So apparently I have mono, and a relatively severe case of it. I've been terribly ill for the past two weeks, and my full recovery does not appear to be on the horizon any time soon. On May 13th, I came down with a fever with no other symptoms, which became agonizingly bad that Saturday night. By that Monday my fever was gone, and was replaced by coughing, nausea, and a total loss of appetite. For a week I was probably consuming ~500 calories a day, and some days throwing up half of it. By the end of that week, my appetite had returned to the point where I could eat two small meals or so, so I figured I might be getting over whatever I had.

Wrong. I still felt kind of crummy by the 23rd, so I decided to go to the university clinic the following day. I wake up Monday morning at 5:30am with the most painful sore throat I had ever experienced at the time. I skip class and go to the clinic; the doctor suspects I have mono, so they took a blood test and mouth swab. 20 minutes later it's confirmed that I have it and I get a prescription for codeine. The next day, while on codeine, my throat felt even worse than the previous day. I go back to the doctor, and he prescribes me a 6 day steroid treatment to reduce the swelling of my tonsils and whatever else is in my throat. I'm on day three, and feeling a lot better compared to how I did Monday and Tuesday, but it still hurts to swallow and generally still sucks. Although now because my glands on the right side of my neck are so swollen I think its somehow putting pressure on my ear canal and my inner ear hurts on the right side. I'm hoping that's what it is and not some kind of infection

TL;DR? I'm really sick because of mono, and it sucks. I also have no idea where/who I got it from. The virus multiplies inside of you for 4-6 weeks until you start to show symptoms. I've kissed two girls who are both healthy during that time period, so either one of them were somehow contagious without ever having any symptoms, or I might have somehow accidentally shared a drink with someone who wasn't sick at the time. Or I might have had some ******* spit in my food for all I know.

Anyway, has anyone here every experienced the many joys and wonders of mono or have any advice/encouragement/opinions on the subject?

You got it from me.

I just had it.

It sucks, that's it.

*googles mono*

It always lasted for about a month or so when I had it.


They're typically supposed to give you an antibiotic that prevents you from getting Bronchitis, which often forms after the Mono.


There's absolutely no way to know where you got it. It's the result of a virus that more than 90% of people have been exposed to. They call it "the kissing disease" but I first got it when I was a child & wasn't kissing anyone. I also never shared drinks or eating utensils. I probably got it from something that I touched (I was always chewing on my nails) just like most people get the flu.


Believe it or not, I've had it twice. It was much worse having it when I was a child (early 80's) I was out of school for a month or so, lost a ton of weight & was in bed almost the entire time. The doctor was actually having problems diagnosing me at first & on first glance he had told my parents that it was possible that I had Tuberculosis & that I could die. It turned out to just be a severe case of Mono. I don't remember a lot of my early childhood but I remember having Mono. It's not something that you forget if it's a bad enough case.

I got it again when I was in high school. I don't know if it re-activated itself (it lies dormant once you get it) or if I got it from someone (this was a transitional period between 2-3 girlfriends). My memories of the effects from my childhood were so vivid that I knew exactly what it was. I walked to the doctor (no easy task) & told him that I had Mono. He said there's no way to know that for sure w/o running some diagnostics. I told him to run whatever he wants but that he's going to see that I have Mono. I did have Mono. This time around wasn't nearly as bad as when I was young or either my tolerance for pain was much higher. It went away in about 3 weeks but I was left w/ a case of Bronchitis because my parents encouraged me not to take antibiotics (religious exemption).

I feel for you. Drink plenty of water, broth, etc. Force yourself to eat as much as possible & eat nutritiously. Rest until you can't rest anymore (it's a great time to catch up on reading). You should probably have someone checking in on you frequently if you live alone. Other than that, you're pretty much ****ed until it's over w/. Good luck.

you're going to be very, very sleepy. No really: Very sleepy and tired as HELL! Prepare for it. Make sure you do not have a lot of commitments. I've had it. So bad that I couldn't get to school for a couple of months. Hell, I've had trouble getting out of my bed for a couple of months. Just, prepare for it. Make sure you haven't got any obligations (paying stuff/working/school etc.), because when you belong to the group that also gets tired, you're going to be tired as hell...

Thanks for that Mentat. I hope I do get very very sleepy. My biggest problem right now is that I can't get to sleep because of all the pain and sweating. I keep on waking up in the middle of the night, and I can't seem to get more than 7 hours of sleep. I've been taking melatonin, but I'm thinking about getting some proper sleeping aids.

And a couple of months? That's terrible. Was it because of pain or because of feeling so worn out?

Most people get mono when they're children and show no syptoms.

Bad news, you can get mono more than once. It can become active pretty much whenever it feels like. I think epstein bar is also a cause for chronic fatigue disorder.

I had mono earlier last year, and it ended up causing moderate damage to my liver because I had syptoms so long. (like 9 months almost)

Also: liver failure, rupture of the spleen, non-Hodgkin and Hodgkin lymphoma, Burkitt lymphoma, NK Cell lymphoma, possibly gastrointestinal epithelioma.

No stress dudes, just saying.

Wait, antibiotic? I was under the impression that an antibiotic could cause extreme complications, usually in the form of a skin rash. In fact, I was misdiagnosed as strep and they called me, frantically trying to tell me to stop taking the antibiotic. However, I took Doxycycline as malaria treatment for some time while I had mono and was fine.

Though, as I'm sure you've been told, don't let anyone hit you in the stomach. Your lymph system, and spleen in particular will be (as I'm sure you noticed) swollen, and fragile.

Also, supposedly you can only get it once, but I have seen people get sick from it twice. You only contract it once though.

EDIT:Though, I personally didn't get tired and symptoms only lasted a while. I was in Belize for a month and I think I drank enough rum to kill any sort of critters, good or bad, that were in my body. Should have made it worse, but maybe I should attribute it to being young and fit.