May 2019
Okay, alright. I think I’ve learned my lesson. It has to be something in the water.
Every time I come to Vietnam I want to eat and drink EVERYTHING. And every trip I get the worst travelers diarrhea without fail. Okay, the first trip I was fine, but that was because I spent 5 months living in China first where I had my share of stomach issues.
The issues started on my second trip to Vietnam. I ended up getting diarrhea for a few days before going to the hospital. They did testing and said that nothing was actually wrong with me (?) and that my body probably just isn’t used to eating so many types of foreign foods at one and was overloaded. I was advised to eat a bland diet and drink Smecta to help. I was so disappointed since that meant that for about a week when my family was eating amazing food I was sitting off to the side eating congee or plain bread.
During my third trip I remembered that my issue was in my gut so after I got sick AGAIN I started to eat yogurt daily as a pro-biotic, thinking it would help to maintain my gut health. I don’t think it really does anything much but it tastes good and I liked to think it was helping. The third trip the illness didn’t last as long so I was grateful for that.
After coming here 3 times without any proper medicine to fight diarrhea, I thought I was truly prepared this time around with my pepto bismol. I went about 3 days without even needing it or having any issues and then it happened. Without fail. I started to get sick. I took the pepto but it honestly did nothing for me.
This time I got sick after one specific meal. I had eaten food that was considered to be clean since it was in a restaurant rather than from the street and the meat was fully cooked. I didn’t think that would have caused a problem. But then I remembered that people kept telling me that the water is probably making me sick. I only drink bottled water in Vietnam but then I realized that the water used to make drinks and ice might not be bottled.
I had drank a fresh watermelon juice and realized that probably I got so sick because they may have blended it with “filtered” water, AKA, water that isn’t up to the same standards as the water in the US. All this time I thought I was doing fine with drinking only bottled water only to find that it was probably still causing my issues.
So as I write this I’m in my sick bed. We are on a couples trip to Ha Long Bay and will be taking a luxurious cruise today. I’m hoping that I start to feel better so that I can enjoy the trip and be able to film better content rather than me just talking about how sick I am. 😂