Severely Mild Cause for Alarm

I have West Nile Virus.

Or so I thought at 6:30 a.m. this morning when I started planning my own eulogy and what it would be like to be admitted to the hospital. Death and hospital admittance both experiences I have thus far not experienced personally (*knock on wood*).

What I do have is a mosquito in the house with a fucked up sense of humor and a severely mild case of hypochondria. (I have the hypochondria. I don't know if the mosquito is also crazy.)


So last Monday I woke up with 3 mosquito bites on one arm and one on my jawline. I'm one of those people who mosquitos love. Sit me next to 5 people and I'm the only one bitten. The fun part is that my body, like my mind, overreacts. Bites don't get big and itchy like a normal person's; they get giant, hot, and then bruise because blood vessels burst and they itch like... like something worse than mosquito bites.

So I whined for 3 days straight. I put on 3 different anti-itch creams and used ice and benadryl to calm the itch. Days passed. Bruises formed. Bruises started to heal.

This morning, a week later, I woke up in the middle of the night with a sore throat due to a swollen gland in my neck. One. It's always the left one. Like the right one is broken or is attached to a different immune response. When I got up this morning I felt feverish (mildly) and tired (which is pretty normal for 6 a.m., but I was busy overreacting).

I started examining myself closely. Am I sallow? Dark circles? I Googled "west nile virus" from my phone and learned that 1 in 5 people who contract the virus have symptoms. Just my luck, you know? I eat right and work out and I'm one of the 20% who is going to be sick for weeks. Or die. Like 1% of people who get West Nile die. Did you know that? And now I'm going to die.

As I put my make up on I started imaging my life without me. How will I go on? Who will take the cats? Thank god I didn't buy a house because that would be a real hassle for my family what with my death and all...

I arrived at the office not even worried about the 9:00 meeting with the President of the company because I'd be in rushed to the ER by 8:45.

And suddenly it was 10:30 and other than burning from rage during my 9:00 meeting, I didn't have the fever I was never sure I had anyway because I never officially checked.

And suddenly it was 2:30 and my swollen gland wasn't swollen and hurty anymore.

I skipped the gym tonight anyway because it's obvious I need to rest and I could be dead later... and sitting on my couch telling you about this was way more important. I'll workout tomorrow... if I survive.

Also, I have 4 new mosquito bites today: forehead (awesome), 2 on my left arm (the 3 from last Sunday into Monday were on the right arm) and chest (mild relief as I thought I was growing a chest horn earlier today).

In conclusion, I have a problem and it isn't West Nile. Real people get it and 20% get sick and 1% die and the only way I can cope with these odds is by assuming it's me until it isn't. It's amazing how relieved you can be waking up each day realizing you don't have the horrible disease you thought you might have despite a complete lack of symptoms or supporting evidence. It's called perspective.

This one time, in 2006, I went to India... where mosquitos carry malaria. I stopped taking the malaria pills because they made me nauseous. Guess how long I thought I had malaria?

Indian selfie. Let's pretend that pimple on my chin is a
mosquito bite containing malaria.... for dramatic effect.