swollen and was turning red, purple, and black. I could not figure out what was happening. It became very painful and I started to worry. (You know, the kind of worrying that you do at 2:00 am). I remembered the warning sign at the thermal pond and really started to get worried. I got up and
Google the place and found out that people had died from bacterial infections that they had contracted here! Now, I am really worried!! As morning came, I told Ken that I needed to go the doctor. When he saw my leg, he was astounded by the way it looked. I took the article that I printed off of the
Internet. Dr.
Rajani took one look at my leg and immediately knew what it was -
cellulitis-a bacterial infection of the skin. He said it was very serious and left unchecked could to into the bone and lead to amputation. I was given a large shot of antibiotics, bottles of antibiotics to continue taking, and a stern warning that if it got any worse, we were to go directly to the hospital. Dr
Rajani read the article and decided to take blood sample to see if they could isolate the bacteria. He said that he could not be certain that the infection had come from there but wanted to proceed with caution. The real trial was to see if the antibiotics would work and some of these bacteria have become resistant to them. Needless to say, I left the doctor's office in shock. I am happy to report that the
antibiotics worked and now after four days of absolute boredom of sitting with my leg elevated, the leg is starting to improve. I have one more day of staying at home with
my leg elevated and then back to work and see it I can take 10 hours of
standing on it. Sam is getting married on Saturday, I am planning on being there!
