The 24th Birthday Project: Day Two

 

Health is wealth

The underestimation of good health is a simple case of, ‘you don’t know what you have till it’s lost.’ I’m talking about both physical and mental health. A majority of Nigerians though do not take mental health as seriously; the pandemic lockdown revealed how important it is and I believe the statistics will improve with time.

My health status this year was not too bad. It’s significant to me though because I haven’t had malaria and typhoid in 6 months. It’s a big deal because this is the longest I’ve gone without having malaria. I had my worse sickness in October 2020, I was down for 2 weeks, I took drugs and an injection for malaria, I didn’t feel better. At a point, I suspected it was covid-19 because I lost my sense of smell, and with the way, things were at the time I was scared to go for an official test, especially because it was only one symptom that I was feeling. So I delved into local treatment, ginger, and garlic drink (drinking garlic is so nauseating). I got better and regained my sense of smell eventually then went back to work. Even though I didn’t go for a test, it is important to do tests, we self-medicate a lot. I’m very guilty of this but I’m trying to do better. I took tests most of the time I fell ill last year. So, I guess effort counts.

This year I discovered I have to work to do on my mental health. I had to do a mental reevaluation when faced with an issue from my past, and I was stunned to realize that I was not as balanced as I thought I was, it is something I have buried inside myself that only comes up when it’s triggered. So it’s there waiting for a trigger for it to rise. That is not good, and I realized it had to be dealt with. I’ve known for a while that I have a temperamental nature which makes me get defensive when I’m not getting my way. It became more obvious this year, it seems when we decide to live consciously, we become more aware of our flaws. Knowing my flaws helps to be able to correct them, to be better. I know it’s not a day, month, or year job, but little drops can make an ocean (probably, lol).