Today, I am going to talk about a recent event that I am quite ashamed of. I took stupid decisions after stupid decisions that made something very easy becoming something very complicated.
It all started because we decided to celebrate one of my friend’s 30th birthday. We were around 10 guests, 2 of them were organizing everything. The plan was to book an entire day to make a memorable trip in my country (I am so afraid that one of them will read this that I don’t want to say in which country I’m from… yes, I am deeply ashamed). We had a great program planned and we were all really looking forward to this day.
Problems arose when we checked the weather forecast and realized that it will rain. Now, what we had planned was an outside activity so it was kind of a bummer. The organizers decided to cancel everything and find another plan (we were Tuesday, it was for Saturday). I was quite happy because I really didn’t want to stand in the rain for hours… as you can imagine.
The organizers came with 3 other activities we could do, they were really amazing. We all voted for the same one so we were quite happy to have find a Plan B so fast. However, one of my friend then suggested that since the activity took place near a famous wellness center, we could go the thermal baths and spa afterwards. Everybody was really happy about the suggestion. From this point on, I began to act like an idiot so be prepared.
So, I am allergic to water… let’s say that I was not thrilled at all with the idea to go to thermal baths and/or a spa. Staying in warm water for hours is not appealing to me because it means I will enjoy the first 10 minutes, then my skin will start to get itchy and burning so I will need to act like I’m fine when I am definitely not. Even after the baths, it will take me hours for my skin reaction to stop so let’s just say I avoid thermal baths.
Anyway, the logical thing to do in this situation would have been to say that I can’t go to thermal baths so it would be better to find something else to do, right? Well, that’s not what I did. You have to know that I HATE to be an inconvenience to people. I will literally try to do ANYTHING to avoid asking people for help. I also hate having to say no when somebody ask me for a helping hand. So, since everybody was so happy with the suggestion, I couldn’t bring myself to tell them I wasn’t. I just didn’t say anything about it. For one entire day, I tortured myself to find a solution. I even thought: « Well, would it really kill you to go to the thermal baths? Can’t you do this for your friends? You’ll get better the next day, just roll with it » and I think if I was a bit younger that’s what I would have done. But, even though I am stupid, I knew that I couldn’t do this.
After torturing myself and talking about it with my best friend (who couldn’t understand why I didn’t say anything in the first place haha), I decided that I just had to say that I would go to the activity, eat lunch with them and then leave before going to the wellness center. That’s reasonable and understandable, right? Well, let’s not forget that I made a lot of stupid decisions, OK?
However, when we decided where to go for lunch (on the same day as the thermal baths was decided), somebody suggested a restaurant and we all agreed (me included). What I didn’t realize though was that the restaurant was located next to the wellness center. Now, the plan was to go by car to our activity (I don’t have a car, one of my friend was picking me up), which was located 15 minutes away from the closest train station. Then, we would go to a village in the MOUNTAIN for lunch and thermal baths. At least 45 minutes away from the closest train station. See my problem? If I were to tell them that I couldn’t go to the thermal baths, somebody would have to drive me down to the train station and then come back to the village, losing 1 and a half hour just because of me.
I couldn’t even bring myself to ask, I would have been too ashamed to make somebody lose this time for me. So I thought: « Well, I can just do the activity and then ask to be dropped to the train station before they go for lunch » but at this point it was Friday, and I was already really ashamed of my stupid ass. I realized that if I was going to tell them this only now, they would ask why I didn’t say anything sooner. So, do you know what I did? NOTHING! I didn’t say anything!
And then, to top off my stupidity… on Saturday morning, the day of the trip (2 hours before the meeting point), I texted them to say that I was feeling SICK and wouldn’t be able to join them… was I feeling sick? Not at all! But I was so panicked about what to do that I decided it was better if I didn’t go at all to not bother them.
Let’s just say that now I am really angry at myself for lying and not going. All of this would have been avoided if I just SAID something when they suggested thermal baths. We would have found something else to do or at least found a restaurant close to the train station so I could join for lunch. The worst is that I am sure nobody would have been mad at me if I just asked them at the beginning.
I guess the problem lies in the fact that this allergy is rare and very unknown. I know most of the time, people don’t take it very seriously because they have never heard of it and don’t realize what it implies. So now, I guess I hate having to explain myself and I prefer to worry for days and find a stupid solution instead…
If anybody ever reads this blog, I would love to hear some of your stupid choices, it would make me feel better about my own stupidity, please? ^^’
Daily trouble of Aquagenic Urticaria 