Ill.

So even though I said I don't want to whinge on this blog and that I want to keep it positive, there are times when I need to have a good rant and let it all out otherwise I start to go slightly mad. Plus I'm pretty sure no one reads this anyway, so what does it matter? And I guess I don't feel happy all the time, so having a moan once in a while is an accurate representation of my life, right?

For the past week I've been stuck in bed and haven't left the house because I've got glandular fever. I have no idea where I got it from (no, I haven't been going round kissing random people...), but I think I probably got it somewhere in Cyprus or from the nasty recycled air on the flights there/back. Eww.

About a week after I got back from Cyprus I noticed a weird inch-or-so long lump in my neck, which I thought was just a swollen gland but it was kind of odd as it was only on one side, and I felt completely fine. I started to feel gradually more and more run down and emotional and just plain blah as the weeks went on, but it wasn't bad enough for me to bother with the hassle of having to register as a temporary patient to see a doctor at home so I decided to just wait it out.

After a couple of weeks, I managed to make it back to Falmouth and have about a day here feeling fine, with only a sore throat... then last Sunday night I woke up in absolute agony every time I tried to swallow. I had a look at my tonsils and they were a bit swollen and had had white bits on, so my first thought was "Crap, I've got tonsillitis... meh, it'll go away in a couple of days". Boy, how wrong I was.

I spent all day Monday in bed falling asleep at random times because I felt awful and couldn't keep myself awake. My mum kept pestering me to see a doctor, but being a bank holiday meant the surgery was closed.

Tuesday morning I woke up nice and early to get myself a doctors appointment, dragged myself up to uni to hand some work in, then walked down to Penryn to go to my appointment. The doctor prodded around at the lumps in my neck a bit (which by this point had swollen even further, but they were only swollen glands), had a look at my disgusting tonsils (which now had black bits on as well as white bits. Yeah, gross.) and took a blood sample to test for glandular fever. I was quite shocked as I hadn't even considered having it, but he said it wasn't too likely and was just a possibility. He gave me a course of antibiotics to clear up the tonsillitis, then I headed home (nearly passing out at the bus stop and again on the top deck of the bus, which was an interesting experience...).

Thursday afternoon I got a phonecall from the doctor saying my blood results were back... and that I've got glandular fever. Yay for me :|. Because it's viral there's nothing that can be done to treat it, so I just have to wait it out and it could be weeks before I feel back to normal. Then it hit me that there's no way I'd be able to do my essay due in on the 10th and my exams on the 16th and 19th if all I wanted to do was sleep, and I couldn't even sleep anyway because my tonsils were so swollen that I could barely breathe (and every time my tongue fell back in my mouth while I was asleep it completely cut my air off and I woke up, which happened 3 or 4 times a night). Eating was stupidly difficult too because there was just no space for food to get through when I swallowed, ergh. So anyway, I emailed one of my lecturers and explained the problem, so I've got a two-week extension on my essay and I've deferred my exams until the end of August.

(Here's where the rant starts. If by any slim chance anyone happens to be reading this, I apologise in advance for coming off as a moany bitch because I'm not really like this, honestly! I'm just feeling uber crap due to being ill)

I'm missing out on attending Helston Flora day with St John today which I've been looking forward to for literally a year. I'm beyond gutted, and it really doesn't help that Steve keeps phoning me to tell me how the preparations are going as it unintentionally rubs it in my face that they're all going to be there having a good time while I'm stuck in what's effectively solitary confinement. It was also a bit of a kick in the face this morning, when I'd wanted to have a nice long lie-in and forget what day it is, to be woken up by Steve asking me to find out if Matt was ready to go (which of course he wasn't), then I couldn't get back to sleep so I've been dwelling on it all day. I'm really really hoping I'll be better by Royal Cornwall Show now, because if I'm not I'm going to be so upset it'll be unreal.
I'm kind of beginning to wonder whether I should even bother going back to St John, because I've been there a year and a half now and I've basically done fuck all. I haven't treated anything more serious than a small cut, I've done over 100 hours on duty since I joined but most of those I've spent sitting on my fat arse, I don't do anything in my role as "treasurer" other than count loose change and pay it into the bank every now and again, I'm going to be an absolutely shit trainer (when I eventually finish 7303), and yet somehow I've been made out to be amazing when actually I'm pretty much completely useless. I feel like a fraud, so I'm really considering packing it all in and letting Frankie take over from me as vice chair/trainer next year, because in all honestly she'll be much better at both of those things than I would be, and after the extremely close vote between Steve and Frankie for who gets to be president next year it makes sense for Frankie to be vice chair as people actually wanted to vote for her and people only voted for me because I was the only person who went for that position. And none of the people I meet in different divisions remember who I am anyway even after they've met me several times,showing that there's basically no point in me being part of St John because I'm not good for anything other than occasionally being a dogsbody.

I'm also really wishing I hadn't deferred my exams now. Realistically I know it was the right thing to do, because I've lost out on so much revision time now that I would perform terribly if I sat the exams in a week and a half's time, but now everyone else is revision while I'm stuck here ill and needing some company, and then while they get to celebrate finishing exams and having a nice long summer free from having to worry about work I'm going to have exams and revision lingering in the back of my mind and spoiling everything. I'd been so looking forward to the summer too and being able to be carefree and do whatever I want, but now I know I'm going to have to spend weeks revising, thus spending yet more time by myself.

I feel like life's permanently letting me down. Every time I think I'm picking myself back up something comes along and brutally shoves me back down again. Like when I came back after Easter, I thought things were starting to look up and I only had a few weeks until I was free until October... and now I'm alone (yet again), ill and bed-bound with a nice long summer of revision and bad feeling to look forward to.

I feel so let down by university and everything it promised to be... "You'll make loads of new friends!" "You'll do so many fun things!" "You'll learn so much!" "You'll have the time of your life!"... NONE of those things have been true for me, and it's a huge slap in the face when everyone else I know says how much of an amazing time they're having at uni and I'm literally the only person I know who hates the damn place and wishes I hadn't bothered due to the massive debt it's lumbering me with so what is basically 3 years of misery (and that's not including the masters I'll probably have to do to make this degree worth anything, urgh.)

I just want the whole damn experience to be over, and I want my life to work out the way I want it to for once in fucking while.


If you read all the way through this, I salute you.

I haven't fallen off the face of the planet....

I've just been so incredibly busy over the past few weeks that I've had no time to sit and write a decent blog post.

Things that have been happening in my life since I last posted:

Finished all of my lectures in my first year of uni, yay!

Went out on the SJA night exercise on Dartmoor which was really fun. We did a bunch of different team building and first aid task, all while taking care of an important box of eggs (which were meant to be a swine flu cure so it was vital that we didn't break them). We got to use ambulance equipment like a defibrillator and stretchers which was pretty cool, and I'm excited to do more training to learn how to use all the other stuff. My team won, obviously :P. We came first out of 6 teams - we broke no eggs whereas 3 of the other groups broke at least one, and out of the 3 groups who broke no eggs we were then given points on how well we did for each of the tasks. I was impressed that we scored higher than teams that were being assessed for qualifications 2 or 3 levels above us!

Made the epic trip home, and now I'm here until the beginning of May until I have to travel back to "lovely" Falmouth. I'm holding out hope that when I get back the weather will be glorious so I can finally get to the beach and go on nice long walks. I only have 4 exams in May and I'll possibly stay until July (when I need to sign the contract on the new house, pay rent and collect keys), so I need something to keep me occupied until then, and I've done pretty much every wet weather activity there is!

Went out to Zizzi and Revolution in Richmond for Kat's birthday. I ended up swapping bits of my dinner in Zizzi (my avocado (which I hate because it's tasteless and mushy) for a slice of Jen's pizza, not exactly healthy but better tasting!), but the parts of my meal I did actually eat were yummy. I tried parma violet vodka in Revolution which was soooo good, and I had a couple of cola pear cocktails (cola cube and pear drop vodkas with lemonade) which were really sweet but still yum.

The next day I trotted off down to Portsmouth with Kat and Rachel for Kat's birthday. Not goona lie, Kat's halls are rubbish compared to mine (even she thinks so so it's alright) - they're tiny, with one toilet (that doesn't flush properly, I got left a lovely "present" in the morning, eww) between the 5 of them in the flat, and they're right on a public street and surrounded by loads of noisy people. On the plus side though, she is literally about 5 minutes away from everything - train station, shops, places to eat, lecture theatres... all of them are a short, gentle stroll away. And there are no hills - I hate that about Falmouth, nothing is on flat ground and even after almost 7 months my legs still burn any time I walk up a hill.
Anyway, back to the story of Portsmouth...
We had a look round the shops in the afternoon and then saw Madina Lake in the evening. They were amazing, as always, and reminded me of why I loved them so much over a year ago. I managed to nab myself a guitar pick which was a highlight of the night I reckon. The next day we just lazed around singing the duck song (before you watch, it's stupidly catchy and gets stuck in your head for days - you have been warned!)


Thennn the next day I went down to Devon to see Alan. I'd packed for rubbish weather but it ended up being beautiful the whole time we were there and the sun was shining every day. We even managed to go for a walk on Westward Ho! beach yesterday which was really nice. I've had a sore throat since Friday though which kinda spoiled it. I have no idea what it is, I thought it was a cold but it's a different kind of sore throat to the one I normally get just before a cold, and I've had bad headaches and severe tiredness too. Hopefully it'll clear up soon.

Anddddd I think that just about covers everything! Being ill and tired has probably made me ramble on a lot, so I'll probably read this in a few days and wonder what on earth I was on about haha.

Possibly off to Jane Austen's house tomorrow which should be interesting. When my mum went years ago she said you had to take your shoes off before you could go in to stop the floor getting wrecked. To be honest I'd be more worried about people making the whole house stink with their naked feet, eww!