...like being able to talk.
I recently recovered from some sort of terrible illness. I'm not sure what it was and the doctors didn't know either. My current theory is that I just got a cold from that one time when I slept outside in the cold and rain, and then a series of poor life decisions and no sleep escalated the sickness to high levels of awful. But I WebMD'd it, and that said it could be throat cancer. So, who knows?
Anyway, it started out with just a sore throat in the middle of the week. I had been sneezing so I just brushed it off as the beginnings of a cold. Then I woke up on the weekend and I started to lose my voice. I went to bed early that night thinking a good nights rest would probably be the cure. No. I woke up the next day and I really couldn't talk at all. I went to Noodles for dinner with my friends and I had to whisper my order to the guy. He laughed at me.
This is where it started to get pretty bad, because I had to work a KOMU desk shift that night. My responsibilities include updating the website, Facebook and Twitter, checking emails, and answering the phone and making calls. That last part is a pretty big part of the job, and not being able to talk really inhibited my ability to do that. I had to give away my shift and instead spent the evening eating soup, drinking tea and trying to be quiet.
Then came the turning point when I decided I really needed to go to the doctor. I was working on a story for my journalism class, so I had to make phone calls and interview people for it. I'm frantically trying to call people to find a source and ask people important questions except I can't talk. Super annoying. I needed to be better right then. So I went to the doctor.
I told the doctor I was dying and he really didn't take me seriously. He asked me if I would make it through this visit. I said I hope so, and luckily I did. They did a bunch of tests and sent me off with a prescription for some steroids that would make my throat inflammation go down. He also said it would make my voice come back.
The medicine did make my throat hurt less, but I still really couldn't talk. The doctor also said they would call the next day when my test results came in, but they didn't. I called them back three days later to tell them I wasn't better, and the lady on the phone was looking at my test results and was like, "Umm, well it looks like all the tests came back negative... sooooo it might be a virus... so you can come back in and we can check you out again... or you can just wait a few days and see what happens..." My response was pretty much, "Awesome, thanks doctors. Let me just continue to be sick and dying and croak at the people I need to talk to."
By this time I had been sick for an entire week and I was beginning to think I was never going to get my voice back. This would be a huge problem because I kind of want to be a TV reporter, which requires talking on television for quite a few people to listen. I'd have to change my entire major. I'd have to find something else I'm interested in. That would really, really suck.
Thankfully, I slowly began to recover. It only took about three weeks for my voice to fully come back. I can keep my major and still be a TV reporter.
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