Spring is finally upon us, and we can now enjoy long, sunny days, afternoons spent lounging on the Green, good-natured games of touch football and, of course, severe nausea. That's right, this campus has been hit by "Spring Fever," and I'm not talking about prancing merrily through meadows. I mean the type of fever brought on by an insidious gut-wrenching stomach virus.
As you've probably noticed, a disconcertingly large number of people here at Dartmouth have contracted some sort of gastro-intestinal illness since the beginning of Spring term; and I am one of them. I don't want to disgust anyone with unnecessary details, so let's just say that the symptoms of this virus are "unpleasant" and I of course mean "unpleasant" in the "messy bile-filled, projectile vomiting" sense of the word.
Faced with this illness, me and some of the other "sickies" (which is what we called ourselves -- OK, it's what I called ourselves) naturally spent a good amount of time discussing potential remedies for our ailments. I for one was following an aggressive TV-watching and napping regimen in an effort to reduce my symptoms, but my heroic efforts provided little relief, so I finally broke down and made an appointment to see a doctor. I was really hoping that they would have some sort of miracle cure for me, preferably a fruit-flavored one:
ME: I've been really sick this entire week.
DOCTOR: Severe sickness, eh? This special medicine syrup I happen to have right here, which has a delightful strawberry flavor, should cure you immediately it will also give you super-human strength.
Maybe I was hoping for too much, because I was instead told, "Get some rest, and make sure you drink plenty of fluids," which is of course doctor code for "I have no idea how to help you." So it was then that I decided that I was going to have to conquer the sickness my way. I figured sitting around, not eating and dwelling on how bad I felt was only going to make me weaker; I needed to take the offensive against my illness. So I put the virus out of my mind, got dressed, ate a big hearty sandwich, downed a cool, refreshing Pepsi One and, vowing not to let "a little stomach-ache" ruin my day, strode triumphantly out of my dorm and promptly threw up. Which leads me to an important point: I'm an idiot.
For those of you who are now growing concerned for my health, you don't have to worry, because finally, last Friday, I found myself able to stomach real food again, and the symptoms started to lift. However, even as I am starting to feel better, there are many others out there who are just beginning to come down with this truly inconvenient illness. This is why I decided, as a public service to the Dartmouth community, that I would compile all the helpful information I learned from my experience and present it to you, the reader, in a helpful Frequently Asked Questions format. It is my hope that others can learn from my ordeal and better prepare themselves to handle this viral menace. So without further ado, I am pleased to present my "Insidious Stomach Virus Frequently Asked Questions:"
Q: How will I know if I have this illness?
A: First you will experience a 24-hour period of intense nausea and fever, followed by four to five days of incessant complaining about how bad you feel.
Q: Can you provide an out-of-context fictional dialogue to characterize this complaining?
A: Of course. Here you go:
GUY: Hey.
YOU: I sure am sick!
GUY: Uh huh
YOU: I'm getting nauseous four, five times a day it's a real bear but I'm a trooper -- I think I'll pull through!
GUY: I feel your pain, bud, but you've got a lot of people waiting behind you to place their grill order so what are you having?
YOU: Oh I'm WAY too ill to be eating any food right now!
Q: Are my friends wrong to start losing interest in my increasingly unpleasant minute-by-minute updates on the current state of my digestive system?
A: Yes.
Q: Will my sickness seem to be in remission and then all of the sudden get real bad right in the middle of French drill so that I end up mumbling incoherently with my mouth agape and face pale like some sort of freshly lobotomized deranged mental patient?
A: That really sucked.
Q: Are there responsible steps I can take to reduce the severity and duration of my symptoms?
A: Probably.
In the end, there's just not much more that can be said. If cheap medical novels have taught me anything, this virus will continue to spread, more and more people will get sick, the Centers for Disease Control will return to our campus but be unable to prevent the epidemic from reaching a crisis stage, we will all be quarantined, medical supplies will stop getting through and by the time it is all over the survivors will envy the dead. Or maybe we'll just get some more hand sanitizer in our Hinman Boxes.
