Just Plain Sick

I had a small panic attack on Friday morning.Don't worry, I am mostly fine now.It was just one of those things where little things added up.First, I have had ZERO time to myself over the past 3 or 4 months.Second, I've been getting hit with tiny pieces of stress-filled shrapnel for a while now.No one thing was enough to faze me much, if at all.Added up though, something had to give eventually.As it turns out, a recurring plumbing problem is what sent me over the edge.

I'm not sure if anyone reading this has ever had a panic attack, but it is fucking scary as all hell.I've had two, not counting this minor one.The first was during my first year of college.I came home for my birthday(It's in September, so I was only a few weeks into school.) and was in my room with my sister and some friends.We were laughing and having a good time when I just shut down.If I had to make a comparison, it would be like having all of your car's electric systems shutting down at once while driving.If that has ever happened to you, you know that your lights, radio, engine, gauges, etc all go off at once and you just coast until you stop.Then you hope like hell that the car starts up again.That's what happened to me.I remember people trying to talk to me, but that is about all I remember of when it was actually taking place.

The second time was afew years after I graduated, when I was working for a fence company in their woodshop.It was a job I wasn't too thrilled with to begin with.I was somewhat trapped there(for the time being)and had developed some nasty asthma from constantly breathing in the wood dust.On top of that, the people who worked there were mostly assholes.I was my normal, quiet self and apparently no one could handle that, so they took every opportunity to play practical jokes or just plain taunt me.Their reasoning:They liked to watch me get upset.I was the entertainment.

Anyway, it was a winter day and I was busy nailing together a section of fence.I was getting the usual taunts and catcalls from behind my back when someone whipped a snowball, HARD, that came about 6 inches from hitting me in the back of the head.I absolutely freaked out on everybody.I don't remember one word of what I said, but I know that no one was laughing at me this time.I stormed into my boss's office and told him I was leaving.I drove home in the midst of a 2 hour blackout.My memory of that day goes:yelled at my boss, and then I'm home on the couch.

After that, people at work treated me like I was made of glass.I didn't like that too much either, but at least the taunting stopped and never really got going again, at least not to the extent it was before.This second one was much scarier.I've never blacked out without massive amounts of alcohol in my system before.It felt like I was watching the whole event unfold from outside my own body.

ponsive.I even tried to suck it up and go to work.Everyone noticed right away that I wasn't right.The first words out of the mouth of the woman I worked with were "You look pale.You should go home."I tried to stay, but was just completely emotionally drained.after sitting at my computer for 1/2 hour straight staring at my shoes I realized that all I was doing by staying at work was hurting myself.I knew that every person who saw me so despondent would comment and that would just make me feel worse.So I went home and fell asleep watching a movie.The next day I was still somewhat shaky, but I made it to work and lasted the whole 10 hour day.

Since then I've been congested and just sick-feeling.I can't be sure that the two things are connected, but I'm pretty sure that they are.Today has been the worst day of all.I can't breathe out of my nose at all and have one hell of a headache.Those things are making me feel sluggish and apathetic.I hate feeling like this.

Normally, I have little faith in medicine.Most of it has little effect on me.Today though, I felt so crappy that I took 8 tablets of "Pain Aid", which is a combination of aspirin, acetaminophen, salicylamide(whatever that is), and caffeine.It cleared up my nose and made me feel better for about an hour.Now, of course, I'm back to square one:stuffed up and aching.

Damn it all to hell, I hate having a cold.