I was very physically ill on Saturday. I’m writing about it here because this is after all my personal web log, where it’s “an official record of events.” I find monetization of web logging abhorrent. If you want to write on the web, there are so many better avenues. Be advised that what follows is very graphic about the physical manifestations of my illness.

I am blessed with great health, far better than many. I am on occasion ill, with occasion being measured in years between incidents (so far in my life, but going forward, who knows?). Except for yesterday.

Yesterday around 2 in the afternoon I began to experience vertigo. Over the course of 30 minutes it went from mild to severe, where I could barely stand erect long enough to move from the T.V. room back to my bedroom. This was the same intensity of vertigo I experienced in September 2019. That period of vertigo was so intense that I went into a local hospital and spent the night for observation as well as some rather strong medications to bring it under control. This time I didn’t want another trip and stay. Instead I was trying to perform the exercises with my head to bring the vertigo under control. Those exercises are supposed to calm the inner ear, which when it goes wonky is how you wind up so dizzy.

That didn’t work. Instead it made me even more nauseous to the point I stumbled into the bathroom and threw up. And I mean full ballistic vomiting. I stayed over the commode until it was just dry heaves, washed out my mouth and then stumbled back into the bed. That unfortunately wasn’t the end of it. Over the next hour I went back in three more times for three more sessions. After the last session my body told my mind it was finished with my stomach. That’s when the G.I. tract decided it wanted to chime in, so my next visit was for diarrhea. Fortunately that was only one trip, but once was enough. By the time I was completely finished with my bathroom trips I was dripping cold sweat and worn out. I went back to bed and slept solidly for three hours.

By the time I woke up the nausea was pretty much gone. I drank a fair amount of water to avoid dehydration, but I wasn’t hungry so I ate nothing. I went back to bed later that evening and unfortunately woke up around 4 am this morning.

A lot of folks at this point are probably thinking “COVID!” I almost thought that as well, except it has all the earmarks of food poisoning. The only question is by what. I sure didn’t eat anything from outside of the home yesterday. And considering how quickly it came upon me, and how quickly it subsided, along with the symptoms, leads me to believe in food poisoning. But none of the typical vectors of food poisoning in the home came up. For example I can’t stand mayonnaise, or other types of condiments, and thus don’t eat those. Everything I ate that morning was either cooked or heated except for some fruit I had later in the day, and it was washed as usual. Right now, no clues.

This morning I’m mostly back to normal. There is some residual tiredness, and a very minor headache on the right side of my head around the temple, but it’s nearly gone now. No nausea to be sure. Just a very intense period of illness for half-a-day yesterday.

I just wish I knew what happened to me.

Update

I took the iHealth COVID-19 Antigen Rapid Test at home. I tested negative.