Real Life Stories

ukPeter Moszynski

Just because you’re delirious…

Some years ago when I first went to work in Africa as a wide-eyed novice aid worker, fresh out of college, I had my first close encounter with tropical diseases.

Falciprum malaria is not only the most lethal strain of a disease that still remains mankind’s greatest killer, it also has a habit of messing with the patient’s head, frequently resulting in episodes of total delirium.

Falciprum malaria is not only the most lethal strain of a disease that still remains mankind’s greatest killer

I was living in a house with a number of fellow aid-workers, including a medical student working his elective at the local hospital, and when it became apparent that I had contracted malaria, none of my friends were particularly concerned. A blood test soon showed it to be falciprum, and I began an immediate course of treatment.

However, my condition worsened and I no longer had the energy to get out of bed. As I lay in my extremely rickety, locally-made wood and twine bed, I became convinced that it was infested with a particularly voracious wood boring insect known as a Scania beetle – allegedly because they resemble trucks – although to my fevered imagination they looked exactly like bullets with teeth, dementedly grinning as they set out to disturb my rest.

The noise of their chomping began to echo in my head until I could stand it no more and called out to my housemates: “Help, help, they’re eating my bed!”

My companions rushed in to see what all the fuss was about, and when they finally grasped the content of my demented ravings they all laughed and said: “Shut up and stop making such a fuss, you’re delirious”. Their scepticism failed to assuage the deafening sound of chomping from reverberating through my skull and I desperately tried to think of ways to convince my fellows of my predicament. I summoned up all my strength and managed to haul myself over to the side of my bed in an attempt to find some tell-tale trace of their burrowing. What I saw took my breath away. Huge mountains of sawdust were erupting out of the floor, many times faster than could possibly occur in real life. Such evidence was clearly proof of my dreadful plight and I immediately screamed for assistance.

And would anyone believe me? “Leave it out, you’re hallucinating”, I was reliably informed and once again left alone to suffer further persecution from my unwanted bedfellows.

But not for long. Within a few minutes there was a resounding crash and my companions rushed back inside to find me lying on the floor surrounded by the splintered remnants of my bed and a huge mound of sawdust, laughing uncontrollably as I tried to enunicate the phrase “I hate to say told you so but…”

I guess it goes to show that just because you’re delirious it doesn’t mean that your bed isn’t being eaten away from underneath you.

Originally published by BMJ 2010;340:c2295