When the mighty fall.

Okay, so I’m not exactly mighty, but I don’t get sick. I really don’t. I get sick so infrequently (and by sick I mean chills, nausea, extreme fatigue, aches – believe me, I’ve had my fair share of the sniffles, and more than my fair share of migraines, but those don’t usually bring me to my knees)… anyway, I get sick so infrequently that I can remember almost every time:

There was the time when I was one of a 5-person committee making a multi-million dollar, 10-year contract decision for the university between the two major soft drink companies. One was presenting all morning, the other all afternoon. The presenters included the Canadian Presidents and VP’s and the set-up was elaborate and expensive. During the morning presentation, I started to feel a little shaky. At the break, I went to the washroom to splash my face and then immediately threw up. I excused myself two more times during the first presentation. One of the VP’s commented that I had the smallest bladder he had ever come across. Instead of doing lunch with the committee, I went to my car in the hotel parking lot and slept for an hour, thinking I just needed a little rest and I would be fine. During the afternoon presentation, I had to leave the room no less than 8 times. Yes, I kept going back in! I honestly thought that each time was the last time. After that, I was sick at home for the next three days.

Then there was the time that I was sick for 8 days straight, but never missed a full day of work. I dragged my butt in there everyday thinking I could just shake it off. Several times I fell asleep at my desk (luckily I was in an office with a door). Then, I would go back home at about 10:30 and sleep the rest of the day, only to repeat the madness the next day. I am not a heart surgeon. It really doesn’t matter that much if I skip a couple of days here and there to be sick.

In my first year of university, I missed my economics exam due to “acute influenza” (that’s what they wrote on my doctor’s note when I dragged myself in to infect the school health clinic’s entire waiting room). Do you know what you don’t want to do? Write an economics exam at the end of January when you learned all the material Sept-Nov.

I didn’t miss any school in elementary or high school for real illness. In elementary school, they would give out arm bars (little patches that my mom dutifully sewed onto a pillow for me) for things like winning sports teams you were on, citizenship, and yes, attendance. I got a lot of different badges every year (I was a total joiner), but always got the attendance badge. In high school I took some “sick days”, but they were really more mental health days.

As the human race goes, I’m fairly inexperienced with being sick. When I am sick, I’m fairly certain that’s it for me… that some super-bug has broken through my immunity barrier and will spell my demise.

So it was with my most recent bout of flu(?? – I’m assuming that’s what it was) I was certain I would die, Homer was making my final arrangements (not really, but he was more attentive than usual), the kids were learning to be self-sufficient. But, alas, I’m back. The bug has been banished, the sheets have been changed and I am catching up on everything I missed. Hopefully it will be several years before I have to deal with all that unpleasantness again.