Burning Out and Up

got a new phone last friday and got a terrible cold and a fever the next day. lousy trade off.

i haven't been hit this hard for some time. the last time i got hit so bad was about a year ago. my mother was still alive to take care of me. i was sick for 5 days straight. it was also the first time i came to understand, 'nabinat.' i went home to naga for some 'time off' and to check on my mom; but she ended up taking care of me. the cold and my fever knocked me down cold for 5 days. so the only thing i ever did during that vacation was nurse a cold and a 39 degree celsius fever. my mother wanted to bring me to a hospital but i desisted. i hated going to hospitals unless i need to be operated on. i miss her when i'm sick like this. i miss the soup and her hand on my forehead.

i woke up last Saturday with a burning throat; like the devil just raked a fork through my throat. i thought of drinking a teaspoon of mouthwash, maybe it will kill all the germs and stop the cold but a little bit of sanity and self preservation stopped me.

my brother was sleeping over his friend's house in crame and couldn't go home until the next day. i was running low on paracetamol and ibufrofen. when my brother had dengue a few days before christmas, we brought him to makati med's emergency room. he had been taking bioflu as opposed to tempra forte (paracetamol). the doctor said that bioflu is not really that effective since it's not pure paracetamol. so it's best to take tempra forte or biogesic instead. and you can alternate with ibufrofen since it makes the fever break faster and get rid of the body pains. but i ran out of medicine around lunch and my fever returned in the afternoon. i can barely drag myself to the bathroom much less drag myself to the drugstore. it's hard being alone when you're sick.

so around 12 am or 1 am sunday, i decided to call in. asked myke for marcy's number and workforce or forcedesk (or whatever name they go by these days), since apparently the old number doesn't work anymore. called the number several times and got a recording. i'm supposed to get a reference number, otherwise my call in would be invalid. ncns (no call no show). texted myke no live person answers it, i keep getting the damned recording. finally at 2 am, left a message because i was too frustrated to keep trying to callback. i was freezing cold and my head felt like it's going to split into a thousand pieces, and holding the phone is torture when all i want to do is crawl under the sheet. my Php500 load was diminished to Php428. wasted money, that annoyed me too since my phone calls were pretty much useless since i didn't speak to anyone at all.

i woke up at around 3 am and called again. i got the recording... again. what really ticked me off was the recording seems to say "bawal magakasakit kapag weekend!" It says "forcedesk hours are mondays through fridays from 8am to 6.30am the following day." so goodluck na lang sa magkakasakit ng sabado at linggo. i left another message but i wanted to curse too. i wanted to say all the curses i've learned in my stay here at PS. i never really learned how to curse ng malutong until i started working here. that recording is the most insensitive thing you can do to someone who is calling in sick and who's told to wait for a live person to get a reference number.

kaya eto na:

putang ina nyo for keeping me awake when i should've been sleeping this off.
putang ina nyo when i should've been resting and not worrying about getting a fucking ncns.
putang ina nyo for making my headache worse.
putang ina nyo during the times i can hardly breathe that night.
putang ina nyo for making me redial that fucking number so many times and repeat the stupid message while i try to negotiate how to breathe with my clogged up nose.
putang ina nyo for wasting my money, my phone's load and my time.
putang ina nyo.

i haven't been so pissed with PS until that night and by the time i've texted marcy i was frustrated beyond words. i just don't care anymore. i kept thinking i should just really go and find another job where i can just call my boss or text my boss during daylight hours (and not at some godforsaken time of the day i.e. mangingisda hours) that i can't come in for work since i'm too sick to drag a cat.

sometimes i wonder why i still do this. it's not like the company shows any appreciation for staying. four years of toiling and then what? everyday has been a constant struggle to come to work. i've been dragging my limb everyday to come early and failed. i haven't arrived early since december 20. i have received warnings from verbal reprimand to written ones. i don't know how else to motivate me to come early when even money is beginning to lose it's luster.

i have not felt so much indifference since the early days after my mother's death and here i am again. it's so hard to shake it off this time. sometimes i think i should just see my ob gyne and not wait until may. have her remove the lumps and resign after the operation. why wait until it grows to 20 mm? so why wait until i've finally reached the end of the rope?

One of the symptoms of an approaching nervous breakdown is the belief that one's work is terribly important. - Bertrand Russell