Sick.

I have been sick for the past week. Really sick. More sick than I remember being for a long time. In fact, I think the only symptoms I haven’t experienced are rash and overactive bladder. This illness was so strong it deserved a name — a diagnosis, something to comfort myself with. “Ah, it was pneumonia all along” or, “Oh, just the swine flu, then? Great. Get me that prescription!” Then I would feel that much better for knowing what it was, that much better for having gone to the doctor (because, you see! this illness is not in my head, I am not exaggerating my symptoms as I stumble to the bathroom). But, most importantly, I would feel that much better for having a prescription in my hand for a medicine that would magically kill all the evil in my body while I lie on the sofa and watch “What Not to Wear.”  I would be better in two days! It would almost seem like a vacation.

I decided to go to the after hour’s clinic on Saturday because I was fairly certain I would be hospitalized for complications due to a severe bronchial infection if I waited until Monday. After I explained my long list of symptoms through my weak voice and phlegm-filled coughing the doctor said empathetically, “Oh! That does sound bad,” and sent me off to get a blood test.

A few minutes later as the doctor sat with his nose nearly touching his computer screen he confirmed that we had our results;  my much longed-for diagnosis.

“Nummer treti-en.”

Number 31?! Was this a secret code word for N1H1 or SARS or H5N1 or . . .

He waited a moment to let the fullness of that number register with me and then said firmly, “Influensa.”

“What flu?” I asked, puzzled.

“A very powerful flu.”

The flu. The normal winter flu. The normal flu?! How can a normal seasonal flu knock me flat for five days? Where was my immune system – wintering in Florida? This was ridiculous. Utterly ridiculous. Ear pain, chest pain, back pain, muscle aches, fever, chills, dry-heaves, greenish phlegm, blood-filled snot . . . the flu?

My only thought:  when I am 60 and get the flu I will not survive! Had I lived in the Victorian era I would not have lived past the age of 12!

The doctor was kind. He seemed to sense my deep disappointment with my diagnosis, and so he gave me a consolation prescription – the kind that doctors give when they feel their patients deserve some sort of parting gift, if for no other reason than for having waited two hours to see him. I got a prescription for cough medicine.

I thanked him and  gathered my tissue box, book and water bottle, thinking about my future at home on the sofa.

On my way out a nurse patted my arm in a grandmotherly fashion and offered some final words of what I can only assume she meant as professional medical advice: “You are so sick because you are not Norwegian.”

I guess I will just have to try harder next flu season.