It's like freshman year all over again

My absolute worst grades by a longshot in college came my second semester freshman year. It was a difficult pill to swallow, especially being an overachieving 4.0 student in high school (like every other Georgetown kid), and somehow managing to pull the same my first semester in college (those days are long gone). I do have an excuse. A feeble one, maybe, but one I will stand by to the grave.

I got the swine flu.

No, seriously. May 2009, when swine flu was still mostly just a huge internet joke and didn't actually happen in the US, I came down with it, right during finals week. I refused to go to the doctor, partly because I'm awful about going to the doctor but mostly because Georgetown's student health center is absolutely garbage. I waited until I was safe at home in Seattle, feverish, and too weak to walk unaided until finally agreeing to let my mom haul my sorry ass to the hospital, where I found out that not only did I have swine flu, I also contracted a healthy case of pneumonia on top of that.

I could have died. You would think I learned my lesson. Google sure did:

(I wish this picture were a joke. It's not. Try it in your own google browser!)

I didn't learn my lesson. Just this past semester, I got a sinus infection, and instead of going to the doctor to get a simple round of antibiotics (been there, done that, many times), I thought this time I'd "tough it out". Unfortunately things never work out as planned. I got bronchitis, on top of my severe sinus infection, and couldn't leave my bed for a good ten days. How I did not fail out of college in the process is still mystery to me.

Today is July 18th, 2011. It is not second-semester freshman year. It is also not second-semester junior year. It's "you're about to be a senior in college and people are going to start expecting you to act like an adult" year. Oops.

I'm pretty sick. I started getting really sharp pain in my abdomen area on Tuesday and thought I'd just tough it out (though I have good reason this time--I am constantly plagued with stomach aches of all kinds due to a poor digestive system). It got worse. I reluctantly went to go see my doctor. Appendicitis, he said, and sent me to the hospital to get a CT scan. Drank an ocean's worth of godawful contrast fluid. Got hooked up to an IV. Results: the area where my lower and upper intestine meet (aka where my appendix is) was inflamed, but they couldn't see my actual appendix on the scan. According to my doctor it's rare for someone to have appendicitis without the appendix showing up as inflamed on the scan, no matter how small. Apparently I have a very small appendix (or an appendix on hiatus... where to, no one knows). So the radiologist literally shoo-d me out of his office, and I went home.

Home is where I am now. If I don't get better, I'm going to have to get another CT, and then maybe even a colonoscopy. In light of that, I'm forcing myself to feel better. For now, at least, I'm going to take advantage of this opportunity to curl up in bed with some decaffeinated tea and inhale the rest of George R.R. Martin's epic "A Dance with Dragons." I've learned rather personally this summer that life is always better when you make happiness a choice, rather than a result of circumstance.

And, hey. There are much worst things in life than my current deal. GRRM could've hit a severe writer's block and published the 5th book in his series next year. That would have been real pain. Not this silly mummer's farce of a sick girl.