I truly despise being ill, and the last few days have been torture. I was laid up in bed for most of Monday through Wednesday, and I'm finally able to start moving around and getting some things done today. I may have said already, I don't remember much, but my fever spiked at around 104 on Monday night.
The worst part about being sick is that I have to depend on people to bring me things and take care of me. Don't get me wrong, everyone has been wonderful. Hugh and Eleni are good about bringing me water, Physics is making frequent trips and calls to check on my status, Scott is keeping me fed when I feel that I can ingest something small, and he and Lilly are making a thorough diagnosis using their trusty WebMD. At this point they have it narrowed down to worms, giardia, irritated bowel syndrome, or something caused by the antibiotics I have been taking to get better.
Now that I'm a bit on the upswing, people have taken off the kid gloves and are now getting more insistent that I go to the hospital. I have an exam tomorrow, and now the professors are involved. They're offering to cook me things and suggesting expensive Western-style hospitals that are sure to have the immediate IV-drip cure.
The thing is, I am trying not to make a big fuss about it, and I really don't have much faith in doctors. Maybe it is because of my personal experiences with HMO care back home, but I've come to realise that doctors don't really do much for you that you can't do yourself. Eleni joked yesterday that most Americans seem to know more about healthcare than their doctors do. I'd have to agree with her, and I think it's because we have to.
I have access to online databases to reference my symptoms with possible causes, and I'm free to go to the pharmacy here right now and get pretty much anything that I think will help. Doctors don't do any more than guess most of the time anyway, especially with something like this, so what good would it do? I'm just going to keep trying my home remedies. But don't worry. If it gets any worse again everyone else is threatening to haul me to AIIMS by my toenails.
Flown by mariposa at 08:24 PM on April 28, 2005
