Breathe in. Breathe out. Repeat.
After a very exhausting week and a half, I feel like I am finally coming up for a bit of air. I haven't been able to write much about what's been happening (and believe me, you probably don't want all the gory details anyway), but it all started with what I now suspect was some sort of strange variety of food poisoning (as opposed to a bad gastro virus I/a doctor originally thought I had).
I spent the better part of 4+ days in the WC, dealing with all of that. The doctor, who came the morning after the first hellish night, where I was also vomiting and spiking a fever of 102.4F/39.1C, told me I had probably seen the worst of it already, that it was a virus and should be done by the end of that day. He gave me an RX for some stuff for nausea and for more Smecta (the French remedy for the runs) -- the latter of which wasn't working AT ALL anyway. Maybe that should have been my first clue that this wasn't an ordinary attack of gastro.
The fever bounced up and down for another 40 or so hours after that. The stuff he gave me for nausea DID help quite a bit, so that was something positive. But the rest of my GI track was completely screwed up and nothing seemed to be stopping it. Suffice to say, I was miserable. This was FAR worse than the H1N1 flu, in my personal experience. Finally, on the 4th day, I asked Georges to go and get me some Immodium -- even though Mr. Doctor-Man had said it wouldn't work on this particular type of gastro. Thank God, he was wrong, and it DID seem to work.
For about 24 hours. Then, a small relapse. And here it is, a full week later, and I am STILL having "small relapses" about every 2-3 days! This is really fucked up, if you don't mind my saying so. It's like I can't trust my body at all right now. I'm even afraid to fart.
Breathe in. Breathe out. Repeat.
Luckily, none of these relapses occurred while I was on the train to/from visiting my sister-in-law down south, which had been my biggest concern. And I am no longer worried that what I have is even contagious since no one else in the family came down with it even when it was at its worst. Whatever it is, it's not quite done yet, but life goes on.
And it didn't stop me from having a very nice visit with my sister-in-law and the Little Guy, who is off school for the annual 2-week winter holidays. It was my first time going down there on my own and my first time hanging out with my French family without Georges, and as much as I really missed him, I had such a great time with my sister-in-law, V. (And I mostly have to speak French with her, by the way!) I feel so lucky that Georges' sisters have embraced me so warmly into their family! I was brave enough to drive my sister-in-law's car to do a bit of shopping one morning (even that was a challenge at first, as I could not for the life of me get the car to go in reverse, until a neighbor came over to show me the "trick" of it) -- I now know the roads well enough in and around town to drive! And the Little Guy was really good for me the entire five days, and especially during our last evening and morning -- when my sister-in-law had another bout of one of her own health issues, which was so unfortunate as she'd been in really great shape for almost our entire stay. Her sudden illness meant a lot of scrambling around and not much sleep on my part that final night, and the Little Guy was very understanding and patient about all of it. To top it all off, yesterday morning I discovered that the ceiling in the kitchen of the apartment across the hall, which my SIL also owns, had collapsed due to another leak in the kitchen of the apartment upstairs! The floor was covered in fallen plaster! The cleaning lady, who happened to be there at the time, said she'd been in there on Tuesday and it had been fine, so at least we can narrow down when it happened, and I took some photos for the insurance claim which will follow. But after that, I thought, geez, what MORE could possibly go wrong today?
I hate when I ask questions like that. Because inevitably, there IS something more that could go wrong. And then it usually does.
Breathe in. Breathe out. Repeat.
So, we left yesterday morning to catch our train back to Paris. And somehow, I managed to get us on the WRONG FREAKING TRAIN. There IS a plausible explanation for this, however (besides my brain simply going AWOL from exhaustion). Our train was scheduled to depart at 11:30. There was another train leaving at 11:23. At around 11:20, we started to make our way town the platform to where our car, #15, would be, and I saw a regional train arrive, and then leave, and assumed THAT was the 11:23. At 11:27 the TGV arrived, right on time (so I thought), and we got on board, and took our seats.
Ten minutes later, we stopped at a nearby town. A man came up to me and said we had his seat, and indeed he had a ticket with the same car and seat number as we had... but a different train number. I was convinced HE was on the wrong train, but I got up and went in search of the conductor. Imagine my HORROR when I found out it was WE who were on the wrong train! That's never happened to me before. Turns out, all the trains were running around 10 minutes late, and I hadn't noticed this. With the conductor's help, we worked out that my best bet was to get off the train in Marseilles and change to another train (our original train was NOT due to stop in Marseilles or we would have just been able to hop on board, and no harm done). He told me where to go in the Marseilles station to change the tickets (as the TGV requires seat reservations). I figured this was a good plan, as in the event I had problems getting us on another train, we have very good friends living in Marseilles who could come to our rescue in a worst-case scenario. I was just hoping it wouldn't come to that.
Breathe in. Breathe out. Repeat.
So we get to Marseilles and this little office where I was told to go, facing Voie F, to exchange my tickets? DID NOT EXIST. I was directed to the main ticket office, and told I would have to buy us two new tickets -- NO EXCHANGES! I went to the ticket machine and it said that the next train to Paris -- leaving in 15 minutes -- was full. As was the next one an hour later. I could get us on the following one, TWO hours later, but who wanted to wait two more hours? I called Georges for advice and he suggested I just get on the next train and then work it out with the conductor there; if I would have to pay extra, then so be it, but there was a good chance the conductor might just overlook it since I DID have tickets we'd already paid for.
That's what I did, but not without some hustle to make the train and some added inconvenience once we got on it. At first, we sat in a nearly empty car and caught our breath. But then the train stopped at Aix-en-Provence, and again at Avignon, and that's when the people who had reserved our seats showed up. We relocated ourselves to the foyer (where there were several people already hanging out there -- apparently a LOT of people had "just gotten on the train" with no seat reservations, as I saw a lot of young men sitting in stairways and the bar car was completely full). Finally I found ONE free seat next to a young guy, and I installed the Little Guy in it, and and then proceeded to put our luggage nearby (preparing myself to stand for the rest of the trip if need be). That's when that very nice young man actually stood up and GAVE me his seat! I couldn't believe it. What kindness and generosity from a total stranger! He surely racked up some good karma points for himself, and I hope he went on to win the lottery or fall in love with the girl of his dreams or score the perfect job after that very unselfish gesture on his part.
Breathe in. Breathe out. Repeat.
We got to Gare de Lyon without further incident (I did speak to the conductor and after explaining my predicament, he did not charge me anything extra!), and even got a taxi immediately, without there being any sort of line. We'd seen sunshine for the entire trip home, even in Paris, so it wasn't all bad. The Little Guy was a real trooper about the whole thing, too, taking it all in stride and laughing with me at my silly mistake and our "adventure". Now we have a common story to tell and make fun of together.
Georges arrived at the house about a half-hour after we did, having left work a bit early to come and see his wayward travelers. By that time, I'd had a shower and had started to decompress after the past 28 hours of general craziness. We hadn't really been able to "see" each other much this week, as my SIL's internet box decided to burn itself out, just to add to the excitement, and I had to rely on some very dodgy FreeWifi access. I never thought of myself as the type of woman who would want to literally RUN into the arms of the man I love, but it turns out... I am that woman. And his arms were just where I wanted to be.
Still, I'd do it all again in a minute. Traveling alone with a child isn't easy for anyone, as those of you who've done it can attest to, and THIS child knows the route like the back of his own hand, having done this trip many times in his 8 years. He is old enough to manage his own small rolling suitcase of toys and books. He is very cooperative when traveling, so much more so than some other children I've seen, so he's really a pleasure to travel with. We agreed that we'd had a very nice time visiting with his aunt V, although we were both sad that she'd gotten sick at the end (and the latest word is, it's not so serious this time around and hopefully all will be well again within a few more days) and though we both missed the presence of his Papa. I think it was just the right amount of time for a trip like that. I'm really glad I was feeling well enough to go.
Breathe in. Breathe out. Repeat.
I slept well last night, after that long day, in the arms of my loving husband, but I'm still not 100% out of the woods with my digestive "issues". I suppose if I'm still having trouble by Monday, I'll need to see my regular doctor and maybe get some antibiotics, because clearly this is not normal by any stretch of the imagination. Mostly, I am just happy to be home and even to do some quiet, every-day things like blogging, laundry and food shopping.
And breathing in... breathing out.
