"Well, I feel less stupid and on fire."

This is what I said to my friend Claire Friday night, a couple hours after beginning my second round of Coartem (anti-malarials) in the last month. It's a pretty accurate summary of what malaria feels like. Yeah -- in case you haven't heard, I got malaria. Twice.

Before I begin this story, I would just like to say that malaria sucks. A lot. It is kind of like having every sickness you have ever had all at the same time, and then worse. Ridiculous fever, chills, headache, stomach ache, backache, headache, nausea, exhaustion. I have never been so tired in my life. Like I went three days without so much as washing my dishes because I was too tired. Yesterday I slept all morning, then walked five minutes to the store and back and had to take another nap. Yeah. Malaria sucks.

But to begin at the beginning...early in October, I started having these mysterious fevers and feeling really tired. They were never above 100 degrees, and seeing as I live in Africa, where it is always really hot and I am always really tired, I didn't take it too seriously...especially as they seemed to go away on their own after a day or two...then come back a day or two after that. About a week later I was informed by a friend (how did I not know this?) that a cyclical fever is classic sign of malaria... something to do with the reproductive cycle of the parasites living in my blood. Awesome. So, I decided that maybe I should go to the hospital, but seeing as my temperature was still not that high, I thought it could wait again, and my principal offered to drive me on Tuesday morning.

Naturally, Monday night, I woke up in the middle of the night with horrible chills and a 103 degree fever. First let me say, nothing is more confusing than having chills when you know it has to be at least 90 degrees outside. You can feel the air and it is hot, but your body is telling you it is cold. Something is wrong. Stuck in the village (only way to the hospital is a 45 minute moto ride; no motos to be found at night), I got up, took a bucket bath and some ibuprofen, made malaria slides, and started my three-day course of intensive, brutal anti-malarial meds.

The next morning my principal came to my house to drive me to the hospital. I work really hard here to look professional -- it's not easy to do this when you are 22, a woman, a non-native French speaker, and unfamiliar with the school system and the culture you're working in. It's particularly not easy to do this when you are in a malarial stupor, riding on the back of your boss' motorcycle. Anyways, the hospital is in the town where my principal lives, so instead of stumbling around on my own and waiting in line for hours, he literally took me by the hand, led me everywhere I needed to go, did all the talking for me ("This is my teacher. She has malaria. I need her to get better so she can work. We will see the doctor now."), barged straight into the doctor's office, and even translated what the doctor was saying for me when I didn't understand (malaria is like kryptonite to my ability to speak French). I got stabbed in the finger again, more malaria slides were made, and an hour later I was told I had 2% malaria. I don't know what this means, but I was informed by the Peace Corps Medical Officer (PCMO) that I don't need to worry until I have 6% malaria. Awesome. So I was told to finish with the Coartem, sleep for a week, and come back if it got worse. I slept for a week (like pretty much the entire time), then was pretty much better, and returned to work.

Fast forward to Thursday afternoon...I've been feeling really great lately (even started running again), but I come home from school and am exhausted. I think maybe it is because I have been having too much fun and not sleeping enough, so I decide to take a nap. Three hours later I wake up. That's weird. The next day I come to Maroua for a meeting. I arrive at the Peace Corps house in the afternoon just in time to eat a gigantic ridiculous lunch of cheeseburgers and onion rings that the volunteers who got here earlier have made. I am feeling great. Then I notice that I am really hot...take my temperature, it's 99.2 degrees. That's weird.

Three hours later it's 102 degrees, and I have chills and all the other ridiculous body pains that accompany malaria. Well, shit. I call the PCMO and the following dialogue transpires:

Me: Hi, sorry to bother you after hours, but I think I have malaria again.
PCMO: Well, you just had malaria a couple weeks ago right? The Coartem is supposed to last at least that long, so you probably don't actually have malaria. What are your symptoms?
I describe my symptoms.
PCMO: Hmm. It sounds like you have malaria. You are probably going to want to take Coartem again.

So I did. A couple hours later, I was feeling less stupid and on fire...and although I nursed a 100 degree fever all day yesterday and couldn't stay awake for more than a couple hours at a time, my temperature is finally down this morning and I am feeling a lot better. Thank you Coartem.

So malaria sucks a lot...but it has also been a good reminder (both times) that I do have an excellent support system here in Cameroon. Round one I had my principal literally pick me up at my house, drive me to the hospital, and cut through all the red tape to get me the help I needed. Round two I was with friends in Maroua who read the directions on my medication for me when I was too out of it and made sure I remembered to eat food, then stayed home to watch movies with me instead of going out. Pretty great.

Aside from the malaria, things are great here. When I'm not too sick to go to work, I'm loving my job and think I might even be getting good at it sometimes. I'm also settling in a bit more in the village and might have even found a Mandara tutor. I'll be out of touch the next few weeks -- probably not coming into the city again until Thanksgiving, but hope to connect with you all then. As always, your love and support (and care packages!) mean the world to me, so thanks.