A Look at Cognitive Dissonance

I recently had a big scare and while working my second concrete night pour in a row I started to have some pretty crazy symptoms. Here is what happened:

At 2 am last Wednesday I started getting some intense pain in the area of my pelvic joints. Not knowing what it was I thought I tweaked something so I took some Tylenol and tried to relax for the rest of the night. I then I got a killer headache. Unfortunatly the pain got worse through the night and close to 6 am I started to feel very cold and I started to shiver. I then decided I needed to get home and get to bed, assuming that these problems were stemming from lack of proper sleep and poor diet (come from working nights). On my drive home I bought 2 V8 Fusions and chugged them for the good nutrition and cranked up the heater to get rid of my shakes/shivers. Thank god I hit traffic because once the shakes stopped I started to get some blurry vision and it was good I wasn't driving fast.

Once I got home the walk to my door cooled me off and my shivers started again so I cranked up my heater and headed for bed. After undressing and climbing into bed I had the following symptoms: headache, joint and muscle pain, the shakes, blurred vision, shortness of breath and the tips of my fingers went numb. Once I warmed up the shakes went away but not I was burning up and not sweating. At this point I decided that I had to stop being a tough guy and I needed to go to the hospital.

Heres the thing about hopsital emergency rooms... They are very quick to get you in to make sure you are not dying but then they take a very long time for everything else. This sucks on 2 levels: You are in pain in a room on your own AND it gives you a long time to think of everything that could be wrong with you.

So here I was lying on the doctors table, in a pretty stylish gown I might add, wondering what was wrong with me. Let me share a few of the items running through my head. Appendicitis. Blood Clot. Heart issue. Cancer. Lyme Disease. Death. Lets just say I was freaking out as to what was wrong with me. Well just in case you are wondering, I was diagnosed with Cellulitis after some blood tests and such. Cellulitis is an infection of the deep subcutaneous tissue of the skin that is often associated with a fever. So all of these symptoms boil down to a simple fever... the worst fever of my life.

Then I was at home on antibiotics thinking of what had got me into this situation and all I can think of is that I must have been bitten by something. Next came the realization that there are times in one's life that serve as a warning of the path you are heading down. Here is mine...

I am leading an unhealthy life with a bleak future.

There it is. Harsh but true. I am a young man who does not take care of himself as he should. I have always said that I am a "young guy whose family has been healthy through their lives despite being on the hefty side." Classic cognitive dissonance and its just not acceptable anymore.

I have decided to listen to this event/warning in my life and it is time to change many things about how I live. Goodbye indifference and hello to proper living.

"Life is far too important a thing ever to talk seriously about."