It's almost final exam season at Swarthmore, but I'm still not fully healed from my illness a few weeks ago. I had lingering symptoms that wouldn't go away even after I was hydrating more than ever, so I decided to go visit the college's health center.
When I first went to the Health Center for a check-up, the nurse practitioner told me that I was just dehydrated and my body would need time to recover. While I did agree with that, I also couldn't think that simply being dehydrated was causing all the confusion, dizziness, and nausea for such a prolonged period of time. When I told my friends about this diagnosis, they were also skeptical and told me to book another appointment.
For my second check-up, a physician came in to inspect what was going on with me. She did an array of tests, and after a questionnaire to top everything off, she diagnosed me with having a concussion.
This made a lot more sense, given my symptoms and how persistent they were being. I was told to follow a plan for concussion patients at Swarthmore so that the workload wouldn't become a burden for me while I was still recovering. The professors were all understanding of my situation and helped me with accommodations to the deadlines and workload. I was worried that at college, professors wouldn't be very flexible, but that wasn't the case at Swarthmore. Though people were worried all the same, it felt good to put a name to the thing I was going through.
Since I'm still recovering from my concussion (one of the 'rules' is to not look at computer/phone screens for too long) and I've got finals to ease into, I won't be posting anything until summer break starts!
Till then, stay healthy and happy! 😊