Friday, July 18, 2014

First Health Session Paranoia Is Too Real.

 Written on: 6/19/2014
The doctors here installed the fear of God in me about getting diseases. The sessions about diseases are not unlike the Mean Girls gym class teacher's Sex Ed. classes.
*Dramatization*
Do not forget to take your Doxy. Do not sleep without your mosquito net. Do not go out without bugspray. If you do...you will get Malaria...and die.
Do not drink unfiltered water. Do not eat fresh vegetables at the hotelys. Do not forget your Sur' Eau*. You will double dragon** in your PO*** for days....and die. Do not eat in the missionary position. Do not eat standing up. Just don't do it? K?
Alright...come grab some Pepto.
*****
I began to question everything I had eaten over the past week. Was it safe? Did it contain feces? Did my host mom (Neny) clean everything appropriately? WAS SHE EVEN USING SUR'EAU?!?
To calm my nerves I ate about four brownies at snack. My stomach unleashed its wrath further and began to gargle ferociously. It could've been the four brownies I had just eaten...or I had developed Guardia in the past 2 hours and was going to be the first trainee so succumb to the most common disease for PCVs in Madagascar.
My stomach pains worsened and I became extremely gasy - a sign of Guardia. I panicked silently as I rode the PCV truck through the bumpy dirt roads on the way back to my house. Once there, I picked at my dinner...too nervous to eat much of anything my Neny set in front of me. After going to my room I couldn't help but look up the Guardia again in my Personal Health Handbook. In my notes I had written: Sympts included feeling of gasy-ness and sulfur smelling toots.
My stomach let out a minuscule amount of gas and I began sniffing the air. It was free of sulfur, but yet my mind wandered through everything I had eaten again. After tossing and turning in bed for what felt like hours, I finally fell asleep.
When I awoke, the pain was still in my stomach and had moved to the lumbar part of my back. I felt awful. "Is malaise is a symptom?" I wrote down the date and my symptoms on a piece of paper and slipped it into my First Aid kit in case my condition worsened and I needed to inform the doctors of the disease's onset.
After my morning trip to the Kabone, I had a diagnosis for my "illness."
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....................I had gotten my period.
The only meds I needed to "take" were some chill pills because clearly I was paranoid.


*Vocab*
*Sur'Eau - chlorine used to kill germs in water. Tastes like bleach...yum....! You can't taste it in food but sometimes you can in your water. Drink packets like Crystal Lite help A LOT.
**double dragon = simultaneously having explosive diarrhea and vomiting (Thanks PCV Gabby).
***PO = a bucket with a lid that you pee in at night when its too dark to use the kabone**** outside. Can also be used to vomit into or used to poo in when you need to examine your feces for disease.
****Kabone = Outhouse. A hole in the ground with two foot rests text to it. looks like this - []0[]. your business goes in the 0 and your feet go on the []s. I'd be lying if I said I actually didn't mind using the Kabone. It's supposed to be healthier for your body to squat rather than sit while you do your business. Plus i'll have calves and quads of steal soon.



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