Be Anxious for Nothing – except when on Larium

Hello blogosphere, I write to you from an empty dining room in an Entebbe guesthouse.

I would like to say, that I am no longer taking Larium. 

At first, it seemed that the side effects were not, in fact, affecting me. I have always had nutty dreams, most notably, my dreams have a bad habit of picking up where my day left me off. This is cause for some genuine confusion come morning time. Some of my coworkers who are prone to depression stay away from it, as it can make you more depressed. However, I have not felt more depressed than the expected dose of depression when living in an isolated, impoverished, conflict-ridden village in the dead center of Africa. 

I did notice, however, on my last R&R, there was little of both. I could not fall asleep without my passport, money, Swiss Army Knife and headlamp on the pillow beside me. That way, if anything happened, I would know where the important things were and I could run quickly. 

Now, before you think I sound out of my mind, please, bear in mind my daily life style and the places I have been for recent R&Rs… are they in your mind? Alright then. 

  

So, with that in mind, you may understand that my heightened sense of paranoia is not necessarily unhealthy, but a mere necessity of environmental adaptation. I have assumed thus,blaming all my anxiety on Ango. The thing is, this enlightened level of anxiety 

has been instrumental in getting me through
my day to days at the Ango base. 

Yes, I love my job… but it might be out to kill me. And if not my job, then Ango in and of itself. 

Take last week alone: 6 foot viper in my generator, giant spider watching a movie with me by my head on the wall, giant spider bites all over my legs that are still bleeding 6 days later, 5 days in a row of 14 hour work days, mosquito and fly bites that make me wonder if I have leprosy, lightning strikes, bumpy airplanes, dodgy roads, over exuberant military… I could go on, but I am getting more stressed out just typing this. 

Either way, you get the point. 

So, needless to say, my daily needs of adrenaline, anxiety and paranoia have been perfectly on par with my level of activity. However, like I said, my last R&R I was really struggling with feeling very unbalanced and uneasy. My levels of these usually much required pheromones (Are those pheromones? I don’t think so, but it sounded good.) did not drop as my level of activity and responsibility did. So, I had made it up in my mind that if I could not calm down in Europe this September, it was time for a change in my malaria prophylaxis. 

The other day, though, when I got to Bunia, one of my coworkers was talking about how calm she was after going off of Larium, then another chimed in on how it was making her crazy and another how she was still paranoid even as she was staying at her cousin’s house (an ambassador, who lives in one of the most fortified places you can find in these parts)… So, yeah, that to say, I have quit cold turkey. Now, fellow hostel stayers do not have to endure my talking in my sleep and I do not have to endure waking up to hitting walls with my fist thinking I am defending myself from a carjacker in Nairobi. I guess it is a win-win situation. 

However, with the switch always comes a bit of exposure risk. In my cosmetic bag for my Europe R&R (where I hope to soak in as many Rs as possible), I have a thermometer, two rapid result malaria tests and malaria treatment, just in case. So, yeah, if needed, I will be giving myself a blood test… because I don’t already do enough ridiculous things in my life.