News of my Near Death May Have Been Exaggerated

I spent the last three days lying on a couch in the living room of the flat where I am staying trying not to die. I highly recommend avoiding the flu while on vacation in another country. It is just really inconvenient and bothersome. To be honest I am not sure how high my temperature got. I do remember hallucinating a bit on day two. I get sick like everyone else but I normally do not get a high fever incapacitating sick. It was very nice to get to experience this kind of illness outside of my home environment.


Like any seasoned traveler I came prepared. We all have our special medications that we know will work for us. Last year it was Mitch who was sick and he needed Tylenol PM. Sadly that drug is illegal here in Russia, though we did not know that at the time because we searched many pharmacies looking for it. For a friend from Russia traveling to Africa, she had her mother mail her all her favorite medications incase she got sick. For me it is Nyquil and Dayquil that keep me from frying my brain (I brought plenty of both). I prefer to let my body heal naturally, but I am not stupid, I know when serious damage can occur and I will take medications to temporarily alleviate symptoms. My normal course of action is to let it run its course. If my fever climbs to high i.e. enter hallucinations, then I take some meds to bring it down. Then I wait to see if my body will keep it down. I know I am healing when I can break my fever without the aid of meds. That finally happened to me yesterday. Then it is just another day or two of recovery time and I am good as new.


I could tell you tale of meditations for three hours and controlling your immune system, but unless you are into that whole Taoist stuff you will not care. So I will skip that part and just tell you I willed myself to health. Ordinarily this would be the end of my trip to Russia. Jean and the discovery team are heading back to the USA in two days, and I would be leaving too. This year I made some additional plans to meet up with friends in St. Petersburg, thus extending my stay by 10 days. This provided me with a high degree of motivation to get healthy. Really who wants a sick friend to come and visit them? That just sucks for everyone involved.


Here I sit on a couch in Moscow recovering from my flu. I think in retrospect, running in -20 degree weather was not such a good idea. Oh well, live and learn.

-Dana