Careful Observation

The time stamp on this post is 5:43am. I've been up for a little over an hour. I really don't do either side of 5am all that well, but I'm getting tired of watching the sun rise.

Here's the disclaimer on this post. It'll most likely be graphic and somewhat grouchy. it's 5am and I'm tired of "watching" things.

#1. Watching my feet and ankles swell and deflate. Tired of that. Also tired of none of my shoes fitting and feeling a bit cliched as I shuffle, (not walk... can't actually walk) barefoot, around my house with what feels like water filled socks on.

#2. Watching the clock to count my contractions and try to discern what is an actual contraction vs. baby movement vs. just plain old uterine grouchiness. Basically the entire area of my torso is a battlefield right now.

I feel this bizarre need to quantify both of these rather irritating phenomenon. Perhaps it's a way of distancing myself from the atrocity of becoming a fluid filled sack of muscle spasms. I had a very similar (and equally disturbing to onlookers) reaction to my two most painful quasi-surgical experiences. And since it's still not 6am, I am going to subject you to both of them.

#1. After a lovely church led outing to a local "action" filled amusement "park", I sustained 2nd and 3rd degree abrasion burns to my right leg, left arm and face as well as two torn ligaments in my right ankle. I was 13. They poured liquid bandaid on the burns without cleaning them and sent me home with the advice of "take a bath" when I got there. The next morning, my mother took me to the doctor where they poured hydrogen peroxide on the wounds and used a surgical scrub brush to clear out the gravel and debris. I watched the whole thing and repeatedly pointed out spots that they had missed and should go back over with bubbly foamy peroxide and a plastic scrub brush. The nurses were a little afraid of me.

#2. In college I drove the world's coolest and possibly filthiest Ford Thunderbird, affectionately known as BOB, the luxury vehicle (as he had power window AND door locks). The excessive amount of driving that I did in this car I'm sure led to a very large and very grotesque Pilonidal Cyst. Check that link out. Isn't that disgusting? By the time I got around to having it checked out (the first time) it was roughly the size of a grapefruit. Again in the doctor's office, I had that bad boy lanced while I bit on a washcloth. No, I'm not kidding and no, this did not take place in the old west. They packed the wound with gauze and sent me home to soak in an epsom salt bath and remove the packing. My mom came in the bathroom with me to help get the gauze out of my ass. She was trying to do it slowly so that it would hurt less. I grabbed the side of the tub with one hand and the gauze strip with the other. That bathtub still has fingerprints in the porcelain.

When it happened again a few months later, I went to the emergency room, laid down on a gurney and had an intern stick a needle roughly the gauge of a bendy straw into the same spot to drain off more fluid. This time I had no washcloth. I do, however, have a lovely scar along the base of my spine. In case I'm every horribly disfigured in an accident, but my ass survives the fire.

What's the point? Other than grossing everyone out? I guess it's that I'm not that big a baby. But this shit is killing me. I can't walk. I can't sleep. I can't sit comfortably. I can't even lay down. My feet constantly swell and deflate, but never to the size or shape of actual feet. Plus I have this truly fantastic, low lying pressure as if someone were repeatedly head-butting my cervix. Which kicks off the charming cascade of irregular contractions, trip to hospital, shot of terbutaline, shakes and heart palps, ending nicely in coma.

So if you don't hear from me for a day or two, that's where I am. Either in the hospital or in a coma. don't worry, I already woke up H and asked him to work from home today. He responded by asking me if he needed to put pants on now and then rolled over and turned off the alarm.