Sick

So...this week was a tough one.

On Monday night, I emailed my "HIT crew"--the six guys I've worked out with all summer--to see if anyone wanted to come with me to the 6:45am High Intensity Training workout on Tuesday. Everyone said something to the effect of, "You is cray-cray. It's pharmacology week." I slept my five hours, woke up in the dark, went to the gym, had a great workout, but then proceeded to start vomiting that day. I thought it might've just been that I worked out too hard (sprints, presses, air squats, burpees, thrusts, on circuit) and this was finally the sign that I pushed myself too hard on not enough sleep. But then my throat started aching. I couldn't swallow. Vomiting hurt. I didn't say much during my SNMA conference planning meeting (my school was hosting a regional conference for the Midwest, about 100 students, and since I'm on executive board, the burden has been great this week). I couldn't keep anything down and went to bed on Tuesday night with a rumbling tummy.

Wednesday came. I asked the girls at my church connection group to pray that my mild sickness wouldn't turn into anything full-blown. I still couldn't eat anything and my loud stomach was definitely a distraction during group. I tried to study pharm. Which isn't an easy task. I don't really know how to convey how difficult pharm is...only that I eat, sleep, and breathe it during our pharm exam weeks. It sounds dramatic, and undoubtedly many of you will roll your eyes, but I can't liken it to anything I've ever done. I got an email cc'd to everyone asking why I hadn't been picking up slack for the SNMA conference. Turns out I was left off the initial email list from one month ago (some other Connie had been added instead) and I never got the emails. No one thought to check why I wasn't responded, or hadn't done the appropriate conference promos. No one apologized. I was too groggy from meds to be upset, or even really care.

Thursday. My roommate offers to buy me a pita from the Pita Pit next door. As tempting as that sounds, I opted for chicken broth instead. I was still having trouble swallowing. Worse, I was blowing enough mucous out of my nose to finish two boxes of Kleenex in two days. Good thing I bought the 10-pack at Costco. I skipped all of my classes to study at the library. I studied with my usual group at night at school, and ended up falling asleep with my earphones in while taking a practice test. Everyone told me to go home. It was only 11pm. 

Friday. The pharmacology exam. I had brought tissues and cough drops in my pockets, which are supposed to be empty. I figured that if the proctors wanted to collect my snotty tissues, they could be my guest. I was only mildly disruptive during the exam. But there was a minor blip in which I thought I was bubbling in the correct answers, but all I did was bubble in a column of "A's. I caught it in time, but was disturbed that maybe I had hallucinated. Maybe I was hypovolemic from all the vomiting and had metabolic alkalosis, causing confusion? Who knows. I finished the test in what I thought was record speed, but actually took most of 2 hours. I ended up doing better on this exam than on the first pharm exam. How this is possible, I'm not sure. Praise be to God.

I went to bed at 4pm on Friday and was woken up repeatedly by calls regarding the conference ("Connie, where are you? Please be at the Sheraton by 7pm." "Connie, please bring markers to the table in the morning.") I turned off my phone and went back to sleep until 5:30am the next morning. Then I got up, told myself it was a new day, and went to the conference to help with registration.

As I walked across the bridge trying to breathe in the cold dawn air through my congested nasal passages, I prayed that I would be a good witness to students visiting our school for this conference. I did my best from 6am until 9pm--a full fifteen hours of being on my feet while constantly scrambling for tissues and hand sanitizer. While opening T-shirts, I scraped myself with a box cutter  (don't worry, not the blade itself) and the long red gash didn't even register pain because I was on so many medications. I felt invincible. I could do anything. (I think I fall into that trap frequently, feeling like I can do more things faster and better than anyone else. It's a pride issue that I can't quite shake.)

So...I'm not sure what the point of this post was, I'm still having some trouble thinking thoughts through and reading. Yes, reading. Maybe I have anti-NMDA encephalitis, but med students are all hypochondriacs.