Thursday, April 26, 2012

We don't want your brain to boil

During my last FTX (Field Exercise) in basic training, I came down with the flu.  The weather wasn't the greatest, it was early February in South Carolina and it has been sleeting, rainy and cold the whole time, which probably hadn't helped the situation.  I was taken to the hospital and spent the next day on quarters with IVs hooked up.

Each morning, a doctor came through and evaluated whether you could go back out to your training unit.  I was still running a low grade fever, so the doctor wanted to keep me there for another day.  Throughout the whole cycle, the drill sergeants had been telling us that if we missed so much of certain training events and missed the final ruck march (13 miles) in from the field that we wouldn't be able to graduate and would be moved to another BCT unit to complete the training.  My parents had already purchased plane tickets to come out and I didn't want to get shifted back, I wanted to complete training on time with my battle buddies.

I begged the doctor to release me and after about 15 minutes of going back and forth, he told me he would release me, but he would keep the bed set up since he knew I would be back within 24 hours.  I considered what he said for about two seconds before I asked again for him to release me and he did.  I was taken back out to my unit in the field.  I arrived back in time to help tear everything down and to pack my rucksack for the march. 

I was feeling okay as we headed out.  As the sun started to set and it started getting cooler, I couldn't seem to keep up with my nose running and I'm not sure how tactical sneezing is, but I tried to cover the sound as much as possible.  By about halfway through, I was feeling pretty cruddy.  Finally, as we were marching down the street that we all knew led back to the our basic training barracks, we all felt the sense of accomplishment.  We still had over a mile before we would be in the clear, but we had 12 miles in our rear view. 

As we arrived back to the barracks, there was a bonfire going and music to celebrate the completion of training.  Everything from that point forward was the outprocessing and graduation of BCT.  After the ceremony was complete and we had each received our Army Values tag, we went inside to have cookies and punch.  This may seem a little weird, but after not being able to have sweets during training, it was a reward. 

By this point, I still wasn't feeling well, so I said something to one of the Drill Sergeants.  He sent me to the duty Drill Sergeant to have my temperature taken, it was 104.3.  The duty Drill told me to go up to my locker and back a bag with a couple nights worth of personal hygiene and clothing.  I was upstairs less than ten minutes getting everything together and then I reported back down to the duty Drill.  He told me that an ambulance had been called to take me to the hospital and he decided to check my temperature again.  It had risen to 104.7. 

About that time, the commander walked out of his office and was told I was the soldier being sent to the hospital.  In a poor attempt to comfort me, he looked me square in the eye and told me in a voice like he was explaining something to a two year old that they had called an ambulance for me because they didn't want my brain to boil.  At the time, all I could think was 'is this guy serious?!?', he already proven to be a little less than intelligent, so this kind of encouragement just topped the cake. 

I was taken to the hospital and ended up being there for two more days and missed the huge dinner to celebrate the end of BCT, but I finished all my training and was able to graduate with the rest of my rotation the following Friday.

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