For the past week I've been experiencing headaches. Its not uncommon for me to have a headache for a day or an afternoon, but when I got to day 4 with a headache I was not too pleased. I contacted my nurse with Peace Corps and we had a chat. I read in the book Sastun, which is about traditional Maya medicinal healing with plants, that boiling mango leaves and drinking the tea is a good way to relieve headaches. I tried it, and the aroma from the leaves smelled amazing! The tea didn't taste as good as the smell, kind of like the chapstick we used in elementary school. Those flavored chapsticks smelled so good I wanted to eat them, but we all know how that ends.Anyway, I drank the tea, trying to have faith in the plant and hoping secretely I wouldn't die. I had my coworker help me select leaves and he swore they were from the mango tree. They were. But in the end, I didn't feel any better in the head.
Other than my head, I feel fine. Great actually. I feel very positive about life, my work is going along smoothly, we just started the world map painting project and I'm pleased with it so far. Yesterday I went into work late and left only two hours after arriving. My head hurt and I was exhausted just from being in pain. So I went home, took some ibuprofen, ate some chocolate (thanks Michelle!!) and laid in bed to read - propped up on my new pillows that I bought in Melchor, Guatemala for less the $5 Belize, a steal! I read and read and read. I read for nearly 6 hours and I loved every minute of it. The book is finished and it was fantastic, East of Eden by John Steinbeck. I really love his writing. Its so pastoral and makes me want to go take up residence in a log cabin somewhere. Anyway, I felt great by the end of the night, was in no pain and went to bed early and slept in late.
This morning I woke up feeling well although was a little weary, trying to get a sense of how I might be feeling. I made a beautiful breakfast scramble with hot tortillas and Marie Sharps. I swept up the ants that were flexing their ridiculous muscles in carrying off the bits of dropped cat food from the floor. I planted the little seedlings from my porch into a plot in my yard. The start of a garden and I'm very excited! Zucchini, red peppers, tomatoes and a sunflower :) And at the end of all that the dull headache has creeped back into my head. I talked with the nurse this morning and we deducted that it must just be muscle tension. Serious muscle tension. I'm ordered to rest when possible with a heating pad to relax my muscles. I'll take some ibuprofen and maybe some other meds she's sending my way and I'll do my own yoga to stretch my neck and try to losen my sore muscles. Hopefully I'll feel better in time, but what I really need is a massage. In time, I'll find a physical massage therapist in town and splurge for this treatment. It just baffles me that the western response to pain is medicine! medicine! medicine! I'd rather massage but I'm not sure that I can get Peace Corps to pay for it just yet. I'll keep working that.
For now, I'm staying positive and resting and reading as much as possible. Someone asked me if maybe it was due to stress. "Maybe you should take some vacation", she said. My response? "I'm a Peace Corps volunteer! I'm already on permanent vacation!"
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