It all started on Monday with a tickle in the back of my throat. It felt as though someone had shoved a feather in my mouth and played Tetherball with my uvula. The next day, the tickle returned, only this time it was less akin to a feather and much closer to the wolverine’s notorious talons. Although I could barely speak or swallow, I fervently denied the fact that I could be sick and went on with my day. “I just won’t talk, or eat, or drink.” I told myself, I’ll be that cool shy girl that's a total mystery. Maybe I’ll start wearing maxi dresses, who knows? I’ll actually be better off. When I briefly forgot about my friend wolverine that had set up shop in my throat, I decided to treat myself to some lunch. It was impossible to ignore the incessant burning every time I swallowed, but I forced myself to choke down some avocado toast and a smoothie. If I was “sick”, this healthy food would take care of it, I rationalized. After lunch, I began to sweat bullets and was overcome by abdomen pains. The healthy food did not “take care of it.” It did not take care of it at all. When my phone buzzed, alerting me that I had plans to go to dinner with my two friends, Talha and Elijah, I knew I had a decision to make, so I assessed the situation. On one hand, I had a burning throat disease (possibly zika?), horrendous cramps, and my own personal heat wave. On the other, It was summer and I had a pulse.
On the ride home from dinner, I started shaking like a wet Chihuahua in the arctic. I told the Uber driver about my predicament and informed him not to worry and that if I passed out and that he should just shove me in the back, keep going and finish out the night. When he dropped me at home, he bellowed, “Get worse, Ok,” attempting a joke. At the time I laughed, but looking back on it, I think he may have cursed me. When I stumbled into the house and crawled my way up the stairs to check my temperature, I felt betrayed by my thermometer, or rather the number, 103.6, displayed on the flashing screen. Nooooo, how could my body play me like this?! We had a deal! I would provide myself with enough supplements to start up a small apothecary, and in return I was supposed to never get sick, and during the summer no less. How am I supposed to reap the benefits of a sick day in the summer? What am I supposed to do, report to my mom that I will be sleeping in past the usual 12, and I will be unable to fulfill my Netflix duties for the day? Ugh, no, this meant I had to tell my mom. I knew she would freak out and probably blame it all on my cartilage piercing.
As predicted, the first thing my mom did when I told her I felt sick was examine my ear; she’s got nothing against piercings, but she’s absolutely terrified that I will get another infection and end up with toxic shock syndrome again (yeah, that’s right again). “Honey, It looks infected, I need to take you to the emergency room,” she informed me invoking her most serious doctor-like tone. “Isn’t that a bit dramatic, Mother,” I replied, wanting nothing more than to go to sleep and forget this whole nightmare. But then I remembered that creepy prayer my Mom used to whisper in my ear as a child that went something along the lines of “now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the lord my soul to keep, if I should die before I wake, I pray the lord my soul to take.” And the thought of “laying my head down to sleep” and handing my soul over to the "lord" was unsettling to say the least.
I attempted to take off my makeup, but only succeeded in smearing it in a dark circle around my eyes. I grabbed my favorite Grateful Dead t-shirt, some sweatpants, and a pair of Birkenstocks and limped out the door. I’m not gonna lie to you, I’ve seen better days. My hair was a sweaty, sticky, frizzy mess, my skin was paler than Snow White’s derriere, I had straight up raccoon eyes, and my whole body was trembling. “Mom, they’re all gonna think I overdosed” I moaned to her in the car. “Stop being silly, Caitlin you don’t look that bad, besides you’re just going to the hospital, who's gonna see you?” my mom asked me in a reassuring tone. Mom’s question answered itself when we walked into the hospital, and I found myself face to face with the most attractive guy I had ever seen. This guy was seriously gorgeous, like if Prince Eric and Aladdin had a love child and that love child was not animated and also 6’2 and also at a hospital in Maryland in the middle of the night, that would be him. He was stationed at a desk behind a window with a tag attached to his sweater that read “volunteer.” “I did that,” my mom informed me. “BEAUTY AND BRAINS,” I whisper shouted to myself. “What?” mom asked, confused. “Never mind,” I muttered back. I would have talked to him if I didn’t look like a coked out hippie, I told myself, all the while knowing that I would never have the balls.
That night at the ER was slow, so I was ushered into a room almost immediately and examined by a nurse. I described my symptoms to her and she took my vitals. Afterwords, she “administered fluids,” by shoving a giant needle into my arm vein, drawing several vials of my blood, and hooking me up to a plastic sack filled with water. I lay there for hours, just a girl and her giggly sack. I was so bored that I began counting the coughs of the old man next door, and ranking them based on phlegm content. Finally, the doctor came in to examine me. She informed me that my tests for mono and strep were negative, but that I appeared to be fighting an infection. She prescribed me some antibiotics and cream for my ear, and we left the hospital. As we were leaving I turned to see if Prince Charming was still stationed in his little glass box. He wasn’t.
“I knew it was that piercing of yours, Caitlin I just knew it. No way are you are getting your nose pierced after this young lady,” Mom stated. Too feverish and delirious to argue with her I just nodded. We got home around three a.m. and I went right to sleep. The whole next day my condition did not improve. While both of my parents were at work, I turned to reality TV in the hopes that it would make my troubles disappear. I watched a few episodes of the Real Housewives of New York and was quelled by the white wine and yelling.
The Uber driver’s prophecy rang true that night. I spent a couple hours tossing and turning in a pile of my own sweat, but It didn’t feel it necessary to alert anyone until I started to hallucinate. I saw a shape on the foot of my bed that looked like Esmeralda from The Hunchback of Notre Dame, positioned on her side as if she were Kate Winslet in Titanic, and I was to draw her like one of my French girls. I was terrified; I suck at drawing. I ran to my Mom’s room all the while realizing that I had an immense amount of pain in both of my ears, and I was still burning up. The pain in my ears also made it difficult to hear and I was having problems with my sight (probably due to the fact that it was nighttime and I was hysterically crying). I had heard horror stories of people who had gotten sick with mysterious ailments and lost their senses. So, by the time I got to my mom’s room, I had forgotten all about Esmerelda, and I was convinced that I was going both blind and deaf. “Mom I’m not ready to face this kind of adversity, not now” I screamed in a frenzy. “How will I do stand-up comedy if I’m blind and deaf? How will I know if they’re laughing,” I sobbed. I still can’t believe that out of everything that was my biggest concern that night. She walked me back to my room, assuring me that I was delirious and that I wouldn't be losing my senses that night. She was somehow convinced that this had to do with my infected cartilage piercing, so she took out a tissue and began squeezing the top of my ear. What happened next, would shock even the bravest of souls. I sh*t you not, my ear coughed up a hairball. When my mom squeezed it, a tiny ball of hair evacuated my cartilage hole. My mom rejoiced while I lied on the bed, completely and utterly shocked. I’ve seen my body produce some gross things, but this was a whole new ball game. You might be asking yourself, Oh, so a clump of hair in your cartilage hole? That’s it, that’s what caused this whole mess? To which I reply, If only it were that simple.
The next day, my mom took me to an ear, nose, and throat doctor who looked like he should play a doctor on TV. The doctor examined my ear and informed my mother that my sickness had not been caused by the “hairball lodged in my cartilage.” He looked in my mouth and informed my mother that my throat looked completely normal. I was outraged, “completely normal”? What’s normal about feeling stabbed by tiny knives every time you swallow. He left the room and promised he would return with some tools to examine my throat more extensively. When he returned, he was carrying a huge box contraption. Attached was a thin bendy stick with a light at the end of it. It reminded me of ET’s finger. As I was laughing to myself about the comparison, the doctor proceeded to shove ET’s finger up my nose and down into my throat. Conducting a “nasal laryngoscopy.” He gasped. “Are you aware that your adenoids are incredibly infected?” he stammered. “That’s impossible doctor, I had my adenoids removed years ago” I stated confidently. “You know the funny thing about adenoids is, they can grow back.” The doctor informed me. “You’re telling my adenoids had the audacity to grow back AND get infected after I essentially exiled them from my body.” I asked, dumbfounded. Bold move, adenoids, bold move.
The next day, I felt thoroughly betrayed by my body. I had hair coming out of my ear cartilage, adenoids setting up camp willynilly, and to top it all off, I had to go to the gynecologist the next day to get my “ovaries examined.” A perfect end to a perfect week. I won’t go into detail about the gynecologist, and let’s just say I was violated by a camera yet again, and this one was not in my nose. When I reflect on this experience it is bittersweet. I am grateful that I had access to health care and medication that so many people live without, but I also don’t know if I’ll ever be the same after seeing what my body is capable of.
