The last few days of our New Zealand leg, Grant started to get another bout of rash spreading now on both legs. We had already booked an appointment to be seen the day after arriving in the states, but the pain was starting to affect him to the point where it was hard to walk comfortably. I tried to encourage him to go to the ER after our dinner with his coworkers, but he just wanted to make it back to the states. However, he woke up that morning around 4:15 feeling warm and in more pain. I was getting seriously concerned as we had a long day ahead of us with two flights and I was worried that if we weren’t seen something serious could happen. My medical brain was flashing to the worse case scenarios (aka getting septic while flying over several thousand miles of ocean!) and needless to say I broke down. 

Grant finally agreed to go to the emergency room where we spent the next 5 hours trying to be seen. They got us in quickly to triage and take some blood, but anyone who has been to the ER knows it’s a whole process to be seen. We were quickly encroaching on our time to head to the airport and were coming up with options depending on what the bloodwork stated. Thankfully, the infection hadn’t spread to the blood so we were able to get some antibiotics to take with us and head to the airport. Needless to say the next 24 hours weren’t the most comfortable for Grant sitting in a cramped seat with both knees in pain. He was asked while getting off our connecting flight in Fiji if he wanted to use a wheelchair, but declined (we often debate which one of us is the most stubborn).  

Once we arrived back in the states, Grant went through a couple of doctor visits to finally get an answer on what was going on. The urgent care doctor in San Diego was frustrated that no one in this entire saga had thought to drain and culture any of the infected sites. She was concerned that with all of our travels he may have picked up something exotic as this seemed worse than any other MRSA infection she has seen. She prolonged the course of Bactrim he had been started on and told us we should have the results within a couple of days. Thankfully, we finally had an answer with the results: MRSA. Grant may not have enjoyed me having to continually push out any infection left within the wounds, but needless to say it has been great practice for me throughout this experience. 

Although it has taken a couple of weeks and a change in antibiotics due to finding out he’s allergic to sulfa medications, we have finally cleared the infection and he now has the scars as a lovely reminder. Though this may have not been the best way to end the trip, we are thankful that this was the only serious medical issue we encountered over the last few months.