The silver lining? I knew I had great friends, but I didn't know just how great they are until all of this happened.
Two weeks ago, I fell down some stairs. I heard a crack and felt a little pop in my left ankle, but I got right back up afterward, so I assumed I'd just twisted it. Sure enough, after a bit, I could walk just fine -- that is, until I couldn't. I started feeling lightheaded, so I grabbed my friend's arm for support, thinking that it would pass, but it didn't. I got dizzier and dizzier, my vision started clouding, my head and limbs suddenly got very heavy, and there was a rushing sound in my ears. I sat down to wait for it to pass.
When I was feeling up to it, three of my friends helped me get up so we could go back to my residence hall. When we were halfway there, I was all of a sudden extremely queasy and found that I couldn't put much weight on my left foot. One of my friends basically let me put all of my weight on her and she held me upright the whole way back to my building. They helped me lie down in the first floor's lounge, as I knew there was no way I was going to make it up the stairs to the third floor where I live. One friend ran up to the third floor and grabbed some water for me, and someone also ran up there to get a bag of frozen fruit so I could ice my ankle.
At this point, I was no longer queasy or lightheaded, but my ankle hurt. So badly. When we were sure that I wasn't going to vomit, one of my friends gave me a piggyback ride up the stairs. Once in my room, my friends took my mattress off of the top bunk and put it on the floor so that I didn't have to climb a ladder (because that wasn't happening), they made sure I was going to be okay, then left so I could call my parents.
All evening, girls from my wing and other people from our floor dropped in to see how I was doing and to bring me food. For days afterward, people would stop me to ask if I was feeling any better and see if they could do anything for me. But this injury meant that I could barely make it to the bathroom (which is next door) by myself for a few days. My bestie took me to the doctor, which took four hours and resulted in the diagnosis that I'd predicted: kinda bad ankle sprain. She waited with me the whole time.
Through this whole crazy ordeal, my friends have been so wonderful. They've been attentive and helpful, with just the right number of "gimp" jokes. They even still laugh every time I only mostly-jokingly warn them to be careful while going down stairs, or they'll fall and sprain their ankles. True friends, right there.
Update on my condition:
I have good days and bad days. Yesterday my foot and ankle felt totally normal (though I still have a limited range of motion) but this evening the whole deal started randomly hurting. It'll get better with time and exercises; in the meantime, I am not giving tours and am taking care of myself as much as possible.
