Ultimate Misery: The Canker Sore

Nothing ruins your day quite like a canker sore (not a cold sore; those are outside the mouth). They hurt like absolute hell and although they only really stick around for a week or so, it feels like an eternity. And the worst part is waking up after a blissful night's sleep of not feeling it. For that 20 or so minutes after you get out of bed, it feels like acid is being poured into your mouth, and there's no stopping it.

This is not me, but they all pretty much look the same.
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If you've never seen one before, 1. You're lucky, and 2: ^^^

Basically, they're tiny puddles of fiery hell-sore.

And although the surface area is tiny, they tend to make an entire side of one's mouth feel like it's being operated on by a really shitty oral surgeon. For example, the canker sore I have right now is in the back of my left cheek, riiiiiight between where my teeth bite, so logically, the entire left side of my jaw and mouth hurts. Nice. Here's a short list of the daily activities that have been hindered by black hole ulcer in my mouth:

• Eating: Chewing is definitely out, so I've been living on cottage cheese, yogurt, and ice cream. (And no, chewing on one side doesn't help, because BOTH sides of my jaw go up and down, meaning that the sore will get hit even when there's no food there)
• Talking: If I've seemed reticent/sad/unusually quiet, it's not because I don't like you (well, maybe, but the odds are low). It's because talking moves everything around and if words aren't critical, they're not worth it right now.
• Teeth Brushing: Between the  bristles and the toothpaste, this sucks. My obsessive need for dental hygiene requires me to power through it though; I fight cavities at all costs. 
• Drinking (and not in the alcohol sense): You can basically swallow food on one side (more or less), but liquid spreads out everywhere and burns. Pro-tip: don't go for the carbonated beverages...
• Gum Chewing: Just don't bother.
• General Happiness: Constant pain leads to constant irritation/pissed-off-ed-ness. Although to be fair, I get frustrated/angry extremely easily when I'm in pain of any sort. From now on, I'm calling them Cranky Sores©

But every once in a while, a few minutes goes by when you forgot that it's there. There's no pain. Maybe it's starting to heal. So you smile a bit, start to say "Hooray" and...

Epic rage time
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...it's back.

Screw you, immune system

The end of my winter vacation should have involved a five-day ski trip at Stowe. As an avid skier who received an amazing set of brandy new skis for Christmas, I've been waiting for this for awhile. Expecting to leave Harvard at 2pm on the 13th, I arrived at night on the 12th, you know, just to wait it out. Well, here's how I spent the night of the 12th and all of the 13th:

And if you can't tell, I'm not on a bus.

Why? Because somehow in the approximately 10 hours that I had sat alone in my dorm room, I managed to catch the same stomach flu (or something of the sort) that has hit essentially all of Boston. There are few things that I hate more than puking, but puking blood certainly qualifies.

I've probably never felt quite as helpless as I did when I started vomming my brains out all alone, in an empty dorm room. And incidentally, the 5am walk from Winthrop to After Hours Urgent Care felt like 10 miles of stumbling around all alone in the windy darkness.  Apparently, I became sick and dehydrated enough to warrant having a shot of anti-nausea medication stuck in my hip (which is about as thick as hair gel, BTW) and four bags of IV fluids pumped into my arm. Here's a timeline of my misfortune:

12th: 5pm: Arrive on campus. Never leave my dorm.

13th: 1:30am: Go to sleep. Feel kind of weird, but whatevs. I'll sleep it off.

          3:30am: Wake up and promptly start expelling my guts. 

          5:00am: Puking blood. WTF.

          5:30am: World's longest walk to UHS.

          6:00am: Find out that I have what everyone else has. Get my very own bed in Stillman Infirmary.

          4:30pm: My all too accommodating father picks me up from Stillman because suffering at home is better than suffering alone on campus.

And then I slept for 15 and a half hours.

So here I am now, sitting in my living room instead of on a ski lift and wearing a fuzzy blanket instead of snow pants.

Not a happy camper.

I want soup.

College and the common cold blues

Falling ill while at school is the very definition of the word "misery." My immune system is pretty baller and I only really get sick once or twice a year. It usually lasts for about 24 hours and then I'm fine. I don't visit the doctor unless death is on the horizon.

FEEL BAD FOR ME

** Note the sadface, blanket, and the mug of tea. Oh, and the oxford comma in that last sentence YEAH.

I've just passed the one week point and I'm confused and unhappy about it. I've dealt with the sore throat, body aches, and congestion akin to what would happen if you rubbed a shedding cat on my face. I also lost my voice and sounded like a man-lurking-in-the-bushes for 3 or 4 days. I cannot breathe, I cannot smell, my ears keep popping in and out, and I'm all gross and snivelly.

And here's the worst part: college has no sick days. Assignments don't get postponed because you need extra sleep (like, 8 full hours or something...ultra rare!). All I want is a self-wallowing pity party, but my commitments keep floating around in front of me. I actually have, you know...stuff to do. I'm not getting anything done because I feel like death, and yet I can't take a nap because I'll feel guilty if I'm intentionally not working. This is a vicious circle if I ever saw one.

I've made it through a bottle and a half of DayQuil (which tastes like it was brewed by the devil himself), more than 2 rolls of toilet paper (for my NOSE. Tissues are expensive and toilet paper is free. I'm not cheap, I'm frugal), and a bag of Halls. WTF common cold. Taking medicine is totally not my style.

I'm that kid that everyone made fun of in middle school. The one who's coughing like their extra-curricular is coal mining and making gross snarf-a-larf-a-larf noises as they suffer through class (totally worse in a 200 person lecture). I'm the kid that no one wants to sit next to because let's be real. Ew. I am Hester Prynne, ostracized and condemned by society. It gives me the sadz.

Okay, I'm done playing myself the world's saddest song on the world's smallest violin. This is the part where you pity me back with chocolate, tea, and Puff's lotion infused tissues, kay?