I noticed a rough headache, painful eyes, chills, muscle pain and a fever. The Dengue mosquito had done his job on me and I did not know it.

The devil’s disease

Dengue fever is a tropical disease spread by those well known buzzing mosquitoes and it kills over 22.000 persons annually. There are no treatments known so far, but it can leave you flat in your bed for days or even weeks.

I knew something was very wrong when I sat down in the evening with my Mexican friends at a local restaurant and started feeling very dizzy. I had been spending the entire day at the beach of San Augustin, so the sun must have been more than I could handle. At least that is what I thought.

Knocked out in bed

I thought I had a heatstroke

The next morning I still felt like I got hit by a car. I jumped into a taxi and went to my friend’s place so that I would not remain all by myself in the room where I was staying. When I got there I stretched out on a mattress on the floor with pounding headaches, muscle pain all over my body, cold chills in 40 degrees Celsius weather and pain in my eyes. My friend started putting wet towels on my head against the fever and giving massages to my legs and arms against the muscle pain, but the pain did not really seem to leave until I started taking Paracetamol. What a mess. However, I and also my friends still believed that it was a heatstroke.

After two days of laying in front of my friend’s TV and not having gone home anymore I decided it was time to visit a doctor to confirm the heatstroke. Doctor Velazquez was recommended by my friends and so I called him for an appointment on a sunny Saturday afternoon. He asked me for my symptoms and the only thing Doc could think of was Dengue. Since it was weekend and all the labs were already closed I had to search for a 24/7 lab where I could do some tests on a Sunday.

Luckily there was one lab in Huatulco town named Laboratorio de Análisis clínicos “Figueroa” that was supposed to be open 24/7, meaning also being open on Sundays. Well, in these countries simple things aren’t always as simple as they look; the lab was closed. There was one phone number written down on the door, but of course, no one answered when I called. I went back to my friend’s place and decided to try again in the morning.

In the meanwhile I described my symptoms on Facebook and basically everyone commented confirming the Doc’s diagnose of Dengue.

When I woke up I called again and at 9:30 I got an appointment for the tests. I walked from my friend’s place to the lab and felt fine, until the doc started squeezing my arm with a rope for a better visibility of the veins. Firstly he could not find any vein on my left arm and had to squeeze off my right arm as well to see if there was any luck on that side. By then I started to feel very, very light in my head and I fainted. My first time ever fainting during a blood test. During that the doc luckily already had the chance to take the blood sample and he helped me up to get to a nearby sofa. I took a taxi back for the 3 blocks I was supposed to walk back to my friend’s place.

I have Dengue

An hour later I had the results. The doc from the lab gave me a quick call, about which he had let me known before that I was not supposed to answer because it would costs him money, just to ring that he had the results ready for me to be picked up. By then I was already back at my friend’s place and since unfortunately there was nobody there to bring me I walked back again to the lab to get my results.

The lab results showing I have Dengue

Positive for Dengue. That was all I needed to understand out of the 3 papers that covered the results. Another interesting thing was my platelet count being quite low, but not that low that blood transfusion in a hospital was required. Luckily I “only” had the Dengue Clásico with risk of internal bleeding if I did not rest enough…

The rest of the day was spend like the previous days; hiding under a blanket on a mattress in front of the TV with a pillow and a bottle of water and of course my iPhone to entertain myself during the commercials.

Recovery

My friends told me I must be having a good immune system to only have fever for two days. However, after the fever I still have to use a lot of Paracetamol against the headaches and the pain in my eyes. The dizziness also still has a lot of presence.

Over the last 5 days I have been laying down a lot, trying to sleep, drinking a lot of water and basically doing nothing (which I find very, very difficult).

My Dengue experience will hopefully just be a short one and if so I can consider myself very lucky.

Tomorrow my sister arrives in Huatulco. I was supposed to meet her in Mexico City for a backpacking trip through the rest of Mexico, but due to the Dengue I was not able to meet up with her in the capital and had to book her a flight to meet me up here in Huatulco – Oaxaca. I will take it easy for the first couple of days when I feel better and show my sis my favorite beautiful Mexican village before we start visiting other places in the wonderful Mexico.

About Renate Rigters

Ever since I left my home country I felt at home at any other place I went to. I enjoy getting to know more cultures by talking to strangers and hearing their philosophy about life. Speaking with gestures when you can not find a shared language, finding places only the locals go to and learn about their customs and values. Hanging out with local people makes me happy. The experience of every new place is a step out of your comfort zone where I like to wander around until it feels like a second home.

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