Love In The Time Of Dengue

Christopher Travel Journal 9 Comments

So, I contracted Dengue Fever.  If this nasty little tropical mosquito-borne illness is new to you… here’s a handy little official medical diagram of what having Dengue feels like.

Anyway.  We’re in Bali and I’ve spent the last six days alternating between sweating, freezing, cramping, whining, sleeping, and other gross symptoms.   To make matters worse, I found out today in follow up tests that I somehow also picked up a bacterial infection AND a parasite/amoeba type of infection.  Not my finest hour.

But here’s the thing… if there was anywhere that I had to be totally grounded, then Ubud is the place.

Because Lauren… is in hippie heaven!

In between taking care of me, while I’ve slept she has spent six days doing yoga, going to raw-organic-health food restaurants, browsing new-age stores,1  and getting random massage treatments.  Today she even took a class to learn how to make natural beauty products.2  She loooooves Ubud.  I’m pretty sure she’s one guava-quinoa smoothie away from braiding her hair with seashells and changing her name to Moonstar.3

Moving on, after four visits to the local clinic and two blood and other types of nasty tests,4  I now have more drugs in me than a Grateful Dead tourbus, so I’ll be back to blogging soon! 5

Oh yeah, and all that medical service, testing, and RXs…  under $250 US.  Indonesia is amazing.

Ok, going back to sleep now.

Thanks for reading,
Patient Zero


  1. I think that means they sell crystals

  2. Seriously.  Not natural like “find our products at Whole Foods,” but natural like she was grinding up turmeric and came home with yellow hands and jars of weird potions…

  3. Kidding.  Hopefully…

  4. It rhymes with “pool.”  

  5. hopefully

Comments 9

  1. Kaylyn

    Yikes! Out of all the bugs I have worked with Dengue is definitely awful. I remember my grandpa telling me stories about when he had in during WWII while he served in the South Pacific. Thank goodness for advances in medicine over the past 70 years. Glad you are on the mend. Keeping you in our thoughts and prayers.

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        Christopher

        Hey Maureen! good to hear from you. sorry for the delay in commenting. somehow this was caught in the spam filter. Hope all is well!

  2. Vicki Adams

    So sorry you’re not feeling well! Glad you have such a good nurse to take care of you. We’ll be thinking of you and praying for a quick recovery:-) Love you both!!

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  3. Andrew

    Glad you’re recovering, but it does look like you lost some weight based on Lauren’s pics. I may need to find some dengue mosquitoes before our next beach trip.

  4. Peter S

    Yikes!! Glad to hear you’re better, based on your subsequent posts and the fact that you have left Ubud. All of us at DHC miss you!! Loving the blog, by the way…

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