Mandatory Napping

Miss me? I'm sure you have. 

Let me tell you something about me:

I love a good nap. 

I always joke with my kids at school that if I weren't a teacher, I'd be a professional napper.  A few would get my joke and laugh. Others asked if you went to college for that. 

I teach first grade, so that's okay.

Let me tell you something else about me:

Just because I love naps, doesn't mean I like being tired. Or weary. Or exhausted. Or fatigued beyond all that is holy, which is what I am now. 

I have mono.

I started feeling bad on Good Friday/Earth Day (Trash day at our house). Just a cold, which hopped down into my chest over the weekend.  After Church on Easter, I crawled into bed. Woke up that evening running a 101. 

Now fevers aren't great, but they're terrible for adults because we're much whinier and prone to listlessness than children, who fare much better.  I let loose a couple of good coughs that told me I had bronchitis.  This is not unusual for me, with my asthma and allergies. I usually get one bout in the spring and one in the fall.  But this was a little weird because of the fever, so I put in for a sub and went to the doctor. 

With my bronchitis and a little rattle the doctor labeled walking pneumonia, I drugged up with some prednisone and a z-pak expecting to feel better in 24 hours. 

No such luck.  And I happened to be in Branson, where I was supposed to be retreating with my husband.  I actually spent the week in bed watching Glee, Royal Wedding coverage and Pushing Daisies.

Everyone kept asking me if I felt better and I kept telling them no.  Advil, Prednisone, antibiotic, Advil, Prednisone, Tylenol.  Nothing was helping.

We got back to town, I crawled into bed yet again, and the crappiness tarried on. I started to add a little anxiety to the mix because I still wasn't feeling better, the meds were taken and I had to teach!

When the fever made a reappearance on Sunday, I knew I had to go back to the doctor. Now, I was always a child that caught every weird disease you could think of. So by this point in my life I'm as good at diagnosing myself as most medical doctors.  But this time I was stumped and getting a little scared.

I got up Monday morning to go to work. My whole body hurt, I had trouble standing and my skin was unbearably painful to touch.  I got in the car to go to work and drove to the doctor instead. 

You know when a doctor gives you that look. That, furrowed brow "Ooh, crap" look? Then he used the "admit" word and not in the sense of meaning to be true in a reluctant sense, but in the requiring entrance to a particular community building with lots of people wearing scrubs and smoking 50ft from the property sense.

I don't like that verb.

He must have seen my "Whatchoo talkin' bout Willis" face

because he then said he'd get radiology and the lab to do some work first.  

Shot with radiation and poked with needles, I somehow made it home and crawled back into bed.

Then I got the call.

Mono. 

Yes, somehow at 32 I have managed to wrangle the Epstein Barr virus which is commonly found in 15-17 year olds.  I'm like a mono geriatric.

There really isn't anything you can do for mono but rest and drink plenty of fluids.  The doctor was brazenly clear that I was not to go to work.  No activity at all. 

Now, I like a random snow day as much as the next teacher, but I am about to go out of my mind.

I've felt really bad, from head to toe with this unbearable brain fog...and now I'm going crazy. 

I can't really remember a time in my life when my body felt so separate from my mind. Now I'm thinking about all the things I would like to be doing, but my body won't cooperate.  I have to lie down after I get up to do anything. I've created a colossal butt crater in my bed from spending 23 hours a day in bed for the past month. 

Now, I have to say that it has taken me almost a month to write this blog.  The brain fog has been ridiculous, so it has been hard to put a coherent thought together as of late.  It is getting better, though and I am finally getting out of the house a bit.

But I miss my kitchen. I miss thumbing through my cookbooks or pretending like what I make up on my own is any good.  I miss moving without strain.  I miss energy. I miss my mojo. 

But, I do not miss naps.