Living With Mono: The Ups and Downs

So, I said I would post about living with Mono again, but I didn't expect to write about it again so soon. Then this weekend happened and it was like having Mono was making me see everything in a new light.

So, having Mono totally sucks! I hate being tired. All through high school and my life I've always tried to monitor my sleep schedule so that I get around 8 hours of sleep every night and stick to a pretty solid bedtime, just because I like to get up early and have a productive day and that is super hard to do if you don't have a good basis of sleep to work with. Well, since getting sick around a week and a half ago, I haven't had a good night's sleep once! I am suddenly an insomniac and it is AWFUL! I'm just tired all of the time and then when it's finally time to sleep I can't, either because my head hurts too badly to sleep or my neck can't get comfortable on my pillow or I'm thirsty or my throat just kills. So, that was the dire situation on Friday that I was facing. 

Friday (Not one of my best days, I'll admit):

8:00 a.m. Got up after a horrible night sleep.

9:00 a.m. Dragged myself to class, unshowered and ready to go right back to bed.

11:00 a.m. Drove home and got into work out clothes(my pajamas from the night before) Turned on my Jillian Michaels Killer Buns and Thighs tape and made it through the warmup and the first two exercises before I gave up out of complete exhaustion.

--Laid on the couch in a Mono induced zombie state.

12:00 p.m. Cancelled a study session with my Math study buddy.

12:30 p.m. Turned on National Treasure.

1:00 p.m. Dragged myself off the couch to make lunch. I had no appetite, but I realized my stomach kind of hurt, so I thought food would help.

Anyone that knows me well will already see what a mess I was in. I consider myself a pretty motivated person, and even when I am tired or stressed or just don't want to do something like exercise or homework I can pretty much get myself going and jump into it. Another thing about me, I don't usually watch movies, especially not alone, and never during the most productive part of the day.

As I laid there on the couch in a messy house, unshowered, with homework and exercise being neglected, not even texting my friends, it reminded me of one other time in my life when I had lost all motivation. One weekend right after I had moved out, I learned that my grandma had just passed away. I had just finished a very hard stressful week at school and I was just so tired. That weekend like this Friday, I had just laid in my bed, shut out from the world, and watched movies. 

3:00 p.m. I got up. My sister called me saying she needed a ride to the testing center and so I got up to help her out. I brought along a leftover milkshake I had in the freezer. As Catherine took her test I laid in my car, eating ice cream and listening to a Christian rock station on the radio. Still not very productive, but at least I was out of the house. :)

4:00 p.m. I did my easy homework

6:30 p.m. Went to my little sisters' piano recital and ate lots of the cookies there.

8:00 p.m. Back at home. This is when I started to freak out a little bit. I was reviewing my day in my head and just thinking about how intensely gross I felt. All I'd had since 1:00 that day was sugar: ice cream, sugar-y cereal, brownies and a cookie. I hadn't worked out at all because I was too tired to do a single squat. I had laid around in dirty workout clothes/pajamas watching movies and only doing a couple easy school assignments. Plus I was still tired. Was this what my life would be like for the next two months of having Mono? I couldn't bear the thought.

But like the saying goes, when you've hit rock bottom, the only way you can go is up!

That night I took some ibuprofin right before I went to bed. In addition, I left a full water bottle by my bedside. When I woke up in the night I drank water and could go right back to sleep. Since having Mono I've had to sleep with my mouth open in order to keep my airway open because of my swollen tonsils and mild asthma. Since I live in such a dry place, I realized my insomnia was in large part due to dehydration and a dry mouth and throat.

 The next morning after trying those new tricks I felt almost normal! So, I headed to the gym. I actually did a real workout! I love designing my own strength training workouts. Since getting sick though, I haven't had enough energy to really do one, cause they're pretty intense. Jillian Michael's book Slim for Life gave some guidelines to design a good circuit training work out and they are killer, but build muscle so quickly. As I was doing the workout at the gym, a lady on one of the elliptical machines saw me checking the workout plan I had made and asked what program I was doing, I told her I used Jillian Michaels' book to design my own program, she said that was very impressive. I was just thinking, "Aw yeah! And that's from a girl with Mono!" It was pretty awesome. :) 

The rest of my day wasn't as great as that morning, but I felt better that I had gotten a work out in, so even though I was tired, I didn't have a panic attack about losing all my muscle again.

The next day was Sunday. Again, I used my tricks of ibuprofin before bed and then water in the night. I woke up feeling pretty good, to top things off, after church I had a giant smoothie and I can barely feel the Mono getting to me!
Two good days to the one bad, isn't a horrible ratio, and hopefully using the tricks I've learned, the good days will highly outnumber the bad!

6 Tips and Tricks for living with Mononucleosis

1. Take ibuprofin! It helps with swollen tonsils, lymph nodes, and headache

2. Take ibuprofin before bed! Makes sleeping a lot easier

3. Hydrate up! Drink lots of water all the time, keep a water bottle by your bed

4. Eat at mealtimes. Mono can suppress appetite so even

 if food doesn't sound appealing, eat-- it helps with fatigue

5. Watch your sugar intake. Even though it seems like it will give you energy,

 too much will just make you feel worse.

6. Be patient with yourself. If you can't exercise one day, don't beat yourself up for it.

Mono

So, I've been feeling slightly ill for a week or so now, nothing too serious, just  fatigue, swollen lymph glands in my neck, and then recently I developed a sore throat. Anyone that has some medical experience will probably see that fateful triad along with my college age and know exactly what I have. But for me, who is probably the only Bio major that doesn't study about everyday occurring diseases, I had not a clue what my symptoms indicated.

 A couple days ago the sore throat got to be extremely painful, my tonsils were all aflame and it looked like Strep throat. So, I went to the doctor. He asked a few questions and looked at my throat and said to me, I think we'll need to do some blood work, and test for Mono. Wait a second... MONO!!!???

Of all of the diseases my hypochondriac brain could conceive, from throat cancer to Strep to leukemia I had not even thought of Mono once. I was in sort of a denial as the friendly Phlebotemist took my sample, and then five minutes later I was told that indeed, I had Mononucleosis.

I left the doctor's office to go to my Psychology class. During the class I read the info packet the doctor had given me. I knew a little about Mono, but I learned a lot more during the next couple of days-

Mononucleosis Facts

1. It's known as the kissing disease

2. It is spread through saliva through kissing or sharing drinks, toothbrushes or eating utensils

3. It is caused by the Epstein-Barr virus

4. 90% of the population will have had the virus by the time they are 40

5. The virus only causes Mononucleosis if the primary(first time)

 exposure is during adolescent and young adult years

6. You only get Mono once

 7. After you've had the disease, small amounts of the virus

 may periodically reoccur in your saliva

8. Symptoms are a sore throat, swollen lymph glands, 

fatigue, and mild fever lasting about 2 weeks,

 then lingering fatigue and malaise (feeling of general discomfort)

 for about 2 more months

9. It enlarges your spleen, which can cause it to rupture

10. There is no cure

So let's start with number one, it's known as the kissing disease. I always associated Mono with kissing and thereby never thought I would have to worry about getting it. Getting Mono was always a joke with my friends and me, I had a good friend whose sister had gotten Mono up at college (she said from a drinking fountain, not from kissing), so whenever we shared a water bottle she always called it her mono water and warned me about it.

I'm kind of a joking hypochondriac. My sister and I rarely get sick, we have been blessed with amazing immune systems, but we jokingly say whenever we have a headache or heartburn or any symptom it is always a form of cancer, heart disease, or AIDS. I know that's terrible because some people really have those, but being a teenager I don't think those can harm me, so I feel safe joking about them. With my sister and my study buddy at school I've joked about having almost every disease I've heard of, every one except for Mono.

The point is, Mono was always a joke in my mind, something I'd never get. When the doctor told me I had it, I didn't believe him. When I told my family I had it, they didn't believe it either. My older sister actually started to laugh.

Now that I've had Mono for a couple days I've decided it's not going to be so bad. It's not really that embarrassing, only slightly painful and it does have some perks, for instance, now that I have Mono I don't have to worry about any boys other than mono-ridden ones wanting to kiss me, (cough cough, Yannick Periou) and second, I don't have to worry about anyone stealing my ice cream out of the freezer which I marked it "BIOHAZARD-May contain Mono!" :) 

I could write about how horrible Mono makes sleeping and exercising and trying to have enough energy to do anything, but I'd rather dwell on the positive. As long as I take ibuprofin regularly, I just feel like I haven't had enough sleep, which most teenagers feel like anyway. 

Well, I'll be posting more about living with Mono, but that's all for now, good night!

Families Are Part of God's Plan

Today was the Primary Program, yay! My little sister Gracianne was giving a talk in it about how Families are central to the Creator's plan. So like that wonderful and helpful sister I am, I helped her write the talk.

Here's what we wrote:

My talk is about how families are a part of Heavenly Father’s plan. In The Family a Proclamation to the World it says that marriage between a man and woman is ordained of God and that the family is central to the Creator’s plan for the eternal destiny of his children.

There are three main reasons why we come to this earth. The first is to gain a body. The second is to have Earthly experiences and learn to make good choices. And the last reason is to make covenants that help us gain eternal life. The family helps us in all of these.

Families helped us to gain a body through the marriage of a man and woman having children. The first commandment God gave Adam and Eve was about having children. In the Proclamation it says that His commandment to multiply and replenish the earth is still in force today.

The second reason is to get earthly experiences and learn to make good choices. Families help us in this by supporting us. Parents can teach their children right and wrong and be good examples. In families we can learn to love like God loves us.

Lastly, Families help us to make covenants that help us gain eternal life. We can only gain the highest level of the celestial kingdom if we are married in the temple. Families can help us prepare for the temple covenants. When you are married you and your spouse start your own family.

To close I’d like to read the words to the song Families can be together forever:

I have a family here on earth

they are so good to me

I want to share my life with them through all eternity.

Families can be together forever

through Heavenly Father’s plan

I always want to be with my own family

and the Lord has shown me how I can.

I say this in the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.

I'm so proud of my little sister, she already knows so much about why we're here, where we came from and where we are going after death. Those are questions that people throughout the world struggle to find answers to and already my sweet 11 year old sister knows the truth to answer all of those inquiries.

I'm so grateful for the Proclamation to the World about Families. I know that families really are part of God's  eternal plan for us. I am so grateful to know that if I live righteously that someday I can go to one of God's temples and be married and sealed for all eternity to my future husband and family. We are sent to families to learn to love and  become more like God. I know that death is not the end for families, but that those relationships are carried on after this life and that we really can be with our family members forever.