On the road to recovery

Well I am getting better. I am so bored of being in my apartment. I'm totally well enough that I could be around people, but most of my friends live a little too far for me to walk still. I walked to the Creamery last night. That was a terrible experience. I think I will have to wait one more week before I make an hour-long walking trip to my friends. If only the roads and sidewalks weren't covered in ice, I might be able to use my bicycle, but I fear that might be dangerous.

Speaking of ice, we had a ton of that on Thursday. If you are a fellow BYU student reading this, you will know exactly what I mean, but to my family from the desert, let me try to explain to you the anomaly that was freezing rain. It was below freezing...yet it was raining. I am quite used to having it snow and then melt as soon as it touches the ground, but this was the opposite. It was raining, and as soon as it touched the ground, it froze. Every sidewalk was covered in a layer of ice. BYU was a giant ice skating rink. We had no friction. And in case you didn't already know, I have to walk 30 minutes to get to school. But Thursday it took me an hour and a half to get to class (I was SO late). I was slipping and sliding all over the place. I fell three times, and the third time was the worst. Utah just loves to have these underground parking lots underneath apartment buildings with SUPER steep driveways. Well I slipped at the top of once of those, landed pretty painfully on my hip, my hat and umbrella went flying (for the third time), and I founding myself sliding down the driveway. I flipped over to my hands and knees and dug my fingers into the ground, trying to find something to hold on to, but there was nothing and there was no friction. I slid, crying from landing on my hip, all the way to the bottom. And then I was stuck down there. Because the ice was so slippery, I couldn't get back up the driveway! I hugged the wall trying to pull myself up the driveway as my feet continued to slide everywhere. A man came and helped me out of there, retrieved my umbrella and hat, and saw me safely to the street where there was less ice. Looking back, I now find it hilarious, but at the time I was in pain and I was still very sick from the flu. I had a paper due that day, and so I knew I had to go to school, but I still did not feel well enough to leave my apartment. Luckily, a woman gave me a ride to campus after that third fall.

I'm doing better now, but I am recovering very slowly. My body has started this sort of coughing that sounds like I am wheezing and honestly it sounds like I am barely coughing at all, but in truth I am coughing as hard as I possibly can. But there simply isn't enough force behind the cough to get the fluid out of my lungs. And yet, my body continues to try. So I cough...and I cough...and I don't stop coughing...and I don't get any relief...ALL NIGHT LONG!

But really I am doing better, I'm just complaining because I am tired of being sick. I want to be well already!

I made a most interesting connection the other day. So I haven't had much of an appetite all week. For a while I couldn't taste anything, and even now I still really don't have an appetite. And so I ate very very little for quite a few days in a row. Originally, the only thing that sounded good was bread. I craved a sandwich. And then I started craving fruit. And then I really started wanting cookies. Cookies, brownies, ice cream...any sort of sugar would do...but I didn't have any. And I figured it's unhealthy anyways. So I continued to starve myself. Then I saw something online that reminded me that when you starve yourself, your metabolism slows and your body really needs energy in the form of carbs. That's when I stopped and went "wait a second. Bread? Fruit? Cookies? I've been craving carbs all week. Oh. I think it's about time I ate something." So yep that was my brilliant discovery. Sometimes I amaze myself...mostly that I could be so stupid.

And that was my week. The take home message is don't starve yourself, and watch out for frozen sidewalks.
The end.

Back to School Again, Except for Today

Since I have been in bed all day, I guess now is the perfect time to update the blog. This semester looks like it will be better than last semester. I am taking Mission Prep, New Testament, Strengthening Marriage and Family, Statistics, Ballroom Dance, Intro to SFL, and Human Development. My Human Development class has really got me thinking. I want to work with children, and I'm starting to wonder if maybe Human Development is a little closer to what I am interested in than Family Studies. It would still be the same major  (Family Life), just a different emphasis. Obviously I just started the course, so I don't want to jump to any conclusions yet, but it's got me wondering.

I'm definitely staying within the Family Life major though. I feel very confident about that. Last Friday I had my first class for Intro to SFL (School of Family Life) and I felt so strongly that I had chosen the right major. The speaker told us that if you ask anyone, "in sixty years, looking back at your life, what would you consider a successful life?" the majority of people will first think of their family and close relationships. In the church we are taught that the family is essential to God's plan and (besides Christ himself) is the most important thing in the church. The speaker than told us "So congratulations on choosing to study the most important thing in the world." That's when it really hit me. After all this time of considering pretty much every major out there, I felt the Spirit tell me "you have chosen well."

Last week was very fun. My FHE brother Mark came up to visit us one day. It was so great to see him. Our FHE brother Kenny sent us a picture of his first baptism with the captioning "The definition of SWAG." And our FHE brother Drew sent us a Christmas card, which is his first form of contact with us since he left a year ago. On Friday, I got to spend time and sleep over at my Spring Term roommates' apartment. We watched like 4 hours of "Say Yes to the Dress" and also watched Peter Pan. It was awesome.

My mission call has been temporarily postponed, but I'm hoping I'll get it in two weeks. I should have gotten it this week, so that's disappointing, but now that I am sick, I guess a trip down to Vegas this weekend to open the call wouldn't have been the most fun thing. I've been lying in bed most of the day. Yesterday I started to feel like I might be getting sick, but my symptoms weren't very clear. I felt chilled all day, and my body felt sore all over, and I just felt kind of icky, but other than that, there didn't seem to be anything really wrong with me. Then that evening I started to get a headache and a fever. The headache was mild though, and the fever didn't last too long, so I figured whatever I had, I would be better soon. And then I went to bed.

Last night was one of the worsts night I have ever had. I woke up every hour, sometimes multiple times an hour, because my body temperature kept fluctuating. Even though I had my electric blanket on, I woke up the first time curled in a ball shivering very hard, unable to sleep because I was so dang cold. I turned my electric blanket on to the highest level, put on my house coat, and fell back asleep, still shivering. An hour later, I woke up covered in sweat. My body temperature had dropped. So I turned down my electric blanket, took off my house coat, fell back asleep, only to wake up an hour later freezing again. This lasted all night long. By morning, I had an intense headache and my legs and back really hurt. I've been taking Motrin so for the majority of the day I haven't felt too bad, it's just when the medicine wears off that my fever comes back.

Even with being sick however, I still experience little blessings in my life. Yesterday I was running late for school, when someone offered to give me a ride to campus. Such a blessing! And my Relief Society President brought me a very delicious brownie when she found out I was sick. And I am ever so glad that my sister Kimberly gave me a Massaging Body Roll for Christmas because that helped the muscles in my legs to not be so tight.

Well, I've run out of things to say, so I'll end here and wish you all that you don't get sick.

Happy New Years!

My vacation is pretty much over. I leave for Provo tomorrow morning. I really hope this next semester is better than last semester. These last three weeks have been lovely, exciting, fun, and full of love. The first week of break I worked on my mission papers. That was a whole lot of needles. You know how this summer I discovered that I have a fear of needles when I went to have my wisdom teeth pulled? Well that fear resurfaced again, and I almost fainted while getting my tuberculosis skin test. I say almost because I could still hear, I was still conscious, but I blacked out and I went limp, so I pretty much fainted. After that I was terrified of the following shots and blood tests I had to go through that week. But luckily, I was able to get through them with no more fainting spells.

The next week was of course Christmas. My sisters and their families came over for Christmas Eve, and then we went to my sister's house for Christmas. Then two days later we left for Florida. We spent the first day in Epcot, which we all enjoyed a lot. It was fun to say "We're off to Mexico! And then we'll go to China. It's right next door!" The next day we went to Universal Studios, where we spent the majority of the day in Harry Potter World. It was truly amazing. Extremely packed, but magical nonetheless. I took pictures of pretty much every inch of that place. I drank butterbeer and bought myself a wand. The rest of the day, I proceeded to cast numerous spells on my family and the people around me.

Sunday was hilarious. The plan was to drive to my sister's hotel, pick her and her husband up and go to a church that was near them. Unfortunately, we got lost. Pretty badly. By the time we got to the church...church was over. The only thing going on was the Spanish branch's Sunday School. Well at least we tried.

New Years Eve was in the Magic Kingdom. The majority of the day was happy and magical with the whole family smiling and laughing. But having woken up at 6 in the morning (which would be 3:00 Vegas Time), by 11:00 pm we were exhausted and getting cranky. But it was exciting to count down in Magic Kingdom and watch the amazing firework show. It was the most exciting New Years Eve any of us has ever had. We spent New Years in the Animal Kingdom, and the following day in Hollywood Studios. Finally yesterday, before we flew home, we went to Gatorland, which was really cool. The gators were huge and ugly and I got to feed and play tug-of-war with a giant tortoise as it tried to eat the stick in my hand.

And well, I'm in Vegas again, watching Aladdin. It was a great week, and starting tomorrow, it's back to reality. : ( Well at least I got three wonderful weeks of much needed vacation. Happy New Years Everyone!