My Disastrous Symptom Flare & How I Plan to Get Out of It

Before I’d even opened my eyes, I knew something was terribly wrong. Every muscle in my body hurt. I was drenched in sweat. My heart was racing. I had an 101º fever.

As I lay there trying to will myself out of bed, my heart-monitor watch went off, warning of a high heart rate. I didn’t think much of it because I had a fever, so of course my heart would be above 100.

But then it kept going off. Again. And again.

Not having it, I rolled over and slapped on my blood pressure cuff. My pulse was 166. Crap crap crap! This was really happening again.

Continue reading “My Disastrous Symptom Flare & How I Plan to Get Out of It”

Remember M.E.: Why I’m Missing Today

Today was Graduation Day for my master’s degree…

But I’m not graduating.

And I don’t mean that I’m not getting an in-person ceremony, the same as the rest of the class of 2020. I mean that I’m not graduating because my illness forced me to leave grad school halfway through a degree.

For years, I had planned on going to grad school, getting a PhD, and then becoming a professor. I liked school and liked the tutoring job I had in college, so I thought teaching and researching at a university was what I wanted. Continue reading “Remember M.E.: Why I’m Missing Today”