Uvula Fun

Okay, so honestly, do you know what a uvula is? It's that hanging down "thing" in the back of your throat. See? Blog reading IS educational! And did you know that on occasions the uvula may decide to swell itself to mulitple times it's normal length?



I got some sort of colf/flu/sore throat thing on Thursday night. Friday it was off to Wichita. Medicine is good! Stayed up until 5am Saturday morning because my mom needed help wrapping gifts. The Lord and the medicine gave me some sort of reprieve from illness because the throat and such was fine. By mid-morning Saturday my voice was going. By the time I went to sleep last night I had hardly any voice, and all the joys of cold/flu-related mucous had returned to me. Lovely!

[Warning...if you gag at the mention of eating a worm...skip the next part.]



All last night I kept waking up because it felt like I had a huge puss bubble in the back of my throat. I honestly tried to add pressure to it, hoping it would just burset. It made it hard to cough and get a good breath, or "deal" with mucous.

When Eric woke up I asked him for a syringe. By golly I was going to get that big puss bubble out of my throught! I walked into the bathroom all ready for war. But no. What? Where's the pass bubble? No puss? But holy guacamole what IS going on with my hangy down thingy? That just isn't right!



o you guessed it. My big imaginary puss bubble was actually a big very real swollen uvula. I went back to sleep and (really) dreamed about chopping the thing off!!

I'm telling you, it is the WEIRDEST feeling. Either the thing is hanging forward onto the back of my throat pushing my gag reflex, or I can "swallow" it so it hangs back in my throat and feels like something caught in my airway. I think just the THOUGHT of your uvula being super-sized is hard for the human psyche. I just think about it and gag. I looked up pics on google tonight and wanted to gag. So here's your fair warning....super grody swollen uvula photo coming your way!

The pic doesn't do it justice. That thing in the top middle is NOT supposed to be touching my tongue. If I open my mout my uvula is supposed to sit pretty back in the back--not push it's way to center stage like a mini-tongue of some sort!

Swollen uvulas common, you ask? Not for me, but I guess if you drink and smoke all the time it may have happened to you. If you live in a constant state of deydration, it could happen to you. Or, I guess, if it's 4 days before Christmas and you are a frazzled run-d0wn mommy it might happen to you too! LOL!