I'm not dead

First of all, the interview went great and I got the job!! I have over a year to start, which is good since there is no way I can finish up what I'm doing here soon--I've been sick since I got back from the interview. I'll be brief since it hurts a bit to type. My throat hurt when I got back from the interview but I thought it was from talking. Then it really hurt. Like 10 times worse than I've ever had strep before. I finally got in to see someone and got some antibiotics. A week after they were done, I had strep throat again. This time I got on broad-spectrum antibiotics and I really wish I hadn't. Then I had ELP and LP tested and apparently they had been carrying strep for a few weeks and it just wasn't bothering them much. So they got treated too. Then the broad-spectrum antibiotics likely helped me get sick with some enteric bacteria--Salmonella, Yersinia, something like that. When I thought that was getting better, we were just getting started. My immune system is pissed off about this whole thing. It's probably extra mad because ever since we moved here the kids have been getting a lot of illnesses from the new daycare and I've been sick relatively often as well. Apparently some pieces or molecules related to the enteric bacteria are still around and my immune system is freaking out. It's called reactive arthritis, but for me my spine is the only joint that's really affected. Otherwise it's tendons or the synovia around tendons or the place where they connect to bone. For about 2 weeks there I was getting a new sudden onset of pain in a totally different place every couple of days, and I couldn't get much medical help outside of urgent cares, who had no idea what it was, and then my abdomen started hurting and I thought I might die. I never thought it was likely, but it really seemed like a possibility. Anyway, this wonderful primary care doctor had an cancellation and I finally got in, and she didn't diagnose me quite right, but she was on the right path and she got me in really fast to a rheumatologist. At that point, I couldn't drive, I had to wear shorts because I couldn't pull my pants up, I couldn't type with my left hand due to a "sausage finger", and I couldn't chew regular food. TE was going insane trying to take care of me and the kids, and he did a great job considering, but the house was (is) overrun by ants. Finally I got some steroids and I am in pain but I can function. The sausage finger helped because several people at work noticed I was in really bad shape and started offering some help. (Why did I keep going to work? I guess it's just better than being home alone.) Hopefully this will all go away in a few months, after monotonically getting better.