Trip Report "Lets Begin By Taking a Smallish Nap or Two" - A May 2024 Trip Report *COMPLETED*

We got back from our vacation May 18th and I'm still trying to mentally process this trip I debated whether to even do a trip report but decided to do a quick one since it's not like I'll ever be able to forget it LOL. For those of you who don't know, this trip had been postponed many times because of my elderly dog Pippy. We weren't sure whether we would be able to take the May trip but I had to make the difficult decision to euthanize a couple weeks before we were scheduled to leave. He was my soul mate dog and I still feel his absence every day. His loss is incredibly painful and something that I still can't talk about without ugly crying. The change of scenery at Disney helped a little but it didn't last long. If any of you have followed my previous trip reports, you wouldn't be surprised to know that drama usually follows us to WDW and this trip was no exception - but not how I could've predicted. It wasn't family this time!!!!!

When: May 10-18, 2024
Why: originally longest anniversary, then changed to my bday, then our wedding anniversary, then my husband's bday, then a just because
Where: Coronado Springs Resort
Who: Me (L) and the husband (R)

Despite all my careful planning, we couldn't have predicted the unusually hot May weather (one local news station called it "historic") and what was to follow. We hated the effects of Genie+ on the parks. This trip, even my normally oblivious husband noticed the negative changes and commented on it. We still love WDW but it's not the same as it used to be and that breaks my Disney loving heart. This trip was full of firsts, full of surprises, full of tears, and definitely full of memories We didn't have a theme song this trip but a quote I saw on a pin when trading summed up this trip pretty dang well LOL - "Let's begin by taking a smallish nap or two" ~ Winnie the Pooh

 

[LeighM]

I do love all the Disney parks at night but especially Magic Kingdom. I still miss the late night hours, Extra Magic Hours, and everyone being able to stay late instead of only deluxe guests.

This this point, I was NOT the sweetest at all because I was getting hangry.

Has this tree always been in here???

And has anyone ever purchased one of these?!

As we were getting ready to exit the store, we saw the rain coming down. I checked the weather app and it looked like it was going to be a quick hitting storm. We were actually in one of the best places to wait it out on Main Street without be crowded or blocking traffic. A whole lot of people had decided to call it a night. R said he wanted to ride something so Buzz was the attraction with the lowest wait and still close for me to get to Main Street for fireworks. People were already starting to line up and I was feeling annoyed because I could see all of my careful planning slowly disintegrating.

I had to fight the crowds leaving to get this angle of the castle....

Did I mention how much I love this park at night?!

This is one of my favorite pictures from the trip.

Finally we got to Buzz.

Bit of a backstory. Historically, I suck at this ride. I can never see where my laser is pointing and I feel like sometimes it just doesn't work that well. But this time, I had hanger and a working gun on my side. And I beat R so bad at this ride. But he refused to accept it. He said that my score was actually his score and they somehow got switched. When I asked the CM if that was possible, she said no, and then he told me that something must've glitched with his score when the ride briefly stopped. He just would not let me enjoy my first win on this ride and it was just rubbing me the wrong way. It was a little after 9PM at this point, fireworks were starting at 9:20PM, and I was ready to fight my way through the crowds to get to Main Street. But can you imagine what happens next.....??????

 

[LeighM]

If you guessed the husband getting hungry, you would be correct LOL. I told him that the park was technically closed at a lot of the QS places were closed and not taking new orders. He pulled it up on the app to see that I was correct. And he had to eat then before anything else closed during fireworks. Annoyance and hanger were causing some inner turmoil but I was at MK and I was fighting to stay happy. So we placed an order at the only place still taking orders and that was Cosmic Ray's. I was NOT happy because I had already eaten too much gluten and I was starting to feel it, and their GF options were not appealing. But I had already been hungry for a few hours and was totally regretting not having dinner when I wanted and just let him sit there and watch me eat We made our way there.

The food was ready when we got there but it was the same time as the fireworks began. So, despite me being the one to want to see the fireworks show and castle projection, I was the one stuck getting the food while R watched the fireworks from our bad angle. And he didn't want to sit where I wanted to sit so I could be able to see them in case it started to rain again, so I sat at a bad table, eating bad food, not even able to see anything.

This was R's view

And this was mine....

For a man that was starving and just had to eat, he certainly did forget about his food until the fireworks were over. This was the worst thing I have ever eaten at a Disney park. Just awful but the water tasted good The bread was overheated and hard as a brick, the taste was awful, even the fries weren't good.

And something just broke within me at this point. I guess the grief over my dog, the weird health issues I had been having since Saturday, not being heard, being hungry and low blood sugar just got to me and I started quietly crying in my happy place. I have to apologize to anyone that might have been around us at the time I snapped on my husband. I had tears of sadness until he made the mistake of telling me that I should've told him how important the fireworks were to me. That was legit the main thing I had been saying since we left to go to MK. After that, he knew to give me space until I got calmed down. Yall, it took a long time By the time we finished eating, most of the crowds had left and it was just After Hours people. Every ride was a walk on.

I don't know why I love photographing this ride because the pictures never turn out all that well.

Okay, so this one turned out okay

Happy fake fishes

And the ride stopped here and my chance of taking a decent picture of this scene.

Not the best but not the worst. We stopped somewhere to get the popcorn since I was still hungry from the bad dinner. Rode more rides with everything being a walk on.

 

[fractal]

After walking past the Lego store, we had stopped to refill my water bottle and reapply sunscreen. It was really hot and humid but we were surprisingly not have issues. Our tactic of hydrating and spending time in AC shops had been working. We were both feeling comfortable and weren't pushing ourselves. At this point, we had only been at Disney Springs for maybe 2 hours. We got to World of Disney and I was ready to getting my shopping on. However, less than 5 minutes into the store, I got really lightheaded and hot. I was trying to find a quiet corner out of the way but they don't make those anymore, apparently. I asked a CM if there was a place I could safely sit out of the way until it passed. He brought me out an office chair and some cold water. It all got attention from management. Within a few minutes, I was living one of my nightmares being center of attention in a public space. I kept telling them I was fine and I only needed a few minutes until the dizziness passed. I wasn't dehydrated or anything but I needed to be cool. And the AC in the World of Disney wasn't really working well that day. And the CM told me later that they still haven't fixed their roof that leaks and they continue to rely on buckets when it rains. Around this same time, another man was asking for cold water and was sitting down on his walker seat because he was starting to feel dizzy too. The manager seemed to really not like me sitting in a good office chair or something and kept telling me they would bring me out a courtesy chair. With other people in the store starting to have problems, I told them that we had to leave anyway to go check in for our dining reservation at the Boathouse. Which wasn't a lie but we still had some time and if I wasn't the center of attention in a busy store, I probably would've stayed there longer.

R and I walked slowly to the restaurant to see if they could seat us early, which they could not. Because it was so hot, no one was choosing to sit outside so it was making the waits inside be longer. And the lobby area was getting to be overcrowded because no one wanted to wait outside. While we were waiting in the now busy giftshop, we started talking about what possibly could've happened. The only thing we could think of is that one of my new medications was making me sensitive to the heat and maybe I was low on electrolytes. So that little hiccup made me change up my dinner plans. Because my core had gotten overheated while I was waiting for dinner and I did not want to eat anything that would make me hotter. And I was trying to be GF as much as possible so that I could enjoy Pepe's and 'Ohana later in my trip. They would be my cheat meals. The Boathouse has been on my bucket list for the past few trips and what did I end up having to eat?

A boring, overdressed salad. But I did get sodium from it and that was starting to help (in addition to the pickle slice from R's plate) LOL. I broke down and tried one of their rolls, which was really good. The Boathouse doesn't have a GF menu but the manager said they could put these shrimp (blackened? Can't remember now) on their garden salad, which doesn't come with croutons. I had a great conversation with him and it was a highlight.

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R ordered the club sandwich was was very shocked to see how much meat they put on it.

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He wasn't able to finish it all since we were saving room for dessert. I think all of their desserts have gluten and I wanted to try all of them especially their strawberry shortcake, which just sounded delicious. But I was (trying) to be good and went with the something that R agreed to share with me. This generous slice of their wonderful blackberry cheesecake. I would come back here just for their desserts!

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Sorry that we forgot to take a picture before digging in LOL. We couldn't help ourselves once we saw it We could get a 10% discount here using the Disney Magical Extras card, which saved us $5.55. I feel like we have to come back here one more time to truly experience it on a day I'm not feeling off. I can't judge it based on this one dinner. We were getting tired and overheated so we went back to the resort. We got off at the Casitas bus stop so close to our room to pick up our refillable mugs. When we entered the room we say they had changed the welcome screen on our TV to reflect both of our last names. My husband and I don't share last names as I kept my maiden on after getting married because no one back home could pronounce his last name. Mine is very common. But I'm the one who always plans Disney trips so it was always my name on everything and not his. So this year, I called reservations and asked if it was possible to have the name on the welcome screen be my husband's so that he wouldn't be left out on our anniversary trip. I thought the welcome screen with both our first names was going to be all so coming back to the room today and seeing the last names was a nice surprise.

Took some pictures on our way to the lobby.

This has to be one of the prettiest bougainvillea plants that I've ever seen.

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I didn't notice this during previous trips but they have a hidden Mickey using the coins in the lobby fountain.

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Another couple asked if we could take their photo and they returned the favor by taking ours.

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We got our mugs refilled and went back to our room to relax (and R wanted to continue reading that book he brought with him last minute). Some more pictures of the resort:

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And our room was in this building. The quiet pool is on the left. If you go straight towards to back of the building, our room was to the left facing the bus stop. It was a great location!!

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When it got dark, I started to get hungry. So we made our way to the food court. But before I could go get food, I had to go to the main lobby to complain about the overwhelming strong smell of pot that someone was smoking on the path by the lake on the way to the lobby. This really angered me because it was one of the things we were trying to escape from our house. And it's one of the reasons we want to move so bad. We weren't expecting it to happen at a Disney resort. The CM at the front desk was horrified and immediately called security. Now I could go get food LOL. It was very different than the last we stayed here and I was a little disappointed to be honest. But I didn't want or need anything substantial and my body felt like it needed salt so I got the pre-prepped nachos. I didn't want any of the toppings that go with it that were available in the fridge next to the station - one, because I don't like soggy nachos and two, R doesn't like all the toppings.

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This set up was better for us because I liked the cheese dip and R preferred the beef. So we just dipped individual chips in our preferred cup LOL. I also got the side of Mexican street esquites, which I really liked!

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This was such a basic snack to eat but it turned out to be exactly what we both needed. It was now after 10PM and we were exhausted. We got back to the room and went to sleep. Until I woke up overheated again with an awful headache. The room was 66 but I guess the episode earlier in the day made a reappearance. Luckily, the headache and everything else was gone by morning but I had an awful night's sleep. But luckily, the next day was Sunday and we had nothing set in stone until Boma dinner. We had talked about going to Typhoon Lagoon, which I was uber excited to experience for the first time, but R didn't feel comfortable risking it after what happened to me on Saturday (but I later found out he was nervous to try something new and he used me as the excuse LOL). But that's fine, we pivoted and decided to do Disney Springs again, lunch at Pepe, then whatever until Boma dinner. Oh! We also found out that the pool slide was going to be closed for unexpected repairs so that was changing our plans a little bit. We wanted to try their pool slide before it closed for the rest of the week. Could we make it happen?

Mileage walked - only 7.08 miles

Up next - Sunday, May 12th - more Disney Springs and Boma dinner

Geez. Sorry about the issues with the heat. That happened to me once waiting in line for Haunted Mansion. It can get scary.

 

[Swissmiss]

I have the same opinion as you about the DLP version of Cosmic Ray’s - absolutely awful food and I hate eating there

 

[LeighM]

Geez. Sorry about the issues with the heat. That happened to me once waiting in line for Haunted Mansion. It can get scary.

Just wait until I get to Tuesday

 

[LeighM]

I have the same opinion as you about the DLP version of Cosmic Ray’s - absolutely awful food and I hate eating there

I did everything I could to avoid eating at Cosmic Ray's because of the reviews I had heard about it but the husband was NOT cooperating.....

 

[LeighM]

I still had a lot of anger after eating and I was bitter about him trying to diminish my win on Buzz so we had to do a repeat. I beat him again and he had to admit that the second time was a legitimate win. Again, apologies to anyone around us who saw me give him the bird

And the second butt spanking....

Neither are great scores but it was really nice that he got to experience what I usually do. Usually, I'm the one sitting on the right and I've never had great scores sitting on that side of the car. I told him to remember this the next time he wants to roll his eyes at me when I tell him something isn't right with the laser gun.

I still can't figure out where to look on Haunted Mansion....

And it looks like we're still mad at each other (well technically we were LOL) but we were sitting far apart in order to see in front of us

We were going to ride Dumbo (something we've never done) but the seats were wet from the quick rain cloud that went over us.

I think this area is my favorite of New Fantasyland. It just feels so happy. We rode Peter Pan with a 15 minute wait.

Winnie the Pooh had a longer than expected ride. My husband and I are short people. Why did the CM seat us this way???

I couldn't see a dang thing in front of me. However, towards the end I did get to see this big, burly man boppin his head to the Winnie the Pooh song so that gave me a chuckle. Then it was time for a bathroom break in the Rapunzel section since the crowds were gone....

 

[LeighM]

It was around this time that we heard the announcement for the Enchantment fireworks show. So we hauled ourselves to the front of the the castle because I wasn't going to miss yet another fireworks show! This was going to be our only Magic Kingdom day and I wanted to end it on a great note. We got there just as the show was starting.

People in the front were all sitting down (with the exception of one woman) and people were standing in the back. I started off taking pictures with the standing people and then went to sit down next to R. So these pictures may be out of order.

If only that curly hedge was a little bit more to the left

I've seen video of Tokyo Disney parks and how it's common for everyone to sit down. This is the first time I've experienced this in WDW and it was quite nice!

I was glad to have seen fireworks in Magic Kingdom. And it was a great show. But it isn't Happily Ever After. After the fireworks show, I know we rode Jungle Cruise and we were the first ones on our boat! This might not seem like a big deal to most people but we have a history of always getting the last seat, which is the uncovered step into the boat, and it will start to rain on us. So this time, we were able to sit in the front and were actually able to hear all of the Skipper's jokes. It was starting to get late and R decided he was going to be brave and ride Tron. He usually gets motion sickness and avoids coasters and some motion simulators. But we waited until the end of the night in case he got sick. We made it across the park and he entered the line with 8 minutes until closing and it was still at 25-35 minute wait.

I didn't ride for obvious reasons but waited outside the ride so he couldn't miss me. And waited. And then waited some more. By the time we reconnected, the park had long been closed. He didn't know it was going to be as intense as it was. He was glad he rode it but his ride photo showed the point he realized a mistake had been made, which I'll share at the end of this post. We didn't get back to the resort until a little after 2AM and had plans to go to Epcot in the morning. I was really looking forward to the Flower and Garden Festival, since it's my favorite and had a list of all the food I wanted to try. We were very thankful that our room was so close to the bus stop because we were dragging by then. I started to get overheated again and a little girl on the bus took pity on me and started fanning me with her Disney fan. She was soooo cute and adorable.

(Any guesses as to what word R was screaming in this picture?)

Quick After Hours synopsis: I still love these events!! I love being able to experience a little bit of old WDW when you could go to the parks late at night and everything would be a walk on. I don't like having to pay so much for an experience that used to be included in the park ticket though. But I will keep doing these events. So much less stress planning on MK, little to no waits, and I realized all kinds of late that I forgot to get the Mickey Ice Cream sandwich again this trip We had our tiff in the middle of the event but we recovered by the end of the night and we (and the trip) were back on track. Or so I thought.....

Up next - Tuesday, May 14th - Epcot and the nightmare day from HE double hockey sticks (I've been dragging on this trip report because I don't want to remember this day).

 

[Wicked Sisters]

I felt so sad for you missing the HEA fireworks and I am not surprised you felt so emotional. Pleased you got on so many rides and saw the later fireworks though.

 

[LeighM]

Tuesday, May 14th - Epcot Day

Because the trip was confirmed so last minute, we didn't really have time to finalize all of the small details. And this is the day we suffered for it. We were EXHAUSTED by getting back to the resort so late due to After Hours so we ended up sleeping in a little bit this morning. R had decided not to do Guardians because he was still feeling Tron but we still wanted to do more new to us attractions and food (foreshadowing - be careful what you wish for!).

We still got to Epcot before the parks opened at 8:30 and we had a very short weight at the World Showcase rope drop on the way to Ratatouille. We wanted to focus on that and other rides on that side of Epcot before our 11:30AM lunch at Coral Reef. We had never eaten there before and they had just changed their menu to one that appealed to my husband. We had a lunch reservation at 3:30 at Space 220 Lounge but were only planning on eating light appetizers, we mainly wanted to experience the restaurant.

A few pictures on the way to Ratatouille

And I had a bunch of screenshots of the wait times, rides that were down, etc but darned if I can find any of those images in my screenshots folder now. What I do remember is the line being this long when we finally got to Ratatouille at 8:40AM. I understand those near the International Gateway get there first but this is crazy. It was 65 minutes when we got to to main gate. But soon it ballooned to 95 minutes by 9AM because both Frozen and Test Track were down.

It wasn't that hot and humid yet, and we really wanted to ride, it so we decided to wait. But then further up in the queue my body starting acting weirdly with the heat again, and my bladder was insanely overactive. Despite having to leave the queue twice, I still felt like I was going to have an accident before the ride was over. After (yet another bathroom break) I had to go into the Guerlain store in France to test a couple of their perfumes. We decided to leave World Showcase since we didn't want to be too far from Coral Reef. We walked back to the front of the park and taking advantage of some bored looking PhotoPass photographers. And let me just say how much I LOVED those overly large, ugly barges removed!!!

R is modeling one of the neck fans that were purchased from Amazon and the new cooling shirt from Under Armor We had planned on just relaxing and enjoying our time in the parks. We had gotten Ratatouille out of the way and that was our biggest ride must do since we had ruled against Guardians this trip.

It wasn't even 10AM and already we were experiencing the humidity starting to increase. It was calling for rain today and we were really hoping it would hold off until late afternoon so that it wouldn't become people soup again. We stopped and bought a few pins for the Festival. Visiting the butterfly tent is a requirement for us during this Festival.

It's always enjoyable but less so this time. I'm glad R wasn't with me to see that one of the parents was letting their children stomp the butterflies that were landing. I think they got one or two before I they caught the nasty looks I was sending their way.

Butterflies and hummingbirds LOVE pentas. I'm looking forward to living someplace where I can plant them again! One of our military neighbors that just moved always let her cats roam around outside despite me telling her I didn't want them in my yard. The one year I planted red pentas, the hummingbirds went crazy for it. But then her cats would try to catch the hummingbirds. Those cats got sprayed in the face by my water hose multiple times that summer. Now I can finish putting mulch under the tree since her cats are no longer here to scratch it out LOL.

I was lucky enough to catch this shot!

Then we stopped to get this tropical smoothie from Joffrey's. R loved the tropical flavors!

 

[LeighM]

It was borderline scorching so we went to see Journey of Water since it was close to our lunch destination.

I thought this was a cute addition to the park. I'm not sure if it's the best location for it and I don't know how its longevity will be, but it's nice.

We thought the Te Fiti was stunning

There was line for the PhotoPass area and it was moving along at a nice pace until a group of 3 in front of us wanted to take a mini photo shoot. Eventually we were able to get our picture taken.

Now that I'm doing this part, I think we did the Guerlain store in France after lunch. It was hot as Hades so we went to Coral Reef to get checked in.

 

[LeighM]

The AC in here felt fabulous and we didn't mind waiting until our ADR at 11:30, which I think is when they open. While we were waiting, we heard two different families ask the hostess if they could make an exception for their family and get a table next to the aquarium. Both times, she had to say no and explain that the tables there only sat 4 but the seating for 5 is facing it. The Make a Wish father had a horrible attitude about it and tried to guilt her into changing policy. So I don't know why the older vet thought she would make an exception for his group. Pretty soon, we were called first and we got one of the desired tables. Loved it!

Our server was excellent! He brought me the gluten free rolls since they were fresh but they were still awful. I snuck some of the coconut bread instead. We were dragging at this point between not many hours of sleep and then the humidity sucking all energy from us. We both ordered the Grilled Mahi Mahi with coconut lime rice, mango salsa, avocado, and toasted coconut.

And it was excellent!!! The restaurant also gives a 10% Disney Visa discount for lunch. While eating, the scuba diver came by to say hello and show us a shark tooth. I wish I could remember the story the server told us about the diver but it's all foggy now.

I was hoping the R and I could share the key lime tart since I wasn't hungry enough to eat a full dessert by myself but he just had to have the pineapple coconut bread pudding. It was very similar to Ohana's but a little bit more dry, at least for us. I didn't have but a bite or two because of gluten and all.

We were talking about the weather with the server and I asked if he knew when the rain was supposed to start but he said he didn't. He hoped it wasn't early in the day because of it making the humidity so much worse. He brought us each a cup of water to go without us even needing to ask. We get to the exit and what do we see? Torrential downpour LOL. Despite us being dressed for the weather and me carrying around our rain jackets and umbrella in my backpack, R decided to just wait it out after looking at the radar. So I found me a corner, sat on the dirty floor, and enjoyed the AC a little longer

 

[LeighM]

The rain lasted about 30 minutes and when we got outside we were immediately hit in the face but the most miserable hot and humid weather we could've imagined. The rainstorm picked the worst time of the day to come. At this point is when we went back to Guerlain to try the perfume.

We stopped and enjoyed the tea gardens in England. I wanted to do to tea tour but it was just too hot to wait until the next tour.

I wanted to get a picture with Pooh again but the heat was totally baking my brain and this point and I forgot why I had even stopped back here. We decided to make the sad decision to cancel the ADR at Space 220 still in our cancellation window so that we could go back to the resort, take a nap, and come back in the evening refreshed. We started making our way out of the park.

And if you look closely, you can see Goofy with the dandelions. There was a group that set up camp right there so this was the best I could do.

We also went into Connections but there wasn't any merch I just had to have. We went to Club Cool but no pictures. We also went back to the former Land area for more AC in the aquarium. Because when you're getting overheated, there is no better place to sit besides the round room in the second floor of the aquarium.

 

[LeighM]

I don't know why I don't have any pictures of the manatees. In fact, looking back, I don't even know if we had a chance to go to that section. I think many people had the same idea of enjoying the AC

We wouldn't be us without taking too many pictures of the fish!

My phone automatically does moving pictures and you choose what frame you want so these were all really cool with movement!

And I don't remember what any of these fish are but I was fascinated by this white one

Shrimps (I think)

I believe these are the baby cuttlefish

And we HAVE to have many of R's favorite, the seahorse!

By this time we were properly cooled and made our way back to our resort.

 

[LeighM]

This is the part I've been dreading so I'm just going to keep it short. We had a nice nap in our chilly AC room and made our way back to Epcot. My MagicBand kept falling off and a nice woman on the bus gave me an extra band guard. Why did I not ever know these existed and were so cheap on Amazon?!!!

It was after 5PM and it still felt like 99 because of the humidity. So we were planning on taking things slow, spending time in the gift shops (which I wanted to do anyways) and focus on the lighter options at the Festival kiosks, which we still haven't experienced!

We made our way into the park and rode Nemo again since it was a walk on. Then we went to Living with the Land since it had a 15 minute wait, which was the lowest it had been all day.

I like jackfruit BBQ sandwiches but it is nothing like pulled pork or chicken

It was at this point, where I started to feel off. My left foot was starting to go numb. And I don't mean like pins and needles when you're foot goes to sleep. This was like the cotton feeling you get with Novocain and it was working its way up my leg. When I looked down at my feet to see what was happening, both of my legs from my feet up to my knees had started to swell to twice it's size. All in the space of 10-15 minutes. I was fine before I got onto the ride. When we got off the boat, I asked where the first aid location was. My numbness is my leg was getting worse so I walked as fast as I could to the building before something happened in front of everybody. At this point, I had no idea what was happening because I had never experienced anything like this before. As soon as I walked into the lobby at First Aid, everyone who saw my legs said emergency room. But they took me back and hooked me up to the machines, the man assigned to me didn't like what he was seeing.

My husband took this picture of the space during one of my many bathroom trips.

By this time, the numb feeling had gone to my face. He asked me what I wanted to do. I told him that in these situations, I always listened to the medical professionals who knew more than me and he said he wanted to call the paramedics. I was like fine, if that's what you feel is best. The paramedics get there, look at my stats, the swelling, etc and tell me they want to take me to the emergency room for further testing before letting me go back to my room. I wasn't happy about it but what can you do. When I said I wanted to experience new rides, I did NOT mean my first ever ride in the back of an ambulance!!! The man in the back with me told me there was going to be a 50-50 chance of me being admitted but he thought there was a high likelihood they would keep me overnight for observation.

They had to take me to Celebration hospital for some reason but unfortunately, there was a wildfire nearby and the smoke was getting into the ER. The smoke was also triggering my asthma, which I hadn't had issues with up until that point. By the time the Dr got there, the swelling was reduced by half. And this is where I finally reached my breaking point. To summarize this part, the Dr saw me and wanted to know why I was there, I was a 43 year old woman with cankles in the FL heat and humidity. I told him that I was there because every medical professional who had seen me told me that I needed to go and have more serious issues ruled out. He never even looked at the foot that had gone numb, never took off my sock, nothing. They did the blood work but the nurse who came to give me the IV never came back to hook it up to me after I got back from the bathroom. But I had to pay for it regardless because they had in their notes that I was there for an hour while receiving the fluid. I said that was impossible because after the blood work came back normal, I was demanding to be released. The dr came back and said that he was ordering a chest xray but I denied it. I told him he had already determined that was I was fine, the blood work confirmed nothing serious was currently happening, and that the smoke in the ER was creating a new issue. I was on the verge of tears because he was completely patronizing and belittling. It opened up old wounds from the past - the ER letting Grandma go home after falling down the stairs in her 70s and it turned out she had a broken back, the Dr telling Mom she needed more rest when what she really had was acute myeloid leukemia which killed her a month after diagnosis. So many times, I have experienced male doctors not taking women's health issues seriously and it just broke me. It was the first time my husband had seen the way doctors treat women differently and he felt bad for not speaking up for me later when he found out how common it actually is.

This was my feeling about the whole situation. You can see the unhooked IV.....

So I finally get released. I had forgotten to mention that Reedy Creek offers ambulance rides for free so we didn't have that expensive. Disney gives you a voucher for a taxi to get back to your resort. I was super glad I had listened to my gut instincts and bought travel insurance the day before my window closed. They ended up reimbursing us the hospital fees not covered by insurance.

We get back to CSR after 9:30PM and we were both starving. We never got to eat any of the Festival food and we hadn't even seen most of the World Showcase. We barely did anything this day in Epcot. We went to 3 Bridges again for dinner to get my fav burger. R tried the steak, and he upgraded to the larger size. I told him he wasn't going to like the sauce but he didn't listen.

So, being the good wife, I am, I offered to switch meals. So I had half the burger and half his steak. While sitting down, my left leg was getting that numb feeling again. I had plans to text my PCP in the morning and sent her screenshots of the the blood work. The server took pity on me because I had a huge bruise on my arm where the line was put in for the IV I never got and he brought out free churros. Which was really good but not Nomad Lounge good.

After dinner, we went back to the room. We were supposed to go to Hollywood Studios the next day but R wasn't letting me do anything until I had a chance to talk to my doctor. We had realized that the swelling and numb feeling only started when I was sitting down. So this was putting a complete wrench into our trip.

 

[Swissmiss]

What an awful experience - so sorry for what you had to endure.

 

[Wicked Sisters]

What an awful way to be treated in hospital. I would hate to think that you would be treated like that in the UK. Hope you are ok now.

 

[ajrwdwgirl]

This is the part I've been dreading so I'm just going to keep it short. We had a nice nap in our chilly AC room and made our way back to Epcot. My MagicBand kept falling off and a nice woman on the bus gave me an extra band guard. Why did I not ever know these existed and were so cheap on Amazon?!!!
View attachment 792701

It was after 5PM and it still felt like 99 because of the humidity. So we were planning on taking things slow, spending time in the gift shops (which I wanted to do anyways) and focus on the lighter options at the Festival kiosks, which we still haven't experienced!

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We made our way into the park and rode Nemo again since it was a walk on. Then we went to Living with the Land since it had a 15 minute wait, which was the lowest it had been all day.

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I like jackfruit BBQ sandwiches but it is nothing like pulled pork or chicken

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It was at this point, where I started to feel off. My left foot was starting to go numb. And I don't mean like pins and needles when you're foot goes to sleep. This was like the cotton feeling you get with Novocain and it was working its way up my leg. When I looked down at my feet to see what was happening, both of my legs from my feet up to my knees had started to swell to twice it's size. All in the space of 10-15 minutes. I was fine before I got onto the ride. When we got off the boat, I asked where the first aid location was. My numbness is my leg was getting worse so I walked as fast as I could to the building before something happened in front of everybody. At this point, I had no idea what was happening because I had never experienced anything like this before. As soon as I walked into the lobby at First Aid, everyone who saw my legs said emergency room. But they took me back and hooked me up to the machines, the man assigned to me didn't like what he was seeing.

My husband took this picture of the space during one of my many bathroom trips.

View attachment 792698

By this time, the numb feeling had gone to my face. He asked me what I wanted to do. I told him that in these situations, I always listened to the medical professionals who knew more than me and he said he wanted to call the paramedics. I was like fine, if that's what you feel is best. The paramedics get there, look at my stats, the swelling, etc and tell me they want to take me to the emergency room for further testing before letting me go back to my room. I wasn't happy about it but what can you do. When I said I wanted to experience new rides, I did NOT mean my first ever ride in the back of an ambulance!!! The man in the back with me told me there was going to be a 50-50 chance of me being admitted but he thought there was a high likelihood they would keep me overnight for observation.

They had to take me to Celebration hospital for some reason but unfortunately, there was a wildfire nearby and the smoke was getting into the ER. The smoke was also triggering my asthma, which I hadn't had issues with up until that point. By the time the Dr got there, the swelling was reduced by half. And this is where I finally reached my breaking point. To summarize this part, the Dr saw me and wanted to know why I was there, I was a 43 year old woman with cankles in the FL heat and humidity. I told him that I was there because every medical professional who had seen me told me that I needed to go and have more serious issues ruled out. He never even looked at the foot that had gone numb, never took off my sock, nothing. They did the blood work but the nurse who came to give me the IV never came back to hook it up to me after I got back from the bathroom. But I had to pay for it regardless because they had in their notes that I was there for an hour while receiving the fluid. I said that was impossible because after the blood work came back normal, I was demanding to be released. The dr came back and said that he was ordering a chest xray but I denied it. I told him he had already determined that was I was fine, the blood work confirmed nothing serious was currently happening, and that the smoke in the ER was creating a new issue. I was on the verge of tears because he was completely patronizing and belittling. It opened up old wounds from the past - the ER letting Grandma go home after falling down the stairs in her 70s and it turned out she had a broken back, the Dr telling Mom she needed more rest when what she really had was acute myeloid leukemia which killed her a month after diagnosis. So many times, I have experienced male doctors not taking women's health issues seriously and it just broke me. It was the first time my husband had seen the way doctors treat women differently and he felt bad for not speaking up for me later when he found out how common it actually is.

This was my feeling about the whole situation. You can see the unhooked IV.....

View attachment 792700

So I finally get released. I had forgotten to mention that Reedy Creek offers ambulance rides for free so we didn't have that expensive. Disney gives you a voucher for a taxi to get back to your resort. I was super glad I had listened to my gut instincts and bought travel insurance the day before my window closed. They ended up reimbursing us the hospital fees not covered by insurance.

We get back to CSR after 9:30PM and we were both starving. We never got to eat any of the Festival food and we hadn't even seen most of the World Showcase. We barely did anything this day in Epcot. We went to 3 Bridges again for dinner to get my fav burger. R tried the steak, and he upgraded to the larger size. I told him he wasn't going to like the sauce but he didn't listen.

View attachment 792705

So, being the good wife, I am, I offered to switch meals. So I had half the burger and half his steak. While sitting down, my left leg was getting that numb feeling again. I had plans to text my PCP in the morning and sent her screenshots of the the blood work. The server took pity on me because I had a huge bruise on my arm where the line was put in for the IV I never got and he brought out free churros. Which was really good but not Nomad Lounge good.

View attachment 792706

After dinner, we went back to the room. We were supposed to go to Hollywood Studios the next day but R wasn't letting me do anything until I had a chance to talk to my doctor. We had realized that the swelling and numb feeling only started when I was sitting down. So this was putting a complete wrench into our trip.

That sounds like a terrible experience.The food looked good at 3 Bridges though. While I haven't had a totally patronizing male doctor, I know there are some out there. My podiatrist when I first met him was Mr. Ego and I wondered if he was that way to just women. Then I talked to a male teacher I work with and he had all the same complaints about the Dr. so it was nice to know he just had a doctor ego. I ended up going back to that doctor this spring because of another foot issue and I had forgotten about his ego so the first visit I left feeling upset and rushed, my second visit I went in armed with more questions about my foot and when he answered one of my questions with "well in my 20 years of experience...." I just said "yes, experience is good but this is what is happening with my foot" and then asked my question. I may have rolled my eyes a bit too. But when I had my list of question I think he took me more seriously and didn't rush me like he had before. Before I left for that second appointment, my husband told me to remember that the doctor works for me and not to leave until I was satisfied. But doctors shouldn't treat anyone in a condescending way or rush people through appointments.

 

[LeighM]

Wednesday, May 15th - Resort Day

What was supposed to be Hollywood Studios turned out to be an unplanned resort day. We slept in and had breakfast at the food court. We had had eggs and bacon but the eggs were different. I can't remember now what I had but it was good. The bacon was actually crispy. At the hospital the doctor told me that I needed to increase my salt intake. Well, duh. I had been doing that since Saturday and alternating water with Powerade so that my electrolytes wouldn't drop. He couldn't tell me why I had suddenly started to swell so badly so quickly. Or why my foot had gone numb but whatever. The CSR manager called to check on me to see how I was was feeling after receiving the voucher from the taxi company. He offered to convert our unused tickets to non-expiring so that we could return on a future trip. I explained to him that I would really prefer to go to the parks but I was waiting to talk to my doctor before making a decision. He understood and told me to come to the front desk and they will assist me.

R had the plain eggs.

After eating, we walked around the resort a little bit before it started raining. This is from the Cabanas section.

We've never stayed in the Cabanas section. I do like the architecture and convenience of Casitas but Ranchos is my favorite for theming. This was our first resort day since the dance and cheer teams left and it was back to a relaxing and quiet resort. There was some big business convention that was starting to check in but they didn't affect the atmosphere of the resort. Before we got to Ranchos though, it started to rain so we went back to the room.

R was back to reading his book while I was compiling the required information for my travel insurance claim while reading over the doctor's notes and I thought it was a bunch of BS. He said he examined something that he never even glanced at. By this time, my doctor had the time to review the notes and test results. She was angry when I told her my treatment (because I had let him know I had been having circulation issues in my legs leading up to the trip) and in looking at the labs he never even tested me for clots. I had told her he ruled it out because both legs were swelling not just one. I was still having the issue with my leg going numb when I was sitting down and she said she thought I had two issues going concurrently - one with a vein or something getting pinched (can't remember now what it's called) and she thought a lot of my symptoms aligned with POTS, which was probably triggered by the heat on Saturday. So I've had some tests done since I've returned and I'm definitely having a blood pooling issue. She's trying to get me in to see the cardiologist who specializes in POTS and women's health here in my town. So we'll see where that goes. Apparently, they have seen an increase in POTS cases post covid. I was never diagnosed with covid because my sickness was January - March 2020 but all of the doctors agree that I probably had long covid. So my Dr wouldn't be surprised by POTS.

I tried getting the notes from the ambulance but that has to go through a FOIA request and my doctor will probably never see the stats from the height of the problem. I did submit the request though so we'll see. The front desk did provide this info in case I needed later in my trip.

Maybe this can help someone else planning a future trip. Eventually though, I started to get bored and stir crazy because I was at Disney and stuck in my hotel room. Plus, I was getting hungry. I told R that I was going to Disney Springs with or without him but I could not stay in that room any longer. Also, I wanted to see how I did in a slow paced environment like Disney Springs before attempting a park on Thursday. So off we go to Disney Springs....

 

[LeighM]

I can't remember what time we got to Disney Springs, maybe around 3. I had to stop by Jo Malone for more perfume because I needed the mental boost lol. Then we had lunch at Polite Pig for the second time this trip. And had the exact same thing because why change something good that works???

We got our now favorite seats in front of the window and commenced people watching. I know we went back to World of Disney and other shops in that section. I can't remember if this was the day whether we went to Uniqlo and the escalator had stopped working. Everyone upstairs had to wait in a long line for a tiny elevator and people were complaining about not being able to walk down the escalator since it was turned off and broken. At that point it's just stairs. Eventually, an employee took half the line to the staff merchandise elevator so we were out of the store in no time. That could've happened on Saturday, Sunday, or Monday - we spent a lot of time in Disney Springs this trip LOL. The rain was starting so we decided to skedaddle back to the resort so that I didn't push my luck in the humidity. I really wanted to go to Animal Kingdom on Thursday since we didn't get a chance to go in 2021.

We got back to the resort and I noticed just how dirty the grout was in the bathroom area. Oh gosh, I'm glad I brought my flip flops to wear inside the room!

Eventually though lunch wore off so we had a late dinner at the food court. R got our go to plain nachos with beef and cheese dip. I got the chicken rice bowl, which was really good!!!

We got back to the room and I nibbled on one of the gigantic cookies we got from Gideon's on Monday.

Our plans were to get a good night's sleep, wake up early to get to Animal Kingdom for extra hours before the heat and rain came.

Up next - Animal Kingdom - will it actually happen???