A description of my weekend

I used to enjoy sick days but now I wish I could keep going through the motions so as not to get behind. Growing up? Or maybe being sick was never worth the time off. I've had a fever between 100 and 103 for days and I can hardly get out of bed because my doctor recommended toughing it out without meds until evening. Currently at 103.1.

"When you develop a fever, the body sends signals to the hypothalamus that tells it to raise the setpoint to a higher temperature. Often, but not always, this is a response to an infection, such as a bacterium or a virus. The immune cells that respond to the infection secrete molecules called "endogenous pyrogens." (Endogenous means made by the body, and a pyrogen is something that causes the temperature to rise.) The endogenous pyrogens travel through the blood and reach the hypothalamus, where they cause the setpoint to increase. Once that happens, the hypothalamus tells the body, "You're too cold." Remember that the temperature may be normal in this situation, but what matters is that the temperature is lower than the setpoint, which has been raised. So you feel cold, get under the blankets, and shiver.

A while later, when the temperature has risen to the setpoint, the hypothalamus sends out the signal, "Your temperature is fine now." Then you no longer feel cold and often throw off some of the blankets. And when the fever "breaks," the level of endogenous pyrogens decreases, the hypothalamus changes its setpoint back to normal, and now the elevated temperature again seems too hot. Suddenly you start to sweat and throw off all the blankets! Soon this leads to a decrease in temperature back to the normal setpoint, and you feel normal again."