Face MaskAh, what fun it is to be sick.  I’ve been battling a multitude of Japanese illnesses since Sunday, and it’s leaving my body incredibly exhausted.  I don’t know what kind of instruction set these Asian viruses have in their DNA, but it’s insanely strong, whatever it is.

Saturday night the first sympoms appeared, where my throat was a little scratchy after getting home and I was developing a little bit of a headache, which is nothing new.  The next morning was awful, and I had difficulty eating and even getting out of bed.  Luckily, Reiko was there to take care of me, but it really put a dent into our Sunday plans.  Monday I had to call in sick to work, and Tuesday was also written off.  Not wanting to miss too much work, I forced myself to go in on Wednesday and was greeted with a lovely deep voice that required way too much energy to use.  On top of that, I was having a problem with saying vowels and they would often disappear into a squeak.  Although Reiko asked if I would take Thursday off, I said that I would go in.  I have a few responsibilities to some students and I had made a promise to never miss a particular person’s lesson.  Unfortunately, I had already missed the Tuesday class with them, so I could not miss the next.  On the way to the office, I managed to get my voice to work relatively decently, even though it was quite a bit lower than normal.  That said, 10 minutes into the 3-hour conversation, my voice started to disappear again.  By the end of the day, it was almost completely gone.

Fun?  Wow!

So it came as no surprise when, last night, I started coughing uncontrollably.  The throat had been stripped almost raw, and now I was succeptable to any infection that might find its way past the double-protection of my scarf and face mask.  Getting to sleep was a bit of a chore, and I managed to wake everyone in the house while I was at it.  Luckily, both Reiko and her mother are quite skilled when it comes to medicine and what to do, so they looked after me.  Of course, I would have preferred if they didn’t have to wake up and take care of me, a grown man.

Now, today, we went to the hospital again and had a bunch of things checked.  It looks like I’ll live, which is a good thing, and that I’m in the final stages of the Flu/Cold/Whatever-Else.  I can’t wait to feel healthy again … I feed bad not only for Reiko and her family, but also for my co-workers.  I’m still rather new at this place, but have had to take 3 days off already.  The worst part about this is that it makes me look unreliable.

Alright, on that note, I think I’ll take a short nap.  This doesn’t seem to be making much sense on the re-read, so perhaps I’ll update it a little later.

Being sick sucks.