So the morning dawned earlier for me than I’d like when I discovered, to my deep dismay, that I seemed to have caught the same bug as Stephanie is just getting over. This time I’m sure it’s not the altitude which is a problem as we’ve been here now close on a week.

At least this time we had more of a plan.  Sherri, one of Mum’s American friends had been kind enough to send us the info we required to get the situation sorted out.

“Go to an Urgent Care facility” she said, They’re one step down from the ER, but you can see a doctor and get fixed up immediately. It’s usually quicker as well. It seems our wonderful experience at Memorial Hospital where we walked in and were seen literally straight away, is not the norm.

Sherri had also very kindly sent me a list of facilities in Colorado Springs. So we went along to the second one on her list, “Premier Care” on Voyager Boulevard and paid our $114 to see a doctor. Dr Rob gave me a thorough examination, declared that I had a virus and gave me a prescription for the same stuff Stephanie had got plus a different drug instead of the Imodium. That turned out to be on the restricted list. Always good to know I’m getting the hard stuff!

I’m hoping to get over this rather quicker than Stephanie, indeed the medication is controlling the symptoms very well, I just feel knackered! But hopefully this time it won’t disrupt the remaining couple of days here too badly.

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The final must-do of the day after the night before was to try and finish dealing with Direct Line. What a palaver. The previous evening, they were insistent that they would only pay if a) I took Stephanie to hospital and b) I phoned them from the hospital, with the hospital’s fax number and complete contact details for their insurance department so that they could fax release forms over to the hospital us to sign before we left.

Unsurprisingly, no-one in the ER at 3am knew the fax number, and there’s no way the skeleton night staff would have time or capacity to deal with it. You would think that someone at Direct Line might possibly have the half a brain cell required to work that out. But no, they had to be told.

As a compromise, after a lot of too-ing and fro-ing, they agreed that they would email me the documents and I could get them signed and faxed back to them. They were also dubious that they would be able to get a medical report as she was treated as an outpatient – in which case, of course, they would not guarantee to pay.

We couldn’t fax from the hotel, Amy, star customer services manager, invited me into the back office to see if we could work out how to make the fax machine dial internationally. But after about half an hour of pressing all the buttons and resorting to reading the various manuals(!) we had to give up. So we scanned it in and I’ve emailed it. I can only hope it gets there. I specifically asked them to acknowledge receipt but of course there’s been a deafening silence.

I’m grateful my insurance is with someone else, but before I renew I’ll be asking much more detailed questions as I think the ability to call a doctor in what is clearly an emergency is a key requirement.

Note: I know I’m from Yorkshire and therefore tight, but I would have willingly paid myself for a doctor for Stephanie regardless of the cost – if I could have found one! However I misguidedly thought the purpose of travel insurance was to make life slightly easier, not to turn a bad situation into an even more difficult, stressful experience.

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After the night in the emergency room, and a mere 2 hours sleep the next day turned out to be hectic.

I left Stephanie in bed and went down to have some breakfast. Today’s special was biscuits sandwiching fried chicken with country gravy. I have to say I looked at the combination with slight scepticism, but actually it was jolly good.

I’d never had country gravy before so I asked the chef what was in it and he said it was pork (which I would never have guessed). On further investigation later in the day, a lady who was buying it in the supermarket said “you don’t want to know” and on further pressing she told me it was chicken fat thickened with flour. Sounded horrible. Linda then explained that it’s made by cooking your meat in a pan, removing the meat and stirring flour into the remaining fat. Then you add milk and seasoning. So basically it’s just your standard béchamel with the butter replaced by meat fat.

The next task of the day was to get Stephanie’s prescriptions filled and I accomplished this (and gained some more supermarket loyalty points) with my first visit of the day to King Sooper.

Once back, Stephanie had made it out of bed and was hungry. She wasn’t completely overjoyed that I stuck rigidly to the nurse’s instructions and would only let her have water and Powerade post exercise replenishment drink (Gatorade was the alternative allowed drink, but it wasn’t so luridly coloured, so I couldn’t find it on the shelves).

The nurse also said that very weak tea – dunk the bag only 5 or 6 times and drink every 6 hours – cures diarrhoea, and they used to give it to intensive care patients for that very purpose. But Stephanie prefers her tea builder style, so she gave that a miss.

The next item on the agenda was to move rooms. We’d extended the booking here until Friday, otherwise our time on Colorado would have mainly been spent staring at the 4 walls of our hotel room – And worse than that we’d have flown nearly 5000 miles to see Linda for a mere 2 hours!

The new room is great, it’s a disabled room, so everything is slightly bigger for a wheelchair and there are extra rails and the sink is slightly lowered. And it has the most magnificent panoramic view of the Rockies. Amy, the wonderfully helpful customer services manager, shuffled the bookings round so we could have the good room which was lovely of her. The only slight downside is that I’ve discovered that the toilet cistern is leaking onto the floor. No matter, Amy will get it sorted out tomorrow.

Then there was the nightmare of Direct Line to deal with, but that’s a whole other story!

So now after my third trip to the supermarket today the staff have now taken to greeting me personally. I’ve racked up $2.00 extra credit on my American mobile (wonder if it’ll work in England) and $0.12 discount per gallon of petrol.

On nurse Carrie’s advice I have chicken broth and wild rice soup for Stephanie for dinner, but she’s asleep at the moment and there’s no way I’m waking her up if I can avoid it. She has a raging headache now as well – probably lack of food and lack of sleep, so she’s best off asleep. I also have a headache, but am quite enjoying the respite, now she has anti-sickness stuff and anti-cramping medicine I can relax a bit more. As Stephanie would say, I don’t do sick people, so the last few days have been quite stressful for both of us.

I’m looking forward to getting on with the rest of the holiday.

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As you might guess from the post title, we’ve had a little trip to the Emergency Room.

My tummy problems haven’t gone away. I took some Imodium on Sunday evening and so didn’t feel too bad on Monday morning. Hence our visit to the golf shop and stop off at AppleBee’s for lunch.

During the afternoon, I realised that the Imodium had worn off and so was becoming a friend of the bathroom again! I managed to feel settled enough for a drive out early evening to the Garden of the Gods but didn’t really want anything much to eat. So another foray to King Soopers for some tatties to bake in the microwave and then back to the room.

We spent the evening looking at the photos taken at the Garden of the Gods and then I read my kindle while Susie played with the photos to set up a slide show on the website. I munched a few crisps to help my salt levels and by the time we got round to eating the tatties, felt a bit queasy. I managed the insides of one half of a potato and then started to feel rather nauseous, with a spot of the old D and V ensuing.

By then, it was 3 days since my little problem had started and Susie was getting very concerned that it was getting worse and I was getting dehydrated. She wanted to call a doctor so she phoned my insurance company (Direct Line) but they said they will only cover the costs if I go to hospital. Which is challenging given the nature of the problem.

After much consulting with the hotel reception, medical websites, the insurers and her Mum, she decided to make a foray to find the nearest hospital and ask them for their opinion. They said I should probably come in, that there was zero waiting time and that they see a lot of similar cases due to the altitude.

I wasn’t quite so sure, as I’d have preferred to stay near the bathroom!

So 2:00 am saw us whizzing up the road to the hospital. Fortunately it was only about a mile away and indeed, there was no waiting time whatsoever. A big relief after the 4 hour wait last time I went to A&E in Reading.

I was dealt with very efficiently. Blood was taken to check to see if I had any major infections (I didn’t – the white cell count was fine) and I was given 2 litres of I/V saline plus anti-nausea and anti-cramping drugs. They said that I either have a bug or altitude sickness – it’s difficult to distinguish in terms of symptoms.

By the time we got back to the hotel and to bed, it was around 5:30 in the morning so we’re both knackered from lack of sleep. Susie more so than me as she carried on with trying to sort out the insurance company after I had gone to bed. She’s been brilliant in sorting things out and in looking after me and I’m truly grateful.

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