When we were in the RTW planning phase, we did a bunch of research on vaccines needed for the countries we were visiting. Since Malaria presented some risk in a few of the countries we were visiting, we began researching options of what to take. What I found was, there are zero good medicines for Malaria prevention. Doxy, the cheapest, can cause stomach issues and yeast infections. No thank you. Malarone, the best option with the least side effects, was like $500+ from Costco when I priced it out for how many pills I would need. So I opted for door number three, Mefloquine or Larium because it’s one pill per week and the main negative is extremely vivid dreams. During our travels (Mefloquine packed safely in my medicine kit), I did hear a story of a guy on Mefloquine who started hallucinating and tried to slice his wrists with a toilet seat in Thailand. He’s okay, but it did leave me with a slightly uneasy feeling in regards to my choice of meds.
I opted not to take Malaria pills in Laos (the only real SE Asia location that my doctor thought it necessary) because, first, there is a resistance to Mefloquine so it wouldn’t be effective, and second, I wasn’t going to be living in the jungle and I met plenty of fellow travelers who said not to worry about it. So I didn’t. And it was fine. Perhaps the time of year, but I hardly got any bug bites at all in Laos.
I haven’t experienced any vivid dreams (minus last night where I think I was involved in a armed B&E, but now I can’t remember the details and who knows, that could be my subconscious working out some other issue…what, I’m not sure) or any other super negative side effect, but I haven’t slept through the night in weeks. And for our last night in India, I was sleeping in a Westin Heavenly bed, the night after a 3am night train arrival, following a night dancing till sunrise, so in the normal world, I should have crashed and gotten the best night sleep ever, but no. It wasn’t until we met two doctors traveling in Zanzibar that Danielle and I put two and two together. She hasn’t been sleeping either. We had chalked up the crappy sleeping to a ridiculously hot fan room (the added expense of AC on a backpacker budget is a real SOB in swelteringly hot locales like Zanzibar). After last night, the worst sleep yet, I’m done with the meds. We’re heading to Cape Town on Friday (a non-Malaria zone) and even though you’re supposed to take the medicine for four weeks after leaving the country, I’ve decided I’d like to get a solid night sleep as soon as possible. It’s a treatable disease and I’ll just be on the lookout for any signs of fever, chills, nausea, etc. I mean, a friend we met in Thailand who had been in the Peace Corp in Africa for two years and was taking Malaria meds, still got Malaria.
I’m just going to cross my fingers and hope for the best. And with the drugs out of my system, HOPEFULLY I’ll be sleeping through the night sometime very, very soon!
