sick

Cyn's been sick since sunday or so. She tried going in to work for a while on monday, but had to come home. And then go back for something important. And then someone made her feel like she should "tough it out," and stay. Really dumb, since you're less productive, and you'd very likely get over it sooner if you stayed home. Also, by staying at work, you can infect others, and their productivity goes down too.

Monday night when I went to bed, I felt fine. When I woke up, I had a sore throat. Things went downhill from there. I felt crappy by the time I got home, and had to sleep for a while. I don't think I feel much worse than I did last night (haven't had to nap), but I've been relaxing today. When I'm sick, the illnness takes a lot out of me. Just staying upright in my chair at work, and thinking a lot wears me out. This is energy my body could be using for fighting the illness, I assume, so when I'm sick, I stay home.

It's interesting how different people view illness, and how different people are affected by it. Cyn had a coworker imply that she shouldn't stay home just because she felt under the weather. It's like the pain threshold. Some people get hurt, and they ignore it and get on with things. Some people curl up in the fetal position nursing their wounds. But do people feel pain differently than others? Is that second kind of person really a big baby, or do they just actually feel the pain more acutely than others? Or does it just seem worse to them because they're injured infrequently? And should that matter?

And you can't always tell how sick someone is. Some people look worse than they feel, and some feel worse than they look. I thought Cyn was over her illness yesterday. She wasn't acting any differently than normal. I saw her laugh and smile. That's something I don't have energy for when I'm sick.

I think we should not complain when someone wants to go home sick.