I want to preface this post by saying a few things. Number 1, had I been in a right frame of mind, I would have never thought that I was actually dying. Number 2, I find with all types of stomach flu-like sickness there are a few moments when you think to yourself, "Yes, this is it. This is what death feels like, I am ready Lord, take me home." And that is regardless of if you are sick in a foreign country, you feel that way at home also. Number 3, I am typing this while I am mostly laying flat on my back which means that there may be a few typos. I find that if I sit up for too long though, I get really dizzy and it makes me sick. Number 4, I knew that Jesus was with me the entire time and I knew He would sustain me, but again when you aren't in the right frame of mind, it is easy to forget truths. Number 5, I love Honduras and yes it is really difficult and yes the last two weeks I have wanted to come home more than I have wanted to stay, but God's not ready for that yet and for whatever reason, He needs me here.
So now that I have set the stage, please sit back and enjoy that inner thoughts and struggles that I felt while I thought I was dying of a terrible disease in Honduras.
It all started on Monday when I came home from school. Monday was a great day! The kids were good, lunch was pretty tasty, I didn't have much to get ready for Tuesday, so I was feeling pretty great. I came home and went to my room and started to watch Gilmore Girls. Around 5 o'clock though, I got a really bad headache. I kind of brushed it aside, I get headaches a lot here, I thought it would go away. But it didn't and I started to feel worse. Around 7, I finally decided I would just go to bed, and I asked Samira to wake me up at 5:30am if I wasn't up the next morning.
I didn't get much sleep, I was tossing and turning and 5am came really quickly. When I opened my eyes, the whole room was spinning and my body felt like it was being held down by hundreds of weights. My head hurt and I could tell that I was running a fever. So I did what every normal 21 year old living in a foreign country would do and I called my parents. Repeatedly, and I prayed that they would answer. My mom did, she talked to me, and asked all the good mom questions that mom school teaches a mother to ask. She said she would pray for me, told me to do what I could, told me she loved me and we hung up. At that point, I decided to stand up, and I did. I slightly stumbled and wobbled out into the living room and said, "Samira I need a doctor." She told me to go and lay down and sleep and she would call me when we could go see the doctor.
We went to the doctor's office, which is also an ER, which is also a private clinic. And the doctor asked me a bunch of questions in Spanish and Samira translated. She then decided to give me an IV, to hydrate me, and maybe get ahead of this sickness. Let me tell you friends, getting an IV in Honduras is VERY different than getting an IV in America. And as I sat and saw a needle in my hand, and literally had blood spilling out and dropping to the floor, I thought to myself "huh, this seems totally safe and not that terrifying at all... Oh no wait, what is actually happening right now" (For those close enough to me I am sure that you could read that thought in my totally sarcastic voice). After they poked me, and got a blood sample they attached the IV. And I laid there and waited for the bag to empty. The doctor said everything looked okay with my blood test, I had a lot of mosquito bites, and she wanted to be sure I didn't contract something from those, She said it was probably just a virus and sent me home, but told me to come back if I had any new symptoms.
So I watched Gilmore Girls all afternoon and prayed that my headache would go away. Amanda and Samira got home from school, and neither of them was feeling 100% so we really thought, yea, this is just a little virus we just need to wait it out. I walked out to refill my water and Samira and one of our coworkers, Emilson, were sitting at the table and they both looked at me and said that I looked terrible. Which is something you don't ever want to hear, but when you hear it and you are sick, you don't care. I had fever blisters on my lips, my hair was everywhere, my cheeks were red with fever, I was a mess. I looked terrible and I felt terribler. I thought that maybe if I showered I would feel better, but that didn't work. At one point, I was laying under 3 covers, in pants, with no AC on and I was still shivering. This is when I was like "Yea, I could be dying right now." I was sick.
I did what I do every time I am sick and I need sleep and I took Nyquil. And usually that knocks me out and it sends me into a nice coma for about 9 hours. No such luck this time, I was tossing and turning and then 2am hit. I didn't think that I could get much worse and that's exactly when I did. The toilet and I became real close while the trashcan and I were also becoming real close. At the same time. (See I am a lady and therefore I don't want to use the actual terms for what was taking place in the wee hours of the morning, so that is why I am saying that both were being used at the same time.) It was during those moments in the bathroom that I was actually wondering when I was going to see the bright light, and wondering what the angels that guard Heaven's gates look like. I was also wondering what I had gotten myself into and questioning why God had called me to Honduras only for me to be slowly killed by my own body. While all this was going on, my fever was getting higher. And there was a gecko on my wall. And normally I would have gotten up and chased the gecko away, but I thought to myself, even if he bites me, I don't think I could get worse.
I was wrong. because it turns out that when you haven't eaten in 24 hours, your stomach is empty and it has nothing to get rid of... except water. So I started losing a lot of water. At some point on Wednesday afternoon, I felt well enough to walk to my scale and weigh myself. In just over 24 hours, I had lost 7 pounds. And my fever started to spike again and Samira said, lets go back to the doctor/ER/Clinic. So we went. And it was terrible. They poked me 5 times looking for a vein, one time was so painful that I was crying like an actual baby. Big tears and big sobs. Then they said I would stay the night and in my mind I was just like, "no, this is not happening. I am not going to stay in a hospital where no one speaks English and I don't speak Spanish all night." But they made me stay. And it was a rough night. I questioned why I had decided to listen to God in the first place, I wondered why He was leaving me here, I became angry with myself for not becoming fluent in Spanish before I came down here. And it got worse because every time a nurse would come in they would tell me that I should try to learn Spanish, which isn't exactly comforting when you feel like you are dying. And I wanted to cry and scream. I wanted to rip the IV out of my hand and run out of the hospital. I wanted them to know how painful it was to lay in that little bed, with my tall legs hanging off the sides, and I couldn't tell them any of it. And so I laid there and I just kept praying, and I am sure that my prayers were full of angry questions. I didn't want to be there. But I still knew that God was near to me. I just didn't think I could get through that.
And the next day I had to stay in the hospital all day. I missed Children's Day at school. They told me I could go home when I stopped going to the bathroom as much and so I forced my body to stop, At that point, all I wanted was to be in my own bed, away from the hospital that was so unlike what I was used to in the US. I wanted to stretch out, and take an ibuprofen for my pain. That's what I wanted. My friends all came to visit me in the hospital. They prayed over me, they made me laugh, they talked to the nurses for me. It was nice to see all of them.
Then they brought the bill. And dealing with the doctors in the past, everything here has been pretty cheap and I thought this one would be too. But it wasn't. It was really expensive and I didn't have enough money to cover it. I do have insurance, but you have to pay out of pocket and then be reimbursed. As we were looking over the bill, we realized that they had charged us for more than they should have. All the Hondurans thought it was too high and they tried to bring the price down, but that didn't work out too well. And I was supposed to be going home and feeling better, but all the money talk stressed me out and made me feel terrible. It was really hard not to cry. It was really hard to not become angry. I just wanted to be home, my home, in Indiana, and I was ready to ask for a ticket home. Luckily the school stepped in and lent me the money, and we will send everything to the insurance company to be reimbursed.
I am still not 100% sure what they diagnosed me with.
When I got home on Thursday night, I cried a lot. Because here is the truth friends, the truth is that I don't want to be here anymore. Living in the US is easier. It is comfortable. I had two weeks back to back with terrible stuff. I knew that Honduras was going to be hard, I knew that it would stretch me and pull me out of my comfort zone. I never expected this though. It is so hard. And I know I posted last week about being a warrior, but there are times when you aren't strong enough to pick up a sword and be one. And I know that you all would say that it isn't my strength, it is Jesus'. And that is true, but sometimes you ask for His strength and it feels like it doesn't come. That is so hard. Its hard to be miles and miles from your home and feel like you are actually dying. Knowing that you aren't, but feeling like you are. It is hard to have to think about lesson plans when you feel like you can't even stand up. It is hard to think about going back to a classroom with 23 kids when you have a headache that won't go away. And I have talked to numerous people about this, and I have cried and said that I want to come home, that I am giving it one more week.
I know that I won't quit. I know that in my head. Even thought I want to leave, I also want to stay. I have come too far to just give up. I am too much of a people pleaser to let down everyone who has supported me. And I know that this is where God wants me, and I can't give up on that. But you have to know, this is the most difficult think I have ever done in my life. And yes, you see all the hard parts because that is what I am going through right now. But there will hopefully be a day when my posts can be about all the good.
And I am not saying that there is only hard parts right now, there have been a lot of good moments here. And I love Honduras and my friends here in a way that I can't explain. I love eating baleadas and riding in the back of pick up trucks, I love walking out of the mall and seeing the glorious mountains standing tall. I love seeing the bats flying around at night. I love to chase the geckos with sticks. I love chicky cookies. I love singing American songs loudly at the mall while our Honduran friends laugh at me. I love hugging my students everyday. I love how cheap professional, expensive hair products are here. There is so much that I love and I am not ready to give up yet.
I need your prayers to keep going. I need to be reminded every minute of everyday why I am here. I need to see that all of this pain that I am going through right now is worth it. I need Jesus to be so real and evident in ways that I haven't seen before. That's what I need!!
And here we are at the end, if you read all of that, I am super impressed. The good news is, I didn't die, I lost seven pounds and I got to see a lot of people who love me in a 24 hour time period! I am still weak and tired, and I know that with every sickness, there is a time of recovery to rebuild and strengthen our bodies. That will all come with time.
Thank you for loving me. Thank you for letting me be real and authentic in my writing. Thank you for not being surprised in my moments of trials. Thank you for not trying to fix me or tell me what I am doing wrong. This is a journey and so many of you are along for the ride.
Bendiciones!
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