What have we learned?

I fought the protozoa and the protozoa lost. It's like I have an inhuman ability to heal myself! I came back from a 74 platelet count and barely any white blood cells to speak of without a transfusion (or required medevac to Bangkok for said transfusion). It would make anyone feel special. Also, the purple, yellow and green bruise blossoms surrounding my track marks make me feel good about my choice to never, ever become an intravenous drug user. Except for saline solution. Sweet, life-giving 4 bags of saline on Day 4. That was good, after I stopped crying. Not good? Needles. And the incompetent male nurses who wield them at SOS Clinic when digging around INSIDE your arm looking for veins. And failing! Making me cry and cry and reinforcing my needlephobia just when I was starting to get over it.

To be honest, now that I feel tons better, I don't know what to say about the dengue. You sleep and writhe a lot. There's not much to do beside writhe when you're awake because you have no energy and no appetite. Tylenol is surprisingly powerful stuff. Not eating hurts your stomach. Water tastes bad and trying to suck down too many electrolyte solutions when you are dehydrated and undernourished doesn't work and you will feel better once you go to the clinic and let them IV you for a while, even though IVs are scary. Your coworkers and roommates will realize they are your only friends and will rise to the occasion, keeping you supplied with Royal D (it's basically Tang), Saltines, baby food, and bottled water. They will listen to your feverish ramblings about what you were like in high school, how your mom makes toast, apple sauce and scrambled eggs for dinner when you're sick, and how you want to travel across the Arctic with Bear Grylls because he's hot and it's cold there. You'll despair and fear bleeding from the eyeballs.

Now that I have survived a tropical disease that has no cure, does this make me superior somehow? Like maybe a superhero? Ned survived amoebic dysentery, but really, isn't that just a fancy term for shitstorm? Dengue's kinda fun to say, and since most of my memories were destroyed by low blood sugar and febrile malaise I guess I don't feel that bad about it. Still don't want to bleed from my eyeballs, though. That's what happens when you get it again.