Adventures in Health

I've had a bit of a rough week, health wise.

It started on Friday night at my Zumba class. I started off feeling great--except for a light tickle in my throat that told me something was coming on--but by the time I'd been dancing for 60 minutes, I felt like complete trash. Sunday morning saw me home sick from church. Then Monday I left work early. It started out as a cold. I'm pretty sure the cold ran its course out by last night, however the sudden chills and fever that suddenly took over my body told me something else was up. When I woke up in the middle of the night with a mucus-like substance draining from my left eye, I knew that this was no mere cold I was dealing with. And indeed, in the morning when the sinuses on the left side of my head were painful to the point that if I touched my eye, eyebrow, or cheek bone, I'd groan in pain, I knew that I'd gotten a sinus infection. Sinus infections aren't that bad--I used to get them 4 times a year (that's why they fixed my nose!)--but I knew that a sinus infection gone too long unchecked will turn into bronchitis and there was no way I was risking that kind of infection with asthma. I went to the doc today and got some antibiotics so I can nip this in the bud. (Good thing I went, too, because he said he heard the beginnings of bronchitis in my lungs.)

As if this wasn't bad enough, Tuesday morning I woke up planning to go back to work. I wasn't feeling great, but was willing to suck it up and do my duty. Until I noticed the itch. On my shoulders. And my leg. And my stomach. A full body inspection showed that I had hives all over my neck, creeping onto my face, on my shoulders, back, stomach, and right leg. I've been dealing with hives for about a year now, with increasing severity since Thanksgiving, but never in more than two places at a time. I was absolutely miserable. Not to mention my grotesque appearance. Naturally, I took the day off again. Up to this point I was thinking I was allergic to strawberries. However, I haven't eaten strawberries in over 2 week. Now I knew it wasn't strawberries. After a long while, I finally concluded that it must be Bounce dryer sheets! Which then made me realize I had to wash ALL of my sheets, towels, and clothes that I put in the dryer. Did I mention I had just finished laundry? So I spent all day Tuesday (and continue the arduous task today) doing laundry and resisting the urge to scratch my plethora of hives. Yesterday I saw an allergist. She asked me all sorts of questions, gave me some antihistamines and told me to come back in 3 weeks for skin and allergy testing. Oh, and I have to get blood work done next week. Because with 90% of hives cases, they can't figure out what the cause is. And in that 10% there is a myriad of causes. From regular allergies to thyroid problems, from UTIs to anemia. Basically, it's going to be a long journey to discover the cause of my hives.

This afternoon was the first I'd felt good in almost a week. I took a hot, hot bath this morning with a hot, hot washcloth over my face to loosen up the congestion in my sinuses (and you wouldn't believe how well that simple and relaxing technique worked!). My nose was still runny, but sneezing was gone. And my hives weren't nearly as itchy today. I felt like I'd emerged from this sick haze. It's like I'd forgotten what it was like to feel well. While I was sick (and it wasn't very long or that bad, really) I knew I'd be better and soon, but it's like I was just caught up in the immediateness of my crummy health (and I experienced this same phenomenon the first day of feeling well after my wisdom teeth removal).

I love how good I was feeling today--and I'm not even totally well again either. But it's such a relief to be almost well. It is so true that we could not appreciate the good without the bad. I don't mind getting sick (as long as it's not too often, lol); if I never got sick I wouldn't relish the feeling of good health. I'm grateful that the Lord loves us enough to give us what we need, even if it's not what we always want.