sick face

I am still sick. Always fun. I was hoping by going to the doctor sooner rather than later (on my birthday as opposed to today) that I wouldn't get super sick, but sadly that was not the case. I've been sitting at home the last few days, leaving pretty much only to go to the doctor, class or to drive Braeden to school (he's been driving my car home at night since I've been feeling so crappy so to avoid paying for parking—why is there no free parking on campus?—I've been driving him to campus after he comes back over in the morning to check on me). It gets lonely. Surprisingly lonely. I opened the blinds today and that seems to be helping things.

I've been drinking lots of tea. One of the nice things about tea? If you drink enough of it and throw out enough used tea bags your kitchen garbage starts to smell delicious. Celestial Seasonings Pomegranate is my current favorite.

One of the things about being sick while you're planning a wedding is that you feel like you can't just rest. There's always so much to do and even though your teeth hurt from your sinus headache and your nose is red and dry from tissue burn you still think to yourself, "I might not be well enough to go to work or even get changed out of my pjs, but surely I'm not too sick to plan out the outfits for our engagement pictures, never mind that we had to reschedule them because I've been sick!" Clearly all logic flees in the face of itchy ears, a runny nose and a stuffy head.

Luckily I have a job where they understand if I need to take time off due to illness: sure since I get paid by the hour that means that I don't get paid for my days off, but it also means that I don't have a limited number of sick days I need to worry about using up. I am only taking one class this semester (which I was able to attend this week despite being ill) so I'm not behind in my school work. I have a wonderful, adorable, loving fiancé who takes such good care of me and doesn't get freaked out when I start crying because I'm tired and just so frustrated with not being able to do what I want to do (this my or may not have happened last night...). Even though I feel crappy I still have a lot to be thankful for, I just need to be better about remembering that. Also about actually resting...

the epidemic continues

People are still sick. So it was decreed that everyone—even those of us who are not puking or pooping our guts out—would stay home this afternoon and rest instead of going to shift. That means that, along with eating bananas, white toast with honey, and yogurt, we watched movies.

My favorite movie of the night was "Away We Go." It has John Krasinski in it, so I was already predisposed to love it, and I was not disappointed. It's all about this couple who is expecting a baby and they are trying to figure out where to raise their child. The travel all around the country visiting friends and family trying to decided if they want to move to any of those places. What it really ends up being, however, is the search for a family whose life they want to base their own off of. Eventually, of course, they realize that the only life they can live is their own and nobody else's lives or life decisions have to affect or influence the decisions they make about their own future together. Their story has not yet been written—only they can choose their own destiny. You know, all of that. It was fantastic. Aside from the f word and the awkward sex scene at the beginning it was a winner in my book. Why do movies always have to have those scenes in them that make them "So great! Oh, except for that one part..."? One day I will teach myself how to edit movies and then I will have a library free of such awkward scenage. One day.

quarantined

So remember how I was sick on Monday? Well now everyone else is sick. Six of the girls who went to work this morning left early to rest because they were feeling really sick. A few of them went to the doctor today and here are a some of the diagnosis (diagnosiis?):

• sinus infection
• tonsillitis
• ear infection
• strep throat

Only 4 girls went to the orphanages this afternoon (as opposed to the usual minimum of 10) while the rest of us stayed home. I was feeling fine but I had a scheduled off and Lorena, our house "mom" suggested I stay home too just to be safe. My stomach has been bothering me a little bit again (but nothing major, so don't worry—I think just left over stuff from not eating regularly since Monday) so maybe it was good advice to stay home and rest.

One consolation, I think, is that people seem to all be sick with different things, so at least it's not an epidemic of some kind, right? Right.

...Right?

I just hope that we can all get better soon so we can get back to work! That is what we're here for, after all. Plus, I don't know what some of the orphanages will do without us because they are so understaffed. It's rough enough when we're all working, I can't imagine how hard it would be with only 1 or 2 people! Let's just all pray for a speedy recovery.

b-a-n-a-n-a-s

This morning my roommate Chelsea and I were scheduled to work with the 2-5 year old kids. We planned a really fun activity for them last night that I was really excited about: we found a book about a monkey looking for a banana, then made up little craft bags for the kids to make their own binoculars out of toilet paper rolls that they would then use to look for paper bananas that we made to hide around the park. We made sure that each of the zip lock bags had the same stickers and crayons and materials to decorate the binoculars so there wouldn't be any fighting over materials, which has been a problem in the past. I was excited to try out a new technique of separating the kids at different tables so that each kid would have their own space to create. We were ready!

I was really looking forward to doing the activity, but around 12:30 am last night I started throwing up. And that continued about every two hours until around 9 am, then intermittently from then until about 4 pm. Needless to say, I did not go to shift. Luckily my friend Chalae was able to cover for me at the last minute which was greatly appreciated. She told me that the kids really enjoyed the activity which I was glad to hear—I like when the activities work out (they don't always...). I had an off this afternoon so I was able to rest even further and I am happy to report that I am feeling a lot better. Not 100% yet by any means, but the vomiting has come to a stop which is always nice, especially when it has a tendency to come out of my nose... I just ate a banana and it has stayed down so it looks as if I'm well on my way on the road to recovery.

Some good news about being sick: I had the whole day off so once I stopped throwing up I was able to get some things done that I had been putting off for a while. Things like showering (the last time was Thursday, no big deal), laundry (including blankets and sheets!), and, of course, blogging.

Here's to a hurl-free day tomorrow! (Hear hear!)