My last post was about being nicer to myself, encouraging myself and basically, not being mean to myself. Then, just a few days later, my body decided to turn against me.
It started out simply enough, a couple of sniffles, a tickle in my throat. I told my mother in law, “I’m a teacher, I’ll be fine. I have an incredible immune system, from being attacked all day everyday by sick kids.”
I was trying to stay positive.
I went back to school on that Monday after Christmas break, and by 4th period I knew I wasn’t going to last the whole week. I thought I’d have a sinus infection by Thursday.
By 6th period, I couldn’t get through an entire sentence without coughing, my throat was sore from the coughing, my nose was stuffy, my head hurt and my sinuses above my eyes were excruciating.
As soon as I got home, I called a sun for the next day. I woke up that next morning with a fever of 101.8°. I hurt all over. I made it to the doctor. They told me I had a sinus infection after I told them that I had a sinus infection (it wasn’t my regular doctor and I wasn’t impressed at all.) She prescribed be an antibiotic that wreaked havoc on my intestines.
I ended up missing 4 days of work and still felt pretty bad when I went back. Then two weeks after the fever started, my chest began hurting when I took deep breaths, with stabbing pains when I coughed, which was still a lot. I went back to the doctor and found out that my asthma had been triggered by the sinus infection and most likely the mold in my bedroom from a flood in there we woke up to on Christmas morning.
That doctor gave me a few prescriptions to get my asthma under control and within hours I felt better. The pain in my chest was gone and I could breath comfortably again.
I thought it was ironic that just a few days after I wrote about being nice to myself, and not tearing myself down, but encouraging myself, my body would turn against me.
This illness has sapped my energy for most of the past 3 weeks, I haven’t exercised, graded very many papers at work, eaten very well, spent good time with my family etc. Usually I would berate myself for that. I would tell myself that I was a horrible wife, mom, teacher, person, but I haven’t. I’ve been sick.
I’ve needed to focus on taking care of me and getting better. If I’m not healthy, I can’t really be there for anybody else.
So as I’ve felt better, I’ve cooked dinners for my family, graded and returned assignments to my students, helped my son with homework, and yesterday, for the first time in three weeks, did the stretching part of my exercise routine.
This illness took a lot out of me and it took a lot of time from me. It will take a while to get back to where I was before, but that’s okay.
It doesn’t make me less, it makes me human.
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