Well I'm Hot Blooded, Check it and See...

[taste_is_sweet]

For them's what might be interested, there is a multi-fandom commentfic meme going on at ariadnes_string's LJ (don't know her, but the woman has good ideas).

This particular meme is all about fevers, which as we all know tend to be awesome in fiction and kind of horrible in real life. (My mom got Dengue fever right after a Habitat for Humanity trip to Haiti many, many years ago, and at one point her poor brain was so fried that she honestly thought she'd been a victim of a voodoo curse. Definitely not fun to witness at the time.)

I've gone through all the comment prompts and read almost all of the finished fic(lets), and I've been grinning like the wicked, H/C junkie fangirl that I am. Except for one little thing that I just don't get.

So far, every writer who's actually said what temperature the suffering, delirious woobie has reached has written it as being no higher than 102 Fahrenheit (about 38.9 Celsius). Now, I've had a fever that high and let me say in no uncertain terms that it sucks balls, but that's nowhere near high enough to cause delirium.

Generally, people don't start hallucinating or thinking they've been cursed until their fever hits 104 F (40 miserable degrees Celsius). Temperatures of 105 (40.5) and up are where you drag your raging teammate outside into the blizzard so you can bury him in snow before the brain and organ damage starts.

Now, it is true that the faster a person's temperature rises, the more likely they are to have febrile seizures. But a normally climbing fever that gets to 102/38.9 will probably make you want to die, but it won't make you see the Grim Reaper and his flying monkeys coming through the window to help you get right on that. There's a good rule-of-thumb chart right here.

Obviously not everyone will react to a higher-than-normal body temperature in the same way, but it still struck me as odd that a temperature 102/38.9 would be considered dangerous. Have any of you guys had different experiences? Am I wrong? Enlighten me, FList! :D (Passes out the Tylenol and Paracetamol.)

Comments

[sholio]

I had a fever of about 104 when I had the flu this past winter, and not only did I not hallucinate, I didn't even feel THAT awful. I was just too tired to move. Nor did I feel the urge to bathe myself in ice water to bring my temperature down.

I imagine that people's bodies probably react differently to fevers, so I can't rule out the possibility of a person being delirious at 102, but I suspect that it's just a case of research!fail. Like the hypothermia fic I read awhile back in which the character was near death with a body temperature of 97.

[taste-is-sweet.livejournal.com]

Man, I wish I had your stamina! The fever I was talking about above was either 102 or slightly under, and every single part of my body hurt down to my hair follicles and I didn't want to move.

I agree that it's possible for someone to be delirious at 102 (twistedhilarity above mentioned as much), but not likely across, say, three different fandoms full of adult males. ;-> And yeah, I have a colleague whose normal body temperature is 97 degrees F. I don't even think you hit a real danger zone until you're under 80.

[jak-frostty.livejournal.com]

My baseline temp is just below 97, does that mean I'm dead? XD

[taste-is-sweet.livejournal.com]

I have a friend who has the same kind of baseline, so I doubt it. But I'd hate to think of you getting a temperature above 103... ;->

[jak-frostty.livejournal.com]

Highest I ever remember getting since my teens was 102. Wasn't at the hallucinating stage but I felt like I'd been hit by a truck after drinking about 5 beers (and I'm kinda a lightweight).

[taste-is-sweet.livejournal.com]

Yeah, that sounds about right. :( The last time I had a fever like that I hurt so much I thought I'd actually strained my back muscles. God, it's horrible.