Deja Vu

In 1993, during the great flood, I was ten years old. My parents had recently bought my brother and I trampoline as an Easter present. Needless to say, we were both SUPER excited and would jump on it for hours.

One especially hot day, I had been jumping for hours by myself, practicing my cheerleading jumps. Being ten I was not really that interested in "The Great Flood Of 93' “ I ran inside the house; grabbed the biggest cup in the cupboard, which just happened to be a plastic 44oz Hardees cup; filled it to the top and drank the entire thing. As I finished, a thought popped into my mind: Didn't Mom and Dad say something about not drinking the tap water?" That was as far as the thought went. I threw my cup into the sink and ran back outside.

A while later Momma had surgery and was laid up in bed with terrible stomach pains. I got in bed with her one morning and complained, "Momma my tummy feels funny." I began to do this every morning. My parents thought it was so cute; I must have had sympathy pains for my mom.

In the next few months I had "the flu" several times. I began to lose ALOT of weight. My dance teacher even pulled my mom aside and gave her the "Has your daughter been eating regularly" accusation. Of course Lori has been eating. She LOVES food. I still look back at pictures from fourth and fifth grade and am mystified at how freakishly skinny I was. I did look a little on the anorexic side.

So, after about 15 pounds, months and months of insanely intense stomach pains that kept the entire family up all night and the pediatrician’s redundant diagnosis of, "It's just the stomach flu” Momma’s friend, Denise, who is a nurse, asked if they had taken a stool sample. They had not. So the next day Momma and I marched to the Doctors office and mom demanded, "Stool sample please."

Low and behold, we had a diagnosis of giardia lamblia. An extremely uncommon type of stomach parasite. Apparently you are REALLY not supposed to drink the floodwater. So, anyway after some medication and rest I was back to normal.

Fifteen years later I am sitting in the doctors office because I had noticed blood in my stool. After many questions Dr. Venkatesan sent took a stool sample and told me to come back next week. He would be on vacation for the next few days and did not think that it was anything to be too worried about.

The next Thursday I was back. Dr. Venkatesan comes in sits down and says you have a type of stomach parasite called giar… I finished his sentence. Giardia Lamblia? You’re kidding?!? How did I get it again? The Dr. says it is really hard to tell. It is most likely from contaminated water or undercooked food but it is impossible to tell what food or water since I do not remember anything tasting weird or making me immediately sick.

Yep! That is what it was. Only I, would get a completely uncommon stomach parasite twice!