A Lesson Learned the Hard Way

I'm happy to say that after two weeks of hell, I am finally feeling better.

It all started Friday, January 29th, when my friends and I went out dancing for a friend's birthday....After dancing to hip-hop, salsa and banda, we were starved! The only place in town open was a late-night taco restaurant. We took our seats and all ordered tacos de pastor, very common snack after a long night of dancing and drinking. Load them up with salsa and order a few more, wash it all down with a soda and its time to go to bed. The next morning I woke up and felt horrible! Was I hung over? How could it be? I only had 3 beers the whole night! Soon enough I realized that something was wrong and that it definitely not a hangover. I ran to the bathroom and threw up, my body started to get rid of all the water it contained (I'll spare you the details). Something was wrong. I was in so much pain. I was shaking, eyes watering, stomach hurting, head pounding. Luckily for me (or so I thought at the time) I had a 24-hour clinic across the street from me. I crawled over to the doctors office and told him everything that was happening to me. He told me I should have never eaten those tacos which most likely contained salmonella. Oh no! Not again, this happened to me when I first got here and it was horrible! He told me to pick up some medicine at the pharmacy and gave me a strict diet of Gatorade and jello. I didn't leave my bed for 3 days after that. My aunt Evelyn and cousin Belen surprised me the next day and cooked me chicken soup and jello.

A week later, my stomach pain was getting worse. I went to the same clinic, but this time it was a different doctor. She told me that in addition to salmonella, I had colitis, or intense intestine inflammation from the toxins in my stomach. She told me to continue my salmonella medication and to add a few more medications. I tried to do the basics, basically go to school and come home and sleep.

Days after, I noticed that my pain was still getting worse and that I could barley eat anything without crying. One day at lunch I was with my girlfriends trying to eat soup and I started crying from all the pain. They said I looked horrible. That was it. I needed to go see another doctor! I felt that the other two doctors just prescribed me medicine without really giving me the right tests and my pain wasn't going away. I went to the family doctor of a friend who was born and raised here in Texcoco. She ran a bunch of tests on me and told me my salmonella was bad. She gave me a shot, sent me to buy even more meds. and told me to come back after taking some blood tests. The next two days were horrible. I had serious anxiety and I felt like I was putting so many things in my body without knowing if they were really going to help me. I didn't really feel comfortable with going to so many doctors that I didn't know or trust. I was spending a ton of money on appointments and pills and things weren't getting better. Until one night I snapped....I cried and cried, I felt like I was getting worse and I didn't know what else to do to get better, I felt like I had done it all!

I called my aunt and 2AM and she and my uncle came to pick me up and take me to their home. We went to their doctor the next morning and I showed him all the pills I was taking and told him everything that had happened in the past two weeks. He cut out all the medications except one and told me that my body would take care of itself and I would soon get better. He told me that I have to be really careful with what doctors I go see. That its best to only see one doctor and to make sure that that doctor is a professional person of morals. Since in Mexico anyone can have their own private clinic, many times doctors do not provide quality service or have their clients well-being in interest.

I leaned some really important lessons from everything. I learned that I need to be very careful when choosing what doctor I go see, I decided that no matter in how much pain I am, its worth making the trip to see my family's doctor. That just because someone says they are a doctor does not mean that they are a person I can put my trust in, like I'd like to believe. And finally I don't know what I would do without my family here. I've come to this final conclusion over and over again many times and once again it happened. They have kept me strong and safe here. Without them this experience would be completely different.

I'm so happy to be feeling better again, though not 100%, I feel great improvement and I don't think I'll be eating greasy tacos again, I don't care how hungry I am.