Like many spoonies I spend a lot of my time trying not to look sick. It’s not because I don’t trust you to be sympathetic and supportive, it’s mostly because I get sick of my symptoms and want to be able to enjoy whatever event I am attending without paying too much lip service to them.

However, they are always there, hiding in the background and working hard to pull my attention away from your story, the movie, or the amazing meal you cooked. I have to chastise them like poorly behaved toddlers to keep them in line.

Which is why I hate getting sick on top of being chronically ill. That nasty, achy, flu-like, feeling you get with a fever is a daily occurrence thanks to my Fibromyalgia, so when I have an actual fever things suck.

It begins with me feeling like my body is filled with jagged pieces of glass when I move. Everything hurts. Then when I lie still everything hurts. (It turns out lying on jagged pieces of glass isn’t pleasant). Then I will get cold, really cold, deep freezer cold, but the second I pull up the blankets I am boiling hot. Lobster death hot.

At this point I will recognize something else is going on. I will take my temperature, it will be high. I will feel completely and irrationally betrayed by this additional invasion of my already sick body. Shouldn’t I get some kind of “Get of the flu free” card? I have a chronic daily illness, well two actually, shouldn’t that make my body a no fly zone for summer colds, winter flus, and the bacterial crap that hovers around polite society waiting to turn us all into wretched piles of indiscreet bodily functions?

I have become incapable of pushing through colds. I guess it’s because my daily push is so much work that adding the extra layer of suck renders me a wibbly wobbly mess. Every single thing becomes a personal affront to me. I cannot handle the smallest difficulty.

So today, on day two of fever and suck, I feel beset by my illnesses, both chronic and extra. I feel like a presentation exhibit for “What can go wrong with the human body”.