Health and Wellness

I'm pleased to announce that my general health is much improved. I'm still suffering some coughing and a slight bouts of troubled breathing, but it doesn't feel like anyone's sitting on my chest anymore. This is what I would call a victory.

On the subject of life in general, I'm definitely ready to return to the dorms. I love my family for the most part, but they are starting to wear very thin on my nerves. Very thin, indeed. Apart from some minor family annoyances or skirmishes, my life has been very boring. The major joy of my last few days has been loading my CDs into iTunes. With this done, I am satisfied. That's really been the only excitement of my week.

I'd love to talk about the majority of the things that are on my mind lately, but I'm not really sure that they're entirely appropriate to blog about. Frankly, I'm totally amused by a situation that has gone down between me and someone that I thought was my friend who I have blogged about here before, AW. To say that I have not been injured would be a total lie, but to say that I'm hurt to the extent that he and others probably think I am is a total falsehood as well. More ore less, I'm actually kind of laughing about it. My reasons for that would require explanation and back-story, but I'm sure they're not what you're thinking.

I know it's awkward to mention a situation and not explain it, but it's a lot more personal than it seems. And, quite honestly, I don't know if AW reads this blog, and I don't want to write something that seems like it was intended to be scathing or hurtful. I don't want to be scathing or hurtful, but I know that's how my thoughts will come across, so it's probably best to not put them out there. More than that, this a blog for me. Not a blog for my responses to people who have irked me, hurt me, pissed me off, whatever. (Don't get me wrong, I know it becomes that from time to time, but it's not the actual intent.) Plus, I'm just not that upset about it. For a plethora of reasons. It's not as big a letdown as I think he thought it would be.

This is the part of the blog where you think to yourself, "Wow. Jessica might be growing up a little..." Hopefully, you are right.

I'd love to say that I have it in me to drop some great truth or say something deep and meaningful right now, but I don't. Not really. That said, I think I'm going to take my sense of moral superiority off to bed. Extra rest should help me kick the cough a little faster. I leave you with this little joy because it's oddly fitting.

Health Update

I am feeling marginally better today, but my mood is more sour. Funny how one thing improves, but the others falter. My breathing is slightly less labored, but the trade-off is that there's a lot more mucus now. I realize that this is a good thing, but my nose is starting to turn that Kleenex-chafed red. I discovered that sleeping only happens productively for me if my chest is elevated (for whatever perplexing reason), and thus, sleep has not been easy--which is what I'm attributing my pissy mood to. It's not even pissy so much as just lacking completely in any kind of patience.

My twin and his girlfriend, Jill, once again visited us. They were here from Thursday until today. I had intended to mention it in my last post, but other things were weighing heavily on my brain. The only sadness I have regarding their visit was that I spent most of it sick. Because of being sick, I stayed in bed and was mostly useless. It's unfortunate because soon my brother will be moving to Austin, Texas, and I will see him much, much less than I even see him now--which is precious little, let me tell you!

I don't really have much to say beyond that. I have no witty observations or thoughts with any depth. Mostly, I'm just ready to stop being sick and to start classes back up. For now, it's not much deeper than that.

Congestion and Condemnation

I may have mentioned in the past that, when I am sick, I turn into a totally baby. Of course, right now, I am sick. What started out as chest congestion that I was sure was due to my asthma has become body-wracking, hacking coughing, mucous, body aches, and a terrible attitude. I sound like a dying character in a movie or television show with my labored breathing and crackling wheeze. Needles to say, it is not pretty.

The worst part about being sick is that it reduces me to an angry, whining child. When I'm sick, I don't want to do anything, and my self-indulgence tends to get the better of me. I'm so miserable that I've been on the verge of tears all day. Hardly being able to breathe has made me dread getting up or walking around because I know that it's just going to be unpleasant. It's going to hurt, and then I'm going to struggle for the next ten or fifteen minutes to catch my breath without coughing so hard that it makes me pee a little bit.

It is times like these that make me miss my husband. Any time that I have ever been sick, he has done his best to take care of me. When we were first dating, he made me soup and tea and we watched movies on his couch. (This later lead to my story about watching The Notebook, which I have tentatively titled, "How Jessica Makes A Fool of Herself by Crying Like A Child for Forty-five Minutes."It's a good story. I'll tell you about it sometime.) He has always made sure that I have everything I need when I get sick, and he has always babied me, just like I love to be babied.

Alas, due to our current circumstances, we are separated. My family has little, if any, sympathy for me, in spite of the wheezing death knell that I have right now. Of course, having very little sympathy for me means asking me to go up and down the stairs, performing meaningless tasks. It's also manifested in watching me cleaning up dinner dishes from a meal that I wasn't even invited to partake in--in fact, I had to fend for myself when it came to dinner tonight. Being that we have nothing in the house, dinner for me consisted of Club crackers, salami, and cheese. That's going to help me get better quickly, right?

I guess my thesis here today is that I miss my husband, and I feel lousy. I wish that he could be taking care of me right now, rather than sitting by myself in this king sized bed, tearing up because I'm miserable and frustrated. I know I'm not a fan of self-pity in other people, but I'm taking a day to have a little for myself.

Dental Work

The dental appointment I had went fairly well. First, I should explain that I'm terrified of the dentist. I once had a dentist when I was a child who was incredibly mean to me. I bit him, and it was all downhill from there. Needless to say, an experience like that can change a kid's life. Because of that horrible guy (I even remember his name, though it's probably not a good idea to include it), I've always had a hatred of dental offices.

Then, as soon as I start to get comfortable with them again as a teenager, I get the idiot dental assistant who screwed up one of my teeth during a routine cleaning. As a result of being a twin, I have pocked enamel on my teeth, meaning the surface of my teeth is not smooth, but rather litter with tiny little pockets. Apparently, this idiot dental assistant thought that they were the result of excess plaque or something because she tried to scrape them off. Literally, she tried scraping the pocks out of one of my teeth. This wouldn't be so bad if she hadn't dug a gouge into one of my two front teeth. The gouge is actually still visible today.

This most recent appointment was just to get a couple of cavities filled. It went pretty smoothly, actually. I was doing okay because of the chatter of the dentist and the dental assistant. We turned on the TV to CNN so I'd have something else to focus on to ease my tension, and the doctor and assistant were talking about the news of the day: Lindsay Lohan's court appearance, the BP oil spill, the finale of Lost, the season finale of House, etc.

I was doing really well until I saw the flecks of blood on the dentist's rubber gloves. Talk about freaking me out! I kept my cool. I managed to keep it together and not freak out too bad. My breathing got faster, my eyes got wider, I grimaced a lot more, but I didn't lose it. I'm pretty proud of the way I handled myself. The blood came from my gums--the cavities being filled were at the meeting points of two teeth. Because of their location, the dentist had to floss in between them with plastic stripping in a certain way and it made me bleed. The gums are still really irritated right there and sore, but it looks better now.

On the downside, I'm running a low-grade fever right now, and my back is aching like no other. I don't know if those things are in any way related, but it's making me miserable. I can't find a comfortable position to save my soul. My body keeps alternating between hot and miserably uncomfortable to cold sweats. The good thing is that it's coming down. My temperature is starting to normalize--leave it to the nursing student to monitor the change in temperature. I did sleep a little bit, but I woke up as a result of some loud video-game killing happening at the foot of my bed. After that, I simply couldn't seem to get back to sleep.

Hopefully, after some decent rest, I'll be feeling much better.