i have amoebas!

hey all,

sorry for the hiatus in posting...i've been a little occupied the past few days.

last week, my famliy decided to take a family vacation to the coast, and asked me to accompany them, seeing as im a part of their family. prior to leaving, i already had a minor cold, with a tiny sore throat and some mild fatigue. well, by the end of the trip (tuesday, to be exact) i was nauseous, head achy, stomachy, and vomity. yep, as expected (i knew i'd get it at some point! my nurse friends here in Quito warned me...but as usual, i choose food over amoebas...or should i say THEY chose ME!) i had ingested amoebas in some of the food while on the coast. and get this...the coast isn't 20 minutes away like it is in Vancouver...it's a whopping 5 hour drive. aiyaiyai, i took a Gravol and prayed that i wouldn't puke on the way home. thankfully, the nausea subsided while i was lying in the laps of my bro and sis the entire trip holding my head cos it was throbbing.

i arrived home tuesday nite to a rainy Quito (finally!) but i couldn't enjoy the rain that i love so much, because i was so weak and had to sit. did i mention that i hadn't eatan anything all day except for a small portion of scrambled eggs and some plantain? when i saw lunch, i saw "perdon" and ran to hotel room... lunch didn't look very appetizing. all i had consumed aside from that was a bottle of Gatorade to keep myself from dehydration (my last hospital experience in Tanzania taught me to drink Gatorade when you puke/poop too much)

well, we took my temperature and i was only .4 over what's normal...so i wasn't alarmed. despite my lack of appetite i wanted to eat something cos i knew that it was affecting my body negatively...i was so weak! so, i ate one cookie, and drank a cup of tea...and immediately vommitted. dun dun DUN...time to go to the hospital. thankfully, as i've bragged since i've been here, HCJB has Hospital Vozandes right across the street from HCJB so...at 10pm, Faby and Fabian drove me to the hospital where we filled out the necessary paperwork and i was admitted into emergency. it sounds more drastic than it really was... anyways... the doctor came in and i explained to her what was happening, and Faby filled in the rest cos i forgot what else was wrong with me, and she informed me that i had to get an IV....NOOOOOOO NOT AGAIN!! i begged her NOOOOOOO (my last IV was in Tanzania, and while it wasn't bad, i HATE...LOATHE, DESPISE needles of any sort!) so...she gave me a formula to drink for the next hour...1/4 cup every 10 minutes. it was gross...so there i laid...trying to keep a conversation going with my bro so i would not think about the taste. after consuming this liquid, the doc informed me that she needed a stool sample. ick, yet again. but hey, you gotta do what you gotta do.

... ... ...

half an hour later, "i have your results Debbie...you have amoebas." i was half relieved, half laughing, because i immediately thought of my nurse friends, and my host family joking about getting amoebas, and was relieved that it wasn't something else like malaria! well, about 15 minutes later, i started to get all painful again, and she informed me that she had to now give me the IV. here's the funny part...I THOUGHT IT WAS AN IV, BUT IT TURNED OUT TO BE A SHOT OF MEDICATION. i don't have veins, well, very large ones anyways. in Tanzania, the nurse took 15 minutes to find a vein, and the same thing happened in Quito. so eventually, they shot a vein in my hand, and i screamed so loud! gripping my bro's hand trying not to pee my pants...yelling "why the heck is my ENTIRE arm hurting?!?!?!?!?" as Faby asked the nurse and tried to calm me down simultaneously, she informed us that it was a very strong medication and that my reaction was normal. gee, thanks. good to know, i was being "normal."

well, at 1:15am, we left the hospital, and i felt much better. the medication worked, i was prescribed some pills for my little amoebas and im home free. i still can't eat a normal diet, and am restricted to rice, chicken, bread...not cheese, yogurt, milk, boo. i have a follow-up appointment tomorrow with a family doctor to make sure i'm doing ok. all in all, i still have the sniffles, and a cough, but will hopefully deal with that tomorrow.

hey, this is what makes life exciting. maybe not for you, but it provides for a memorable experience on an already exciting journey. stick around, i'm sure there will be more!

for you nurses out there, or anyone else that knows, perhaps you can provide me with a better explanation of what exactly amoebas are and how they affect me long term, if they do at all?

my computer died this morning too...so it's getting fixed upstairs. (im writing this after work on James computer) i can't wait to get back to work...i miss work.

healthily yours,
dL

PS: the coast is beautiful, as always, and the ocean is tepid - perfect for swimming.