Vacation In Southern France

So you may have noticed that we haven't posted in a while. No, it's not because we were just having too much fun, no, it's not because we've had no Internet. We have been wretchedly sick.

******WARNING THIS POST IS GRAPHIC**********

There has been some debate on what made us sick. There was a stomach bug going around the tiny village we were staying in. Our bodies were exhausted from too much drinking and doing in Barcelona so our immune systems were low. And the ringer, we went to an all you can eat sushi place our last night in Barcelona where we consumed massive amounts of raw fish. Maybe it was one of these things, maybe it was a combination, we'll never know. The result? We were virtually incapacitated for 6 days.

Our first day there was fine. We stayed with Victoria, a native Scot, living in southern France. We were supposed to be doing a work exchange where we help weed, garden and do other household chores. We started by raking an enormous amount of leaves to the garden and laying them over everything for the winter. The day left us sore because our muscles have been severely underused on this trip, but it was fulfilling. For lunch I had the pleasure of having fresh eggs from the chicken coop scrambled with fresh herbs I had picked from the garden. We were expecting the rest of the week to go relatively the same way, but the next day things began to go downhill. It had gotten really rainy so for our second day, our task was to clean and paint Paloma's (Victoria's daughter) radiator. After a few hours we stopped for lunch. I was really light headed and not feeling great. Alexis was feeling achy and sick. I attributed this to the fact that we had been painting for a few hours with no windows open. We champed it out and finished the radiator but it was the last push and then we both had to go take a nap. Waking up from the nap was pretty horrible. I knew right away I had a fever. I was shivery and achy but sweating at the same time. Alexis was in a similar position. We ate some dinner but we were not doing well so we retired early.

Now, when most people get digestive sick, they skirt around the details preferring to say "oh yes I had stomach problems." No. Both of us were up all night having diarrhea. Between night sweats, bouts of being freezing and having horrible painful diarrhea I was up all night. Alexis wasn't having the same temperature issues but she was up more often than I was. For the next 6 days I saw more of their tiny little bathroom than anything else in the house. My fever days were really shitty (pardon the pun) because not only was I shitting 10 minutes after every meal but I was achy and fevery doing it. Thank god the fever went away after about 2.5 days. After the fever had passed I could sleep again. Although I say sleep lightly because I was still waking up every night to have diarrhea at least once. Eventually we halted our intake of food almost entirely. I don't know if you've ever had the "pleasure" of shitting out your food while you can still taste it in your mouth but it loses its novelty quite quickly. Soon rice and stewed apples were the only things going into our body. And still we weren't getting better. And it wasn't nice diarrhea that came out quickly and watery. It was painful and an effort every time. It got to the point where I would be in tears wishing aloud quietly that this would be the last time. That it would be over quickly. But someone wasn't listening because it never was. Six days! Six days, Alexis and I could not stop shitting. Finally Victoria remembered that you can drink clay and it will stop up your system entirely. Yes folks, we were desperate enough. We drank green clay and water. It was quite putrid and chalky but I was willing to try anything. At this point it was the 6th day and we were feeling much better (but still not holding down food.) We were supposed to be going to Rome the next day but we were still too weak (if you remember it's essentially been 5 days since we've eaten anything so we were extremely drained). So we ended up having to go to Toulouse instead for a night to finish recovering. The train to Rome from Toulouse (and St. Jean de Paracol respectively) is 15 hours which is exhausting to a healthy person and near impossible for a weak one. After a night in Toulouse we did manage to make it to Rome which is where we are now. We are not fully recovered by any means. Our stomachs are shriveled and sad and I am still having random bouts of diarrhea but it is not nearly as violent or often as it used to be so I'm confident that our road to recovery, while slow, is almost completed. It better be too because we leave for India in 10 days!

I hope this wasn't too graphic for you. But I'll have you know, however uncomfortable these intimate details make you, they are nothing compared to how horrible and wretched we were for those few days and I hope that none of you can ever truly understand what I'm talking about.

Cheers,
Liz