Asbestos, Mildew, and Mold, Oh My!

How many sick days is this? Five? HOW AM I STILL GETTING SICK?

Everyone always says your first year in a school is the worst, that you'll catch everything. My friends, the second year is worse even than that. Your body is already weakened from the previous years diseases, your immune system shocked by the sheer volume of germs assaulting it.

For real though, either I'm a hypochondriac or there is definitely something just plain wrong with the air in my school. By the time February vacation had rolled around I was pretty much ill with a chest cold. Two days later, all signs of illness had mysteriously dried up and I was perfectly fine.

Now it's Wednesday, two days back at school and I am already feeling sick again- achy head, runny nose, scratchy throat, my skin as white and dry as birch bark. I mean, I know schools are breeding grounds for germs and all, but the situation is becoming dire. There are only two possible solutions: 1. My body subconsciously does not want me to have wake up and go to work, thus making up illnesses of it's own accord, or 2. The air quality in this school is extremely poor. And since I love my job, I'm going to go with the latter.

I would love to bring a humidifier into work to alleviate the desert-dry air, but humidity is not good for books and I have the feeling it would just amp up the amount of viruses and bacteria germinating in there. It's also a bit disheartening when you hear the school nurse saying things like, "Wow, the teachers are just dropping like flies today", or the secretaries lamenting that there aren't enough subs to go around. (Speaking of, they better not have put the nutcase sub in for me today- I don't need to go back in tomorrow to find children sleeping in the stacks and the computers coated in an inch thick layer of spitballs.)

What do you do when you're actually allergic to your work?