Saturday 15 May 2010

A Lovely Tonsilitis Pharyngitis Cocktail

Long time no rant. What can I say, when someone who has ME is well enough to work, that's pretty much all they have time to do. I only work 16 hours per week but trust me, it pretty much takes up everything I have. Absolutely knackered on a daily basis right now. I do love my job and my colleagues though so don't think I am complaining. The negative effect is that because I'm so exhausted I have been very prone to illness and infection lately.

This week this finally got the better of me and has kicked the crap out of me. By the time I went to the doctors I was pretty rough and losing the plot a bit. The diagnosis - Tonsillitis and Pharyngitis all at once. Lovely. To many people tonsillitis is no big deal but to me, and I suspect many other ME-ers it absolutely destroys me. I've been in bed for about 4 days now and on the penicillin for 3 of them and still not feeling any better, it better start to kick in soon. My neck feels like a bag o'marbles and is not enjoying having to hold my head up. I guess these regular bouts of knock-you-out illnesses are just something I will have to live with, and have lived with for a long time but they still have the capacity to make me utterly miserable and despairing. I bashed my bonce in the shower the other morning due to illness induced lack of spacial awareness and was so out of it i stood in the shower and cried. I then laughed about the fact I was stood in the shower crying because I'd bashed my head in a kind of 'look at the state of you' way.

I always come through these glitches and plod on in the end but it is tough to keep motivated when you pretty much know you're only gonna have so many healthy days each month. One thing ME has been responsible for is denying me social contact. I have to live with my parents as I have no money to move out and pay rent elsewhere and am only able to work part time so have no potential for more income for the foreseeable future. This would be OK but as my parents live miles from anywhere and hundreds of miles from all my friends and other family I feel I am wasting away alone up in the sticks whilst all my friends live their lives without me. I have now reached the point where I get jealous if they go to the pub, in a pathetic 'I wanna go out and have fun' sort of way. I really do have the feeling I am missing out on life and will be forever alone and lonely, all because of ME and not being able to be independent.