Once again, the Gods smite my arrogance

In my life, I always strive to live with grace. Not in the sense of being graceful like a ballerina, but in the sense of being serene and accepting and very go with the flow. I love to try and help others and often give advice. In my heart, I just want everyone to live happily.

Apparently, I get over confident and arrogant far too easily. For example, I recently posted tips on how to get over a cold super fast. They are still good tips, and they do work, but apparently I got cocky. I sat online thinking that I held the secret to good health in my hands!

The thing about having a fever is that it makes me tired. So after successfully inducing a fever, I stayed in bed to sleep it off for close to two days. I could breathe just fine, but my throat was sore and I could tell that the congestion was there, it was simply not making me miserable.

Then I got out of bed and my fever almost went away. I thought for sure that I was just about back to normal. THAT'S when the Gods decided to punish me for my arrogance. They pointed their fingers at me, laughed, and told me to suffer. (Really wish they weren't so frickin' hard on me!)

My nose suddenly felt like someone had turned on the faucet and then walked away without turning it off. I was blowing my nose every. Five. Seconds! I took my garlic, which helped in the sense that it thickened things up and effectively turned off the faucet. Except that doing that gives me a headache that most people would literally kill to get rid of.

In desperation, I took some vicodin to get rid of the headache without suppressing any of my symptoms and making them take longer to heal. I discovered something that surprised me, but upon further reflection, probably shouldn't have.

Vicdin actually clears up the sinuses. This is what I didn't want to happen since it tampers with the body's natural immunity, but it does. An hour after taking the vicodin, I felt much better... for about an hour, grr!

Vicodin is basically a legal form of opium. In the past, there was a very versatile medicine called laudanum which was basically a liquid form of opium, and it was used for headaches, coughing, as a decongestant, and to help a person sleep. Basically, all the things that drug companies would much rather we have to pay them a ton of money for instead.

Anyway, it's the same reason that codeine is so effective. I wasn't thinking about that when I took the vicodin. I took advantage of the temporary lull in my symptoms to go back to sleep because by this time, I had been awake more than 12 hours and desperately needed sleep.

BUT I need to back up a bit in my story to give you the full effect.

So, just as I was crawling out of bed feeling pretty okay from my fever - before the nose started running - Gryffin lingered in bed with a thundering cough like mine. He moaned and groaned and generally sounded pathetic. He finally managed to crawl out of his room and watched some TV.

"Mama, can you get me the bucket?"

Oh man, this is never a good sign. The bucket was actually occupied, so I got him a huge metal mixing bowl instead, and sure enough, he soon filled it. Hubby made him empty and clean it himself, which normally I would have objected to - a sick person shouldn't have to clean up after themselves after all - but I was starting to feel pretty miserable, and didn't think quick enough to object. Besides, Gryffin simply did it without complaining.

Then he lay down and moaned and groaned and coughed and sneezed for a while until I gave him some fermented cod liver oil and garlic. Then he perked up and felt better for a while. Then he went to bed and slept - which is really the best way to heal.

So - of course - the moment I am hoping to go back to bed, Gryffin is awake again. I have no idea why, but this always seems to happen with Gryffin. He tries to be awake at all times I am, even when I want to go to bed but don't want to leave him alone, sigh...

Anyway, I am tentatively feeling better today, and Gryffin is nice and quiet, cuddled up in the chair watching TV. Phoenix made himself some malt-o-meal, and is also being mostly quiet. THIS is one of the reasons I wish my kids got sick more often, but I AM grateful that they aren't sick ALL the time.

Meanwhile, I've only eaten 2 apples and a handful of pork rinds since I first got sick. One of my more unpleasant symptoms is this nasty taste that makes it unappealing to eat or drink just about anything. Now that I am feeling a little better, I think I might actually be able to eat something.

Whining alert!

So of course I have absolutely NO desire to cook! I would rather starve than cook, and I don't want to eat any carbs, so I can't just grab some cereal or another apple. Therefore, I am probably going to haunt the kitchen until I either 1- muster up the motivation to cook, or more likely 2- hubby gets home and empties MY pan which he used and then left full of carby leftovers that I can't eat.

In any case, here's wishing everyone a happy day. A happy Yule. And even better, a happy Day the World DIDN'T End :-D