Bleah 2
Haven't been writing much because I've been getting ill. When the long dry weather finally turned to wet yesterday, my sinuses popped open, pouring lots of nasty stuff down the throat with lots of inflammation and coughing and fever. Mainly horizontal today; will see if tomorrow improves.

The underlying source is probably displaced stress. Been waiting since August for a start-work order from my publisher; they seem to be having budget problems and can't get organized. Rationally I shouldn't be worrying about this, because I'm safe enough financially whether they want me to continue or not. But rationality doesn't stop an expert worrywart.

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A useful and non-intuitive hint from ehow.com: Don't bundle up when you have a fever. That just holds the heat in like an oven. Wear one layer of clothing, or use minimal blankets in bed. This will be uncomfortable, but the goal is not comfort. The goal is to shed heat.

I was bundling up earlier today, and the greenhouse effect happened. Switched to ordinary clothes and one blanket, and the fever is dropping.


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Next morning (Mon): After a good long sleep with one blanket, the fever is gone and the lungs are mostly clear. I can take a deep breath without coughing. About 60% back to normal, but still sort of weak and foggy.

Afternoon: fever returned, coughing returned, but still better than first day. Always good to sense progress.

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Third day: (Tue) Fever gone in morning and hasn't returned. Lots of coughing in morning, mostly gone by afternoon. Morning coughing was more 'productive' and wet than before, seems to have done a better job of pulling the nasty stuff up and out. Still weak and foggy, but most signs are improving at this point. Let's see if we can avoid relapse.

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Fourth day: (Wed) Still no fever; coughing is down to occasional; but feeling purely awful. Had to take a taxi to the store instead of usual walk/bus. Decided to test a theory, based on Dr Zorba Pastor's NPR show yesterday. The origin of this illness (including some other odd incidents in the last couple months that I haven't written about) fits Zorba's description of GERD perfectly. I hadn't realized that GERD can also affect the lungs through irritation of the vagus nerve. Got some generic acid-blocker pills at the store. Took one; an hour later the belly-burn disappeared, and with it the general sense of illness but not the mucus.

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Fifth day: (Thu) Acid blocker let me sleep 6 solid hours for the first time in many weeks! Woke up feeling generally normal. Still occasional coughing, but no other problems. Even the brain-fog is gone, which had been worrying me.

Thank the lord for generic Pepcid! I wouldn't have thought a boiling digestive system could cause all these strange and varied problems over several months, but a constantly jangled vagus nerve can mess up nearly everything. Lungs, epiglottis, larynx, general function.

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Finally, 10th day: All over. After the mucus was gone, there were still several days of annoying dry coughs, with no obvious purpose. Now it's decisively finished.

Judging by Wikipedia descriptions, this mysterious rare tropical ailment was something known as a 'common cold'. Fits all the parameters. Sort of embarrassing to admit this. I suppose it's down-home commonplace for most folks, but it was unknown and a little scary for me. I haven't had any colds since childhood; all my down-home commonplace illnesses have been in the digestive tract.
  ¶ 3:27 PM