This is the worst day of my life!

I was supposed to write an exam this morning, but thanks to a headache that’s still pounding I couldn’t. A headache might sound like a minor thing. I mean, everyone gets a headache – once in a while. How can a mere headache stop me from writing an exam?

This one was not just a headache! When I woke up this morning it felt as if I had knocked my head against something. Had I knocked it against the wall? Or had I fallen from the bed and crashed my head on the floor?

I’ve been studying a lot and I think that’s what caused it! I know that sounds like an excuse, but it’s the only thing that makes sense to me. The past two days have been the toughest day of my life. Do you know that feeling of frustration you feel when you’re studying and nothing seems to be getting in or making any sense to you? Some of the things it was like I was encountering them for the very first time.

I didn’t know what a Development Support Communication was. I didn’t know what the role of the media is in a development communication project. I tried to revise and go through some past question papers to make sense of it, but when I went to bed around 11 am the content was still Greek to me.

It stressed me to no end. I was writing an exam at 8 in the morning, but I still had lots and lots of work to cover. I thought about this. I tossed and turned on the bed. I tried to sleep, held my teddy close to me, played slow music, but sleep failed to come… by 1 in the morning I was still up. It was only after I had taken a bath that I could finally sleep.

My alarm rang at 3. I heard it, I slept through it, only to wake up when the sun was up, and there were only a few hours left before I go to the exam room. I panicked! My head spun. My head felt as if it had knocked against something.

Until today I had never been in the reception of Dr Cupido’s office, but in the three years I’ve spent in this campus I had heard about him. Today I found myself perched in the comforts of the waiting chairs for an appointment at quarter-past-ten. Tee said I should consider myself lucky that I got an appointment this early – especially today!

Sure, maybe you don’t think one needs luck to see a doctor, right? Well, during exam time on our campus luck has to be in your side for you to see a Dr! The reception was filled with students feigning all sorts of sicknesses. Most even confessed that they were not sick but instead needed a sick letter so they could apply to write an alternative exam.

I think Dr Cupido thought that I was also one of those who only came to him for a medical certificate because he didn’t diagnose me. The only thing he said was that I should exercise, I should drink a lot of water, eat veggies and fruits.

“Exam times are stressful,” he said, dismissing me from his office with a prescription of pain pills. Only pain pills! I can’t believe that I paid R350.00 just to hear a Dr tell me that I should drink water, exercise and eat healthy! My God! What happened to good doctors? I feel robbed.

ZZ xxx

Dish it: do you think what Dr Cupido is doing (giving students’ fake sick letters) is right?