A Super Fun Way to Spend a Friday Night

Invite friends over for dinner.

Two bites into said dinner, develop severe abdominal pain.

Friends finish dinner and then go home while you lie on your bed, wondering if perhaps, you are about to die.

Also, vomiting.

Go to ER. Get triaged, doped up on morphine and hooked up to an IV of fluids. Then, have nurse tell you that “this is technically only an overflow ER, so it’s going to take longer to do anything and if you need an ultrasound or anything like that we’ll have to put you in an ambulance and drive you to another hospital”. Picture bill for said possible excursion, wonder if your insurance will find some way to screw you.

Freak the fuck out. Cause, you know, nothing better than adding insult to injury.

18 gallons of blood drawn. Told the Dr. wants to send you for a CT scan. Only issue with that? Said half-ass ER has CT machine but no CT tech. Wait for CT Tech to arrive from other hospital. Continue waiting. While you’re at it, wait some more, and also freak out some more because, seriously? This is ridiculous.

Ask if, since they don’t have the resources to actually treat you, if they can just freakin’ transfer you already before you wait interminably.

Be told that that’s somehow illegal. Contemplate leaving AMA, going to another hospital ER, and starting all over again.

At this point it’s 1 AM.

Nurse comes back, says Dr. has changed his mind because your white blood cell count is elevated, wants you to have CT with contrast. That requires drinking a lovely barium “smoothie”. About 40 ounces of it.

Oh but wait, it gets better. They don’t even have barium. They have to wait for it to be delivered from, you guessed it, another hospital. And then, you’ll have to wait an hour after that before you can get the CT.

Insert more freaking out here. Envision yourself either dying or at least growing to a ripe old age in this here hospital bed.

Barium Arrives. Do your best to slam that shit down without yakking. Finally finish your lovely Barium Dessert at 1:55 AM. Nurse calls over. CT Tech will arrive at 2:55 to whisk you off to CT land.

Develop extreme hatred for one nurse, whose idea of bedside manner seems to involve sighing, making exasperated faces, and generally being an insufferable human being. Name her Bitchy McBitch face. Plot her death. Gain immense satisfaction in the thought of running into her in a dark alley and beating that smug effing look of her damn ugly bitchface.

Reach an altered state of consciousness in where one would be willing to do just about anything to getthefuckoutofhere.

Wait some more.

3 AM rolls around: no sign of CT tech. Husband hovers at nursing station like a black freaking cloud. Finally gets nurse to page CT tech.

CT tech is in the building! Begin to hope that some actual progress is being made.

Realize that, at this point, you’ve been in this hellhole for about 4 hours and still don’t have any actual diagnosis. Freaking awesome.

3:15, CT tech arrives with wheelchair like a mirage of awesomeness. Chat with CT tech on the way through winding halls to machine, feel like she obviously has a good head on her shoulders, ask her: is it always this bad? She says, and I quote:

“I wouldn’t come to this ER if my arm was falling off and it was the last emergency room on the planet.”

Super freaking awesome.

CT takes only about 20 minutes. Contrast dye is really freaking weird and makes you feel oddly warm.

Back to bay 15 in the ER of Doom. Wait 30 mins for CT to be sent to Australia to be read.

About 4:30 AM at this point. Still no actual diagnosis. Dr. finally comes in and says CT scan shows a “small” kidney stone and urine analysis shows a big fugly UTI.

Heave a small sigh of relief, assume the end is near and that your pillow, beautiful, beautiful pillow, can’t be that far away.

Ohhhhh but wait. Dr. doesn’t like your resting heart rate. It’s high. Like, 127 bpm high. Attempt to convince Dr. that high heart rate is clearly the result of this place BEING SO FUCKING INSANE and that you were agitated because you CAME HERE IN INCREDIBLE PAIN AND THEN WAS LEFT TO LANGUISH FOR HOURS NOT KNOWING WHAT WAS WRONG WITH YOU.

Nurse does EKG. What a freaking miracle they happened to have one of those. In the meantime, a 4 year old girl with pneumonia moves in next door, and across the hallway, a parapalegic homeless man is colorfully describing how badly he’s going to fuck a nurse up if they stick him with a needle again.

Look over, see a tiny pair of 4 year old’s shoes on the ground in the next bay over, hear a doctor half-assedly attempting to talk to her father in Spanish. Realize our health care system is irreparably broken. Sob.

Your favorite nurse, Pressy, a tiny Filipino grandmother comes back in with 2 mg of Ativan in the hopes that it will get your heart rate down. She explains to you how she mixed it with extra saline solution so that it wouldn’t burn going in. Pats your arm and smiles in that universal grandmotherly way. Faith in humanity somewhat restored.

Lay down and try to zen yourself to a lower heart rate. Your poor husband looks like he’s been run over by a truck. Try to picture yourself floating in the pool at your parent’s house with a pitcher full of your father’s famous margaritas in your hand. Heart rate comes down.

Pressy comes in with a big giant pill. Congrats! Here’s your antibiotic, you’re out of here! Wait, let me get you some water with some ice in it to take that with. Refrain from hugging her and asking her to move in with you. Take the antibiotic, wait for discharge papers to come in.

5:45 AM.

Discharge papers come with prescription for antibiotics and further instructions of what to do to try to flush away the small kidney stone. Sign away. Out of the gown, back into clothes, stumble to car and husband drives the 6 blocks home on autopilot.

Come home to hungry cats and a sleepy pup. Make it into bed by sheer force of will. Collapse. 6:30 AM.

So yeah, that’s how I spent my Friday night. Hopefully the rest of you had a far better evening.

Here’s the moral of the story people. Hug your family, take your vitamins, drink lots of water and do some research on your local Emergency Rooms when you have time to figure out which one is best equipped to care for you under any circumstances. Don’t just go to where is closest. Go to where is best.

Tangible

A ring. A four leaf clover brooch. 100 shares of stock. Some pictures. A pearl necklace. Greeting cards. This is all that is left that I can see or touch.

Today I’ll get in my car, drive to a building where a man will stamp a piece of paper that confirms that I am, indeed, who I say I am. I’ll mail that piece of paper to an address in New York. They’ll mail me back a piece of paper that says the stock is mine. I’ll mail another piece of paper back to them that says I’d like to cash it all out. The check will arrive, I’ll take it to my bank and deposit it.

I’ll go to a bike shop. I’ll tell them I’m looking for something light weight, single gear, with nice new squeaky tires and a cushiony seat. On this new bike, I’ll be able to stop at intersections and put my feet flat on the ground, a feature my current bike does not possess, which makes me feel unsure of myself and unsafe riding in the city.

I’ll take my new bike home. I’ll get a basket for trips to the farmer’s market, a bell to warn others of my presence. I’ll wear my helmet. I’ll ride slowly and leisurely and feel safe, but free at the same time, with the wind tickling my nose and the sun on my shoulders. I’ll grow a few new freckles. I’ll burn a few calories. I’ll save some money, save the environment, save my mind from the droning isolation of a winter spent indoors. A winter whose sole characteristic was pain: physical pain, the pain of grief, the pain of self-imposed isolation, and of wondering if, physically, I was ever going to get any better.

I’ll name my new two-wheeled friend Bernice. She always hated that name, and would have undoubtedly gotten a good chuckle out of knowing her namesake had fenders, not feet. I can picture her laughing about it, bringing one slender hand up to cover her mouth. She was always self-conscious about it, after the Bell’s palsy had caused one corner of her mouth to droop more than the other.

I’ll name her Bernice and keep it locked up tight in public. I’ll buy a lock made of all kinds of metal, the kind you’d have to take a chainsaw to to get through. I’ll keep her out of the rain, keep her clean, make sure all her parts are always finely tuned and in perfect working order. In the winter, she’ll have a warm, cozy home in my basement, and provide a fun obstacle for the cats to bat their toys around.

I’ll try to take great care of her, the best care. But it will never really be enough. It will never be as good as the care she gave to me. The real Bernice, the first one, though no one called her that. Everyone called her Elaine, her middle name. I called her Mom Mom. Grandmother. Friend.

Now, I still call her all those things, but I also call her the person I miss the most.

Someone’s Dumb Enough to Pay Me for this Drivel!

Hey All,

Some of you may know that I just got signed on as a freelance staff writer for Gather.com. I was looking for something fun that I could do from home that would accommodate my occasional bad days with Fibromyalgia, and I was lucky enough to get signed on to write for actual cash money! Pretty cool, huh?

As any of you who write for the web know, it’s all about The Clicks—-the more my articles are clicked on and read, the more I get paid. If you’re friends with me on Twitter and/or Facebook, you’ll see my article links show up in your feed. I’m writing about entertainment, celebrity gossip (escandalo!), nutrition, women’s health, women’s issues, and beauty, so undoubtedly I’ll hit on a topic you will find interesting eventually.

Not on Facebook/Twitter? Just hop on over to: Gather.com and throw a few clicks of love my way when the spirit moves you.

Thanks in advance for your help and support.

Don’t forget to check in here at Cathairtumbleweeds periodically for updates on my upcoming volunteer teaching trip to Guatemala, and how you can help get me there! Donations! Tshirts! Oh My!

Shaken Not Stirred,
Julianna

Other News

In other news…
I almost hate to say it out loud, but I am feeling a LOT better these days thanks, I am sure to the 15 pills I take every day as well as my new diet. Also, want to drop about 30 lbs but you’re not allowed to exercise? Cut out sugar, caffeine, alcohol, red meat, white flour, dairy and any and all preservatives. Yup. 30 lbs down since January. And, this week I am headed back to the gym to swim, do some yoga, and meet with a physiologist who can help me design a stretching/ light weights program that is Fibromyalgia friendly. She’s worked with other Fibro patients before, so I am excited not to have to go through the usual “Fibromyalgia? What is that?” song and dance.

As a result of my Fibro diagnosis and a few months of pretty intense flare activity, I had to cut way, way back on working, which was an intense bummer for me, but being on my feet wrangling middle schoolers was just not an option this winter. Now that I am feeling better, (knock on all kinds of wood), I wanted to look for something that I could do with kids on a volunteer basis, and also maybe some sort of actual money-making gig I could do from home. I scoured the internet and put in a lot of feelers here and there and managed, luckily, to find BOTH of those things!

Once a week I’ll be doing a Read With Me evening at a local women’s and children’s shelter. The kids file in to hang out with me while their mothers get free parenting classes, and shelters in general are all at max capacity right now thanks to the Stupid MuggaFuggin Economy, so I feel like I’m making a really good use of my time by working there, even if it is only a few hours a week.

Also! I am now a writer for the website Gather.com! I’ll be writing articles and community posts for Lifestyle Topics and I hope they are ready for me because hoo boy do I have some things to talk about! I’m in “tele-training” this week, which is basically a fancy word for a conference call, and then I should be able to get a post approved and up by this weekend. So, I can sit on my butt, however horrible I feel, and earn a few nickels for sharing my plethora of opinions with the internet, neat, huh? Once I get a post up I’ll make sure to get a link up here and on Twitter for those of you that are interested.

So, that’s the update as of this moment. Spring seems to be on its way and I’m SO ready for it! For those of you who I haven’t talked to or seen much this winter, I am in fact still alive and will be slowly ramping up my social calendar as much as my body allows me to. Thanks to everyone for all of their support, in-person and long-distance. I can’t imagine how I would have been able to deal with this without being surrounded by such awesome, positive people.

Being Internet Famous…

To about 700 people is just about as unexciting as it sounds. Don’t get me wrong, this blog, Twitter and Tumblr have brought me lots of laughs and even a few friends, but lately it seems like Other People’s Butthurt has been dominating my web-world. You see, the internet is a GREAT place to bitch and moan, semi-anonymously. It’s also a great way for people with unfulfilled inner bullies to anonymously spew unpleasantness all over the medium of their choice. Cynical is SO IN and earnestness is TOTALLY a target for the trolls and their brethren. Most of the time I can rise above it, and even enjoy giving a poke back because these folks generally have the IQ of sandpaper, but today’s Aventures in Interwebs got me a little salty.

So, those of you who follow me on Twitter probably saw a pic of my new tattoo. Yes, hubby and I got matching-ish tattoos and yes I know some people think that is stupid but we got them for a reason.

Anyone who has been married for longer than, oh, five minutes, will tell you that sometimes it’s hard. And it’s hard not to get caught up in the hard sometimes, and forget why you agreed to all of this in the first place. Because you love each other. Because you want to build a life together, whatever that picture looks like to you. Because you trust this person to be a soft landing place when the rest of the world is brutal and unwelcoming.

And that’s why we got these tattoos. Two little penguins who are designed to not only remind us both to lighten up a little bit, but also to remind us of what we want. Penguins mate for life. They pick another penguin through whatever penguiny means they use, and they stick with that person, err, penguin, through fish shortages and global warming and all the other penguiny problems.

It seems, in sharing what I thought was something that people would think was a cute and positive thing, that I’ve opened a can of worms and have become the target of a lot of anti-marriage sentiment, on Twitter and stupid formspring and the Tumblr “ask-hole”, and in not so thinly veiled references on other Tumblrs.

I understand that for many people marriage has been a less that pleasant experience. I understand that divorce is the best option for some couples, for a variety of reasons, and I don’t think any less of these people. And I can’t predict the future but I can make a promise, and work my hardest to keep it.

So, if you’re one of the people who think that marriage is stupid or oppressive or unnatural, you are perfectly entitled to that right and I fully understand why you have formulated this opinion.

I would never belittle someone for not wanting to be married. That being said, please don’t demean or insult something that is so important to me, and to many others. Keep your butthurt to yourself, please.