Strep. Blech.

Did you know that adults can get strep throat?

Okay, okay, I suppose that anyone can really get anything. But I really didn't know that adults got strep with any regularity. I have since learned otherwise!

CAM had strep about two months ago.  Poor kiddo. She was miserable, but we caught it pretty quickly, and within one day of taking her amoxicillin ("bubble gum," as we call medicines in our house) she felt 100% better.

I woke up Monday morning and felt downright miserable.  I'm not talking a case of the Mondays, I'm talking, I had cramps, my legs hurt, the back of my head hurt, my throat hurt, I couldn't get warm no matter what I did, I had a tinge of a headache ... and I was completely voiceless.  It hurt to swallow.

Okay, okay, so I was sick.  I went to work, though, because last Thursday I had been able to get a last-minute dentist's appointment to make up for the one we had to cancel for our snowpocalypse two weeks ago, and since we only see our kids every other day, if I missed Monday it would have meant not seeing those groups of kids for over a week by the time this Wednesday rolled around.  That was a long sentence. Hopefully you followed the point: I felt an obligation to my students, particularly my AP Statistics bunch, who have that AP Exam coming at us pretty furiously.

My students were amazing.  For those of you that are doubters about high schoolers, I will tell you that they rise to the occasion when their teacher is sick. (Or at least in my teaching experiences, my kids always have.)  Truly: I was voiceless, and you could hear a pin drop in my three classes, as I tried my darndest to get through the material in each period.  But I'll tell you what: I taught periods 1, 2, and 3, and had prep period 4. I emailed the principal and got permission to go home.  I was reduced to nothingness by the end of my teaching day.

I got home and took a long, hot, shower and crawled, sobbing, into bed.  At this point I'd eaten almost nothing and had a full-on migraine to boot. A friend texted me and asked how I was feeing and I replied that I felt like death.

(I wanted to say I felt like I was pregnant, because that's pretty much how my pregnancies felt until we got the morning sickness under control, but I didn't want her to misinterpret.  Mick gets it, and my sister Courtney gets it; not too many other folks do!)

I took an Excedrin, which helped the throat and the headache, but not in a "made it better" kind-of way -- more in a "took the edge off" kind-of way.

Still, Mick wanted me to call in sick for Tuesday and I wouldn't do it.  I know that when I am getting sick, a lot of times that whole sore-throat thing only lasts a day.

And then Tuesday rolled around, and I was worse.  WHAT?!?!

Sooooo, off to the doctor we went.  And yep -- it's strep.  All my flu-like symptoms were apparently my body's reaction to the strep. The doctor said it was a systemic response. I had a flu shot this season, so I was relieved to learn it was not a super-strong version of the flu.

Why am I blogging about all this?

Well, most of you know me in real life, and everyone has reached out to ask how I am doing, but I can't talk!  So I'm writing it here, instead.  Besides, in a few years I will be able to look back and remember this week fondly.

hahahahahahahah

I'm taking some meds and the flu-like part is starting to get better, but man oh man, my throat.  I'm supposed to gargle some prescription numbing gel (mixed with water to make it gargle-able) to help, but I've tried twice and it's made me gag both times. So I've got that going for me! I went back to the salt and hot water.

In the meantime, I was supposed to co-lead a professional development session today after school and I've had to bail on that, which really, really stinks. And of course my Algebra 2 classes were at a unit change, so they are in a holding pattern until I get back.  These are the goods and bads of an every-other-day schedule: I don't miss quite as much time with each individual class, but because I see them every other day, it hurts more. If I miss again tomorrow, I will have missed a full week with 50% of my classes. That's insane!

In any event, I have spent the past two days mostly sleeping, with intervals of lucidity and checking in on Facebook and email and here, a quick blog post.  I also have a whole new respect for those who say they have strep throat.

Yowsa.

--Jen

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