Hi everyone. Hope you all are doing well. I stayed in Àguas Lindas from Wednesday until Saturday. Wednesday was fine, I just had a cold, little bit of a sore throat, and I was ok during the day...BUT...at night I started not feeling too good, got a little dizzy, headache, and fever...and my throat hurt even more. When we got home I looked in the mirror and my throat was swollen so bad on either side that there was hardly any room left to swallow...no wonder it hurt so much!!! Joyce bought me some anti-inflammatory pills, and I just thought it was a viral infection because those are the ones I usually get(doctors can't do anything for viral infections). So Thursday I stayed in bed, had a fever once or twice, and that night I was ok enough to go to church. Friday I just went to Vôo Livre because I knew that staying in bed would do no good for me. However, I was not feeling very good at all and I got a fever after lunch(thankfully it didn't last long)...I didn't eat anything except dinner on Thursday, just ate hardly anything on Friday, same with Saturday and Sunday, because it hurt so much to swallow. On Saturday we had a game day, and I was on a team, but once again, could not play. It looked like all the kids had a really good time and enjoyed it immensely. They had formed 7 groups of 5 people and the ones who got into 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place got a medal at the end. Of course they were all boys groups, but that's ok. While they were still counting the marks, they had a praise team come and sing songs, and then a man from the international church came and said a few words about the Bible. I thought that was very clever of Joyce to do that, a little outreach program for the kids as they wait to see who won! Afterwards, there was cake and pop and I think it was a good day!
I didn't think about going to the hospital until yesterday. I had noticed something happening in my mouth with my gums, but didn't know what to do. But my gums above my front teeth started going a little white like the back of my mouth, and were very tender. Yesterday it got even worse, and I got two sores on my lips as well, the way the back of my mouth looked. So, finally a friend of my took me to the hospital, (by then I was missing my mommy(I think everyone wants they're mom when they're sick!)) and we waited for two hours. It was funny how the man called my name "ASHLEG"!!! Poor guy, he apologized for not knowing how to say it! I said it doesn't matter. Finally we got to see the doctor, and thankfully he was young! He made me sit in a chair and there was a desk beside it and he sat behind the desk. Then he asked me if I was allergic to anything, if I had any serious illnesses, what's wrong, where it hurts, how high my fever was that day, stuff like that. I was nervous about speaking Portuguese, and thankfully my friend was able to answer some things for me. THEN he took one of those tongue depressors and one of those little laser light(the annoying things that every boy has and likes to shine in people's eyes!) and started looking around my mouth. He kinda cringed what he saw there, and then he looked some more, and he wrote me a prescription and told us to go get a needle on the other side of the hospital. He was really nice. So we went to get the needle...
oh, the needle......let's not talk about this. I am not queasy when it comes to needles, ok, maybe a little but normally not enough to freak out. HOWEVER. let's talk about this for a second. Do you know where they normally put the antibiotic needle here in Brasil??? they inject antibiotics with a needle to the buttox!!!! I was not looking forward to it, and I was watching the girl prepare the needle(which was long enough by the way) and finally the time had come...she was going to put it in me. It hurt going in(like a long prick) BUT the worst part of it was when the antibiotic went in. That kind of pain is torture! I thought my eyes were going to roll back into my head and I started crying immediately! Finally it was over, I wiped my eyes, said thank you to the nurse, and left limping. It still hurts a little today, but I can swallow without pain, so it did something. My mouth is still inflamed and sore, but I'm sure that will go away in the next day or so. However, I'm still not 70% today, and I think it's from lack of food. I already ate a yoghurt today, and we'll see what I can chew today...my gums are very tender. So, that was my adventures this weekend, going to a Brazilian hospital for me! Thankfully the antibiotic was free, all we had to pay for was the medicine for the pain at the drugstore. Thank you Lord!
There's another Canadian here...he arrived on Wednesday. His name is Josh. He is a really nice guy, he just finished university to be a biologist, and next year he's moving to Ontario to study at Guelph. The kids love him already, and so does everyone else!!! He always laughs when he doesn't understand, but he does understand a few things. A group of ladies from Canada is coming this Friday. Hopefully I will be better by then! They're staying for a week to do a DVBS at Vôo Livre. That should be lots of fun!
Hope you all take care...hope you aren't doing too many crazy things this summer...and relax!
Love, Ashleigh