Today is actually the sixth day since I've been sick and I still have a bit residue of the sickness, You may ask; why am I using the imparfait form of être which refers to an action in the past, when I am still sick?
Well, the answer is quite simple, "For how long do you want to pamper yourself and make it a reason to not be productive?"
If you've known me for like, I don't know... at least 2 years, and you've lived with me long enough to know me inside out, then you must have realised that I rarely get sick. Know that when I do, you'll have to spend the entire week looking at a half-dead Liyana. Yup! That's Liyana for you!
Take this interesting example; Last year in March (or was it February?), I was in my final sem in IB at Taylor's. It was the most horrible semester that I've gone through honestly. I was in the middle of submitting all the IAs and doing my not-so-wonderful EE and all, when I suddenly fell really sick. My blood pressure got really low for an unknown reason. When I try to walk, I can't walk straight because my head keep spinning around and I felt like a part of my head was really light, when the rest are quite heavy.
Alhamdulillah I didn't really have anything important to submit in for that week, so once I knew that there was something wrong with me, I asked one of my housemates to accompany me to the clinic. We got there and the doctor did an examination on me. She concluded that I am feeling that way because my blood pressure was really low. She told me to drink lots of 100PLUS (or any isotonic drinks) to replenish my fluids or something. But my friend told me to not do that when we were on the way back to our apartment.
Note that I started to become sick on Monday, and it is until Friday that my parents decided to pick me up from Sri Hartamas and brought me to a hospital. In between, I skipped a lot of classes. I did come for a few, for example; Maths on Wednesday and Friday, and seeing my Theatre Arts teacher in our Theatre studio to discuss on my research essay on which day I can't remember. But during these classes, I can't hold a pen properly and it was hard for me to write down anything. The ultimate backlash moment for me was on Friday when I had Maths HL, in which my teacher decided to teach us proving/show questions. Since I can't write, so for the entire class, I took photos, which is something that I rarely do in Maths. My brain took in too much in order to understand what was being taught, so by the end of the lesson, I felt very dizzy and decided to go home, I was supposed to have English Literature right after Maths, but I told my classmate of my absence.
And so, coming back to the present: I started feeling sick on Tuesday afternoon, approximately one day after attending SCUK16. I went back to sleep after doing my Subuh prayer, and then woke up for the second time around almost noon. After breakfast (or lunch I suppose), I started to vacuum the living room and stairs, but I only used my left hand at that. You see, my right arm has been in great pain ever since I cut branches while volunteering to clear the woods. It's probably due to me overexerting myself when I was sawing off the branches, especially the stubborn-thick-hard ones. One day before, I was carrying my friend's tripod with my right hand, since I carelessly forgot that I can't utilise my right arm to do heavy labour. And of course, the previous day: I was too excited that I didn't want to miss any opportunities to play water sports, especially the katakanu that relied a lot on your arms. Interestingly, I was aware at this moment that I should avoid overstraining my right arm, so I quickly secured a spot on the left side of the katakanu, which I knew that when I row, most strength would have to come from my left arm, and my right one just as the stabiliser. But anyway... my right arm hurt a lot, to the extent that I need my other arm to support it when trying to move it.
My body temperature started to rise and I started to cough really badly. Apparently I didn't even need to make an announcement to tell people in my house that I was sick, they just knew it by heart: through the loudness of my cough and my unusual movement when I'm using the toilet. My first and second day of sickness were the toughest phase. My body temperature was really high (though I do not know how high, but I can tell you it is) and it was my turn to make an economic briefing for my group. Alhamdulillah, I did manage to complete it on time. Although I did the best that I could, condition to that I was sick, I knew I could have done better when I'm healthy.
By the third day, I decided to follow my housemate to TESCO, to get some fresh air. It took us quite a while because my walking pace was slow. Once reaching there, I had to find a place to sit, and then the toilet as a result of drinking a lot of water. I only wanted to get bread (since bread was the only food that tasted nice since my taste buds went crazy up until yesterday ie. fifth day being sick), but ended up buying a few other stuffs along the way.
I literally didn't do any revisions for the third and fourth day, even though my coursemates keep discussing answers to questions through Facebook group chat. Honestly, I was stressed out with the fact that I wasn't doing anything. So, on the fifth day, when I felt that my body temperature was at a tolerable level, I started watching videos on lecture capture (uni website where it contains all recorded lectures). I must say, my choice of module is also quite correct. I chose to start off with CDA (Computing & Data Analysis), a module in which students are taught how to use a software called STATA. I had a problem in understanding the lectures because I kept making silly mistakes when giving commands to STATA and at one point, STATA became crazy and kept making loops of repeated stuffs when I tried to load my previous works. Alhamdulillah, that is now sorted out.
But amidst all, I learnt a few things about myself, reflecting back on my sickness:
- I really like dried fruits. At TESCO, I was looking for dried fruits, but they were like soooooo expensive! I prefer dried apricots and prunes, but they were around 2 pounds more expensive than dried figs, so I bought dried figs in the end. Tracing back my past, I've been buying dried fruits since I was in secondary school. It started with dried mangoes, and then dried guava, and then other fruits. They are my snacks especially when I'm studying.
- My cravings are ridiculously wild when I am sick. I felt like eating kimchi because I wanted something that can give a "kick" when I swallow it. My older brother and younger sister will be saying "chincha?" to me in astonishment. For me~ hehe~ since I still prefer Japanese over Korean, I told myself "hee~ majide?" instead.
- It doesn't hurt to let my parents/family know that I'm sick. Because of the fact that I'm here in the UK and they're over there back in Malaysia, I thought that it wouldn't really be much of a big deal for them to know of my current wellbeing. They kinda found out about it through my FB post and immediately asked me about my health (OMG now I feel like I have to control what I post because they're stalking me, just kidding). But I guess I should have informed them too so that they can give me tips/remedies to fight off the sickness.
- 21, and still not sure how to use water effectively when swallowing a pill. No need explanation, I guess... I'm old enough to be called a lady but I still need to use my finger to push the pill down to my throat, or else, I'll just be drinking lots of water without actually swallowing the pill.
Well, that's it for this post, I know, such a ridiculous one at it. Macam tak bermanfaat sgt la for you who are reading this.
