Sniffles and sneezes and the monster within

Ferris Bueller was right when he said that we need to sit up and smell the flowers once in a while, because life moves fast and we might just miss it. But like his unfortunate friend Cameron, sometimes our bodies simply don’t let us, literally, when we are struck down with a bug or cold.

There’s nothing worse than being sick. The feeling of irritation is consuming. For me, my mind doesn’t grasp the fact that my body is ravaged with the cold or some other ailment until I can no longer breathe through my nose, or stand up without feeling dizzy. I’ve had an awful cold for more than a week now, almost two weeks, which feels like forever. It’s finally going away but it’s taking too long; instead of the initial nasal headaches and runny nose, I’m in that later stage where my body feels fine but mucus is coming out of every orifice in my head, except my ears, I think, I hope. I’m blowing my nose every 5 minutes to try and get aforementioned mucus out and free myself from the need for countless tissues. The tissues are everywhere; in my bag, obviously in my hand, under the sofa, on the coffee table and next to the kettle, where I feel most at home.

It’s beginning to freak people out. The noises are relentless and horrifying; the blowing and wheezing and the grunting sound of phlegm trying to extract itself from wherever it is clinging, is perhaps just too much for some people. My mother despised the word phlegm, despite being a nurse for decades, and I’m reminded of her when I use the word. It’s making me sick even writing about it so I apologise for the graphic detail, but I have to vent, literally and figuratively. Excuse me while I get some tissue.

My loved ones are looking at me differently, terrified of the new noises that are being produced from my body when I’m blowing and coughing, as if I’ve changed into a creature from the black lagoon. I can’t fault them because that’s exactly what I sound like, and perhaps look like, but I refuse to care about that just yet. It’s obscene, I really shouldn’t be let out of the house. And then I’m frustrated with being sick and making horrible noises trying to get well, so I’m a bit of a monster in general; snappy and upset about the unjustness of it all (the cold makes one irrational as well). And then there is the fear that I’ll pass on the bug to whoever is in proximity. Although it seems that people have been avoiding me anyway, and again, I cannot fault them. When one sounds and acts like an alien being then it’s natural for others to want to keep a safe distance, at arm’s length, yet with a face of pity beaming at you from afar. “Yes I’m here to pity you and help, but if you come near me I’ll kill you.”

Perhaps a day or two of quarantine would do the trick, afterwards I can reappear refreshed, reborn and ready to greet the world.

The best thing about being sick is the glorious feeling of being well again and you make a vow to yourself to never take being healthy for granted again. You’ll go out and smell the flowers and breathe with the full use of your lungs so that every alveoli is ballooned with a dose of oxygen-rich air.

You’ll thank the universe for the gift of health and praise everyone in your family for being there for you and providing soup, sanctuary and love. And then you’ll forget all about being sick until the sniffles begin again and the monster stirs. Tissues at the ready.