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Saturday, September 20, 2014

Malaria and dead phones...

It started Thursday... After Physical therapy in the afternoon, I just felt tired. I went back to my room and literally passed out. Woke up 2hrs later, a bit confused and wondering what time it was. Got up, did the night dressing changes and went straight back to bed, didn't even eat. 

I should have known... 

Woke up the next morning and noticed I had slept with my sleeping bag. This is Chad. Lowest temperature is like 30 Celsius (or like 80F). My sleeping bag is for below freezing temperatures (I'm going to Nepal after this). Something was clearly wrong... 

But I still got up and pulled on my scrubs. I made it as far as the living room (50ft away) when it felt like my head exploded and I just collapsed on a chair. 

There was no doubt. I had malaria... 

So whenever I felt able, I pulled myself together to go back to my room and swallow 3 more malarone pills (I had already taken my morning prophylaxis dose). Promptly collapsed again, and didn't move for the rest of the day.

When it rains, it pours, so my phone choose this particular moment to refuse to charge. It still worked perfectly, it would just not charge! So when the battery died, I would have no way of communicating with the outside world. No news of ebola. No way to tell my mother I'm still alive. No blog. Nothing. 

There was nothing I could do, so I just remained in bed and watched the battery drain... 

Today (saturday) I feel slightly better. Even managed to eat a bit... After that, I felt I had a little more strength, so I braved the malaise to go find someone who could tell me if I could get a sim card for my iPad, and get me connected again. 

Clearly, that worked, and I can now still blog and email, just no more phone calls, txt messages or whatsapp... Oh well... It's better than nothing, and my new and overpriced iPhone 5s (which I paid full price for, 3 days before it got reduced due to release of iPhone 6) will arrive in 10 days, along with Dr. Scott. 

I'll survive until then... 

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