A Lethal Injection of Christmas Cheer

So you might have noticed that I never actually finished that whole Look At Me I’m Dying story. I should point out that the events of that story transpired way back in August, when the weather was still flaming hot and I still had a (relatively) scar-free body. Now it’s December and I keep traveling to places like Minnesota, where the weather actually defies human logic with its inability to rise above Fucking Freezing (actual scientific name) and I have this newfound ability to predict the weather with my abdominal tingling.

Because I’m looking to finish talking about the events of this year by the time this year actually ends, I need to get on the ball and do a sum up. Here goes.

After my mother showed up and reaffirmed my conviction that mothers can hear you when you scream in your head, my dad rolled in roughly three hours later. Timetable: Before the surgery. Or even the mention of any surgery. Still vomiting/dry heaving into popcorn buckets but had acquired a private room so as to remain uncontaminated by the Poop Bomb lady.

Right before my parents left to go back to my apartment for the night, I had a sudden flash of the empty cigarette box lying on my kitchen table. Not because I smoke in my house but because I periodically empty my purse of it’s residual crap and the empty box(es) take up valuable space that could be utilized by FULL cigarette boxes.

Normal people would have a) told their parents about their smoking habit many years ago, or b) would have been busted by their parents many years ago. But I’m the child who was so secretive I somehow managed to keep my eighth grade boyfriend under wraps until I was twenty-five. No reason. Just for giggles. So imagine what I can do with a little tobacco habit.

We had a very awkward non-conversation where I told my dad that he was going to get in my car and it was going to smell like an ashtray in an old McDonald’s bag. I also told him he was going to need to move the three or four Virginia Slim Ultra Light Menthol boxes (empty) that would be scattered on the driver side floorboard. Then I looked at my mom and told her that there were going to be empty boxes on my kitchen table. Maybe some in my bedroom. You never know when or where the urge to clean out your purse will strike you. I wished them both a good night and acknowledged that I’d been smoking, off and on, for around a decade.

Two days later they cut out my gallbladder (such a hideous name for an organ). I stayed in the hospital an extra three or four days because I kept passing little alien zygotes in my urine. Before I left a urologist wrote me a prescription for Flomax, a drug that I later learned is designed for MEN with PROSTATE TROUBLE. As I am not a man and I do not have prostate troubles, this ended up being a bit of a concern. Especially when my vision started to go a few days later and WAIT! Let’s google this drug on the internet! Side effects include loss of vision (sometimes permanent). That sounds fun.

A week after the surgery I was still weak and nauseated and oh-so-miserable. So my mother took me to the ER, where they gave me more drugs. And I spent another week following the doctor’s regimen of pills until I decided that those people were morons and I stopped everything. Morphine, Phenargran, Xanax, Valium, Odansetron, Sucralfate, Flomax and Lexapro. Done.

Now that the surgery story is complete, we can move on.

Points of Mild Interest:

1) I have a new scar on my forehead from where my coworker accidentally shot me in the head with a plastic spring-loaded airplane. See the following conversation:

Boss: Don’t point that at Robin – you know liberals and their gun control laws…

Coworker: Oh whatever, I’ve got it totally under contro—WHAP!

Me: SON OF A BITCH!

Coworker: Holy crap you’re bleeding!

Me: SON OF A BITCH!

Coworker: I’m so sorry! It just went off!

Me: YOU SHOT ME IN THE HEAD YOU CRAZY REPUBLICAN!

And now I’ve got a thin half-inch raised scar on my forehead just above my right eye. Gives me a jaunty, rogue-ish look.

2.) My hair is falling out. HA HA HOW I WISH I WAS KIDDING. Apparently this year isn’t through shoving its unlubed fist up my ass. According to my doctor, this can happen to people after a “body trauma.” In my case, the “body trauma” would be the ill-received gallbladder surgery. Anyway, I was doing okay with it, laughing with Mother Nature as fistfuls of my frizzy mane ended up swimming down the drain or coming out in my brush until one day I realized that my hair was falling out. Don’t ask me why one day it just punched me in the face like that, how on Monday I was all, ha ha! my hair is falling out! and then on Tuesday I was all ohmygod I think I’m having a heart attack, my hair, it is falling out.

I ended up sending my hair dresser a frantic text message begging for a hair appointment the next day. I needed bangs. Big, long bangs to cover up the now visible thinning at my hairline.

She obliged. I now have bangs.

If I put in my jaw splint and fluff up my bangs a little, I find myself looking at the 11-year-old me. Just so we’re clear, the 11-year-old me was tall and chubby with frizzy permed hair, braces and a bit of a lisp. I occasionally had to wear head gear. I was a sexy beast.

It's a biter.

Spend more than a night in a hospital and you come to realize that it’s like existing in a suspended reality where time is marked by the arbitrary delivery of green Jell-o and beef broth. It’s a state of being where, thanks to heavy doses of painkillers, a trip to the bathroom becomes the highlight of your day. I mean, where else would you find a seemingly sane woman relieving her bowels on industrial strength linoleum? And upon witnessing said act, respond with neither alarm nor horror and instead calmly notify the nearest be-scrubbed hospital worker?

But enough of all that. Day Two of my hospital stay was just as eventful as the first twelve hours had been, starting with my trip to the nuclear lab. The test itself wasn’t that bad, just a lot of stillness on a cot mattress with a big black drum placed over my midsection for three hours. A screen to my right showed the little nuclear bits going to work on my innards while I tried not to think about alien babies with exoskeletons and dripping mucus. My reverie was interrupted two hours into the test by my lab technician, who informed me they hadn’t been able to view a certain organ. This calls for a morphine injection, stat!

Now, I’ve had this test twice before and each time I’ve been given a morphine injection. I knew what to expect: a swift tingling in my legs spreading upwards towards my heart and down to my fingernails. I would float for a minute and swing gently back to earth. I would want a cookie afterwards. But this time, sweet jesus. It was like flaming balls of acid rolling along my veins until it settled in my stomach, which immediately revolted. As they were pushing my bed out of the nuclear lab I had a stomach contraction so intense I would later swear that the alien baby was gobbling up my internal organs in preparation for its stunning exit through my navel. It was not pleasant.

Thankfully hospitals are prepared for people who spontaneously dry heave and my lab tech had a popcorn bucket in front of me faster than you can say ‘Shoe Sale.’ I heaved all the way down six or seven indistinguishable corridors, straight back into my now spotless semi-private room, a room I was still sharing with my shitastic cell mate.

After an injection of anti-nausea medicine, things calmed down in the stomach region, at least somewhat. I was able to call my mother and tell her I was STILL in the hospital a whopping twenty-four hours later. I know, I know- twenty-four hours. I should get a medal. But seriously, did they misplace their magical illness detector? What was the holdup on getting my alien baby delivered? Could I not just get a stomach transplant?

I ended the call with my mother ten minutes later because even if she didn’t verbally express her grossed-outedness at my dry heaving on the phone in between sentences, I was having a hard time not being grossed out. There’s nothing so miserable as feeling perpetually nauseated with a stomach that says Fuck You at every available opportunity.

Before I hung up I told my mother that I was fine, no need to come up, I was a big girl, no worries. Inside I was screaming Can’t you fuckers fix this? I want my mommy, godammit! But still, as we get farther and farther away from the era when a sniffle warranted a full day at home with mom and ceaseless delivery of Sprite and Saltines, we feel obliged to exert our independence. I can handle this, don’t worry. It’s just an alien baby. People have those ALL THE TIME.

So I closed my eyes and let two fat self-pity tears trail down my cheeks before I drifted off into Candyland. Three hours later I woke up just as my mother was walking into the room. Apparently there’s some supersonic brain wave detector that lets moms know when their children are lying about needing them. Even if said children are skilled secret-keepers with years as practice.

Count to ten and see if it bites.

Back in the middle of August I was working in the nursery on a Wednesday night when all of a sudden my stomach region gave me the finger and I collapsed to the floor in pain. It might have scared the kids a bit, but not as much if I’d let out the stream of GODDAMNSHITASHOMOTHERFUCKINGCOCKSUCKER THIS HURTS! I don’t have the money to pay for their therapy bills so I managed to keep my mouth shut and just groan with the kind of fervor that hopefully conveyed the above phrase, just, you know, without speaking.

Instead of going to the ER, which I probably should have done, I just kind of ignored it. This is a tradition in my family and why start breaking with tradition now, when I’m so close to 30? We’ve carved out our own breast lumps and sent them off for testing because asking the opinion of the doctor is just like admitting you’re stupid.

The aftershocks were still kicking my ass the next day so I made an appointment with my gastro specialist, a man who is not known for his sympathy or endearing bedside manner. I don’t like him much and I’m pretty sure the feeling is mutual, but that following Monday I found myself sharing breathing space with him, trying my best to convey that the pain? It had had been bad? And I wanted to stab myself? But couldn’t? Because nurseries are traditionally scarce on sharp objects?

He nodded abrubtly and left the room for some “papers,” coming back fifteen minutes later smelling like ink toner and Chinese food. According to him, I had 45 minutes to drive home, feed my cats, pack a bag and get to the hospital because shift change was at 6:30 and I didn’t want to get lost in the shuffle.

And then he turned around and walked out. I told you I didn’t like him, and now you don’t like him either. I hadn’t realized the papers he was referring to were admitting papers and I’m not even sure had he said “I’m going to get your admitting papers” that I would have made a connection between leaving the doctors office and checking into a hospital. Which is apparently not called checking-in, but ‘admitting.’ It’s not the Marriot and I now understand the full truth of that statement.

My first night there I was in a double room, which wasn’t really bothersome because I came prepared with earplugs and a sleeping mask. I’ve been in the ER enough times in my life to remember the BEEP BEEP BEEP MOTHERFUCKING BEEP of the heart monitor and the DRIP DRIP WHOOSH DRIP DRIP WHOREFACE DRIP DRIP of the IV line. Not conducive to sleeping. What I was not prepared for started very early the next morning on the other side of the curtained area. My cell mate decided she would start her day with some sporadic moaning and thrashing, followed by thirty minutes of violent pacing in her two square feet of allotted space. If you’re wondering how pacing can be violent then just continue reading, because I can’t say with certainty that I wouldn’t have paced violently if my body was about to drop a bomb on me. **Editors note: That’s not funny yet, but it will be.

While my cell mate continued her pacing I played with my heart rate- forcing it up, WHEEEEE! forcing it down, WHHOOOoooooo. Up! Wheeee! Down, Whoooo. I can do this with my blood pressure as well. Freaks the fuck outta nurses, let me tell you. On one of my down swings I noticed that the pacing behind the curtain had gotten sporadic. Pace pace pace stop, listen, slither plop. Pace pace pace stop, listen, slither plop. It took me a good sixty seconds to figure out what the stopping and slither plop was all about and I can tell you that I now look back on those sixty seconds with fondness. Those blessed sixty seconds spent wondering what the hell was going on, right before my olfactory glands kicked in and bitch slapped me.

She was dropping a bomb, all right. Big, goopey diarrhea bombs. On the floor. Now, this mental image probably isn’t the best but I need you to understand my absolute horror- She was pacing (pace pace pace), stopping at her desired location (stop), tilting her head to the side (listen), unleashing the viscous mass (slither) and waiting until it hit the floor (plop) before starting the process again.

I decided I was mature enough to keep my cool and crawled silently out of bed, pulling along my IV stand to the bathroom, praying for some nose relief. But no, that’s not how this game was to be played. The bathroom had already been bombed; the pee-catcher propped on the toilet was overflowing with poop, the floor was covered with poop and the sink handles were smeared with, two guesses, ok, I’ll give it to you- poop.

Outside in the hallway I overheard two nurse-like-people passing by and decided I’d give them their morning dose of What The Fuck.

“Excuse me ladies, my roommate seems to have had an accident.”

“We’ll get to it as soon as we change the sheets down the hall.”

“I’m afraid that would be too late. Here in about five minutes the River Styx will hit the threshold and I’m not sure I can keep last nights tasty dinner of Glucose Drip down while it makes its way under my bed.”

This catches their attention.

“Is she peeing on the floor again?”

“Peeing on the floor? Again? No ma’am. She’s shitting on the floor. And hopefully there won’t be an “again.”

During this conversation we had attracted the attention of three actual nurses who had started making their morning rounds. While catching them up on the situation I happened to raise my right arm to brace myself against the wall. I may not have been as bad off as Ms. Slither Plop, but I wasn’t feeling frisky and standing up plus conversing plus dragging my IV stand around was wearing me out. The fluorescent lights must have caught my arm just right because in my peripheral vision it looked like I had a flesh-colored cantaloupe strapped to my forearm. Right by the IV line. Upon close inspection it turned out that my peripheral vision wasn’t half bad. I DID have a flesh-colored cantaloupe strapped to my forearm.

“Is this a problem?” I asked, pointing to my IV arm.

“Oh, Jesus. How long has it been like that?”

“I don’t know. I’m sure this isn’t supposed to be comfortable but I have a very angry alien baby gestating in my stomach region and I haven’t been keeping track of anything else.”

“Who did your IV last night? My six-year-old daughter could do a better job.”

“That’s nice. Look, now that we’ve started pointing and talking about it, it appears that it really IS painful and I’d like to take it out. I’m not that squeamish- if you want I can just pull out the needle.”

“Uh, no. Let me get Sheila, she can take this out and start you a new line.”

So while I stood in the hallway with a cantaloupe forearm and a roommate with bowels like the Gulf of Mexico, I contemplated my fate. I had been admitted to the hospital, had a sonogram, been given a ridonkulous IV and slept in a room with a woman who has a habit of peeing on the floor. This was not the fluffy cloud where the Carebears live and I was exceptionally tired.