I was debating whether or not to blog about this but I thought I might as well, seeing as most of you will find out eventually.

As you know, I´ve been sick on and off for about 4-5 weeks, with intermittent nausea and diarrhea, coming and going, making me think I was better then I´d get worse again. I went and got tests done and it turned out I had a parasite and a bacterial infection or a GI infection. So I took some medication for it and it seemed to be a bit better. However, after I went to La Chureca last week I got really sick. On Friday, I threw up 3 times and went to see the doctor who thought it was an ¨ intoxication¨ from the dump, some germ or bacteria I breathed in while there. She gave me a shot for anti-nausea and told me to take it easy, no work.

Ok, fine I said. I spent all weekend feeling nauseous, basically living off of dry toast, jam and bananas. No milk, no fried food, nothing but basic food. I can do that for a few days. But by Tuesday, I was still feeling nauseous all the time and obviously that´s not good. It should have cleared up by then. So I went back to the doctor who agreed with me, saying it should have gone away and that I may still be feeling nauseous because the bacterial infection never cleared up. So she prescribed me some anti-biotics for the infection, some anti-nausea pills, Metachlopromin or something, and somethng else to calm my stomach because the antibiotics can upset your stomach as a side effect. So I was to take the anti-nausea pills 20 min. before eating, three times a day. I did this for 2 days before I started having side effects. It started with my entire body feeling restless, like I had drank too much coffee and had caffeine just racing through my body. I´d had it before with Gravol (its one of the side effects) but never this strong. Then Wednesday night, after dinner around 8pm my eyes started to go weird. I could only look up, as far as my eyes could go, and to the left. I looked like a deer in the head lights, my eyes open wide and always looking up. My face was screwed up in a grimace to accompany my weird eyes. I clearly wasn´t OK, because I also had double vision if I tried to look elsewhere and if I closed my eyes, my eyes were moving under my lids like in REM sleep. So we told Edna, because all my friends were freaked out, and she took me to the doctor.

She tested all my reflexes which were fine, and I could identify things, I just couldn´t see right. So she ended up calling someone at a clinic and I was taken over there at like 9pm or later. They had to open the clinic just for me. I ended up getting a CT scan done of my head, with contrast being pumped into my arm. My eyes were so messed up I couldn´t even look at the guy who was putting in the IV. I was so scared. They were looking for signs of a lesion, or stroke or something to explain my eyes. Nothing. Everything was clean. Which is good. I´m too young to have a stroke thank you very much.

Basically, they told me to try and sleep and see how tomorrow was because no one could explain it. I had an appointment the next day to see a neurologist so maybe he could tell me something. Somehow, I managed to fall asleep - I don´t know how because when I tried to close my eyes, I couldn´t really and it was so dark in our room I couldn´t tell if my eyes were fully closed. Somehow I slept though and the next morning, my eyes were fine. A little sore but fine. I was scared to look up though because I didn´t want them to get stuck there like the night before.

I went and visited the neurologist who did a couple simple reflex tests but concluded everything was fine. He thinks, as does the other doctor, that the anti-nausea drug was overstimulating my optic nerve. Apparently, this same situation happend to someone the doctor knew, like a nephew or something, although it is not a common side effect. Its not even listed as a side effect I don´t think. Anyways, I stopped taking that drug, and stopped taking the anti-biotics because for all I know that could be causing something as well. Not taking any more foreign medication. The doctor told me to just drink lots of water and flush it out of my system. So I did, and I think for the most part I´m better.

I haven´t had any nausea until today and I´ve been eating more real food which is a nice change. My parents are obviosuly freaked out though and there is a small chance that if I get sick again I might go home. I can´t do sickness here anymore. I can´t be sick for school and I´m most likely going to need to sort this all out and make sure I´m healthy before I go for Don Training. I don´t want to have to go home but health is important too. I really hope that I will start to get better and be able to return to work, since I´ve been not working for a week. It´s so frustrating and hard because I´m a rollercoaster of symptoms; sometimes I´ll feel fine, but then I might eat something and feel so sick after. I just never know.

I will try to let you know what happens and see where I´m at in a few days. I really hope though I get better because I´ve come so far on my adventure that I would feel like a bit of a failure to go home.

In other news, Jon Daley, our English housemate left today for back home. It was very sad because he´s been there about the same amount of time as me and was kind of like a brother. Very sad. Tomorrow morning though he will be enjoying his full English breakfast which he´s been looking forward to for so long. We will keep in touch.

Hasta luego!