Appalachian Trail: Day 4 - Giving up?

The plan that day was to get to 220 as soon as possible. After all, I was mostly going downhill, right? I struggled to get everything packed up. The tent really exhausted me. It got harder to put into its bag. Yet I did one more time and eventually started heading south. I didn't even make the 0.6 miles to get out of the private property when during one break, I started generating spit in such huge gobs, I couldn't swallow them. I spit it out. This kept up a few minutes until I started to gag on it, throwing up, dry heaves. I felt so miserable at that point that I'd had enough. I was going to ask the next hiker to cross my path to call for paramedics. I was finished.
I waited, occasionally spitting, and waited some more. No one came. My strength returned, and the spit subsided. I gathered what strength I could and hauled on the pack again. I worked my way down to where the private property ended (not a great distance), and then to where the first ladder and road stood in my way.
At that point I could have dropped the pack and hailed a passing motorist, but my determination had returned, and I had an idea of using the upcoming brook to try to force food into my system.
So I threw the pack over the ladder, crossed the street, said hello to the cows again and then faced a monster of a climb.
You may remember in the previous blog me mentioning a grassy, rolling plain, that when going northward I climbed and then had a steep downhill trek, for which I was overjoyed. Well welcome to the other side of the fence. From this vantage point the grassy plain was a mountain.It took me 5 separate attempts to reach the summit, each effort generating a rest period.
My determination and will were greater than my strength at that point,. The idea of finding water and a nice place to rest was allowing me to overcome growing weakness. I did reach the top and again rested.
Yet after the climb there was a soft downhill trek to where the second ladder was. I threw the pack over, scaled it carefully, rested, then continued the trek until I came to Rte 11. Just across that road lay a source of water. I crossed it, left the pack by the bridge and taking an empty orange juice bottle that Mack had left me, along with my water pack and a package of Trail Mix, filled the orange juice bottle, threw in some Fruit Punch mix, and drank and ate Trail mix while sitting on the bank.
I got quite a bit of food in me all  told, using that method. Yet it didn't take too long before my system would take no more. I  filled the bottle, the water pack, sealing it with duct tape again, dragged my tired, near-corpse up the bank, and after a rest, scouted for a place to spend the night. I knew the spot I had spent that first night, which seemed so long ago, was just a hundred yards away, but I wanted something closer, so I could fill the bottle and bag again in the morning. I found a clearing large enough for the tent, spent my usual long time putting it up, and then lay like a dead thing inside it.
I found out later that during the process of setting up the tent I had inadvertently stepped on my glasses, crushing the frame and popping out one lens.I hadn't used the glasses much at that point, but nevertheless it was just another example of the bad luck I was experiencing.
The night was another cold one. I slowly fed myself, polishing off the Beanie Weanies I had started to eat the day before, which had left a puddle of sauce in my jacket. Again, the appetite wasn't all there, but I ate enough to get me through the night and into the next day.