In April of 07, I had my jaw broken in four places and jiggled around a bit by (qualified professionals, of course). I had been suffering from an intense nawing pain in my face for a few years, and a year previous was told by an orthodontist that I had a 12% effective 'bite' due to seriously mismatched jaws. As a result, the muscles were being overworked to compensate for my sucky jaws and so I basically had a constant migraine in my face. Fun times. So after wearing braces for a year to straighten my teeth (a necessary evil, as no one will do any kind of jaw surgery without the patient having perfectly aligned teeth, that's how the money gets made as the jaw sugery itself is covered by MSI), I was admitted to Dartmouth General hospital the morning of April 13th (also a Friday).
The surgery goes well and I wake up in the recovery room demanding more morphine because it's freaking painful, like nothing I have ever experienced before. EVER. Finally a nurse got snippy with me and told me that I wouldn't be falling asleep if it really hurt so much that I was demanding more drugs every ten minutes. Fortunately for her I couldn't speak, or I would have of course told her to go screw a monkey, but leave the drugs with me, thanks.
The pain is brutal for the first couple hours, despite the ice packs draped over my face. And no more morphine - just some tylenol 3 laced with codine, which isn't exactly doing the trick. And I am not that fun to be around. I think by this time I have snapped at my mother and told both my parents to get out of my room (morphine makes you angry, apparently). i've also had more nosebleeds in the last few hours than I've had throughout my entire childhood, and I was raised with four boys, remember, so I have had my fair share. I guess it's just another side effect of the procedure, and not a pleasant one either. but then there was absolutely nothing pleasant about the experience so? makes sense.
Eventually I am able to get a bit of liquid down, though, and have to use the bathroom. The nurse, this little tanned thing from newfoundland, has been in to explain what to do - under no circumstances am i to flush the toilet. i have to fill this bowl with my pee so someone can come collect it and analyze it, for what i am too sore to ask. Also, there is this long cord thingy that I am to pull if I need help, and I'm thinking "I might have just had my jaw broken, but I'm pretty sure I can manage to take a leak on my own", but I humour her and nod my head because she looks young and stupid and not sure that she's even explaining things right. She's a newfie, remember. I go back to bed until the urge to pee, along with the incessant throbbing in my face, wakes me up.
Painfully, mumbling a string of swear words along the way, i make my way to the bathroom, dragging the IV behind me because I am still attached to the thing. No one is in the room to witness the profanity but, even if there had been, they wouldn't have been able to understand me anyways. And it's not like anyone can read my lips either, considering how they are swollen to about three times their normal size, matching the rest of my face perfectly.
Peeing is, I soon realize, not going to be as easy as I thought. For one thing - my left hand is completely useless, since it's attached to the IV and I can hardly move it. Then there's the johnny shirt that is really fucking this whole thing up. I'm trying to pull it away from my ass long enough so that I can actually sit down, while pulling my underwear down at the same time. After a few times, I finally manage. I reach for the toilet paper and do what every woman does after she urinates, then I remember I can't put the tissue in the bowl, but where's the fucking garbage? I stand up, and at that second my nose starts to bleed. It's POURING blood as I try to pull up my underwear, still holding the tissue because the fucking garbage is on the other side of the fucking room, only when I reach down to try and cover my bare ass, my nose just bleeds more. So there I stand, underwear at my knees, nose bleeding, still holding the fucking tissue with my piss all over it.
Then I see the cord.
And I remember what the little Newfie Nurse said to do if I got into trouble.
Pretty sure this counts.
So I pull it.
Seconds pass, and in comes the Newfie Nurse. By this time I have managed to wobble to the middle of the bathroom, blood all down my face and shirt, one hand practically behind me as I try and pull the IV across the threshold that separates the little toilet stall from the the rest of the bathroom, one hand still holding the god damned tissue.
Quickly, the Newfie Nurse assesses the situation. I wait for her to grab a face cloth or paper towel, only she doesn't.
Too late, I realize her plan.
She grabs. the tissue. out of my hand. and COVERS MY NOSE WITH IT.
The same tissue i just used, a few minutes ago, to wipe my own piss.
I am spitting and trying to yank my nose away from her grabbly little hands, but she thinks it's because I am just being difficult.
All I am thinking is "I need to stop tasting my own piss. RIGHT NOW!!"
Finally, I break free. She can't understand a word I say so she leads me back to my bed, completely oblivious of the trauma she's just inflicted upon me.
Taste and see, people. Taste. and. see.
Monday, October 27, 2008
Sunday, October 26, 2008
Sincerely, Brainless in North Bay
Yesterday a dear friend, who is poet-menopausal and coming to terms with the havoc it is wreaking on her body, sent me and some other friends an email. In this email she outlined certain physical side effects and her on-going battle to disguise them with make - up and other material ruses. After reading it I had two thoughts: 1) Getting old is really going to suck, in many ways and 2) Being 26 is not all that fantastic either. In an effort to make her feel better I thought I should outline what it means to be young in the modern sense, at least for me. Here is my response. I hope you get a laugh, but please don't tell my mom. She will be horrified, and will no doubt start a Novena so that I will stop embarrassing myself in such ways because no man in his right mind would want a lush like me to have his babies, and my mom is all about me having babies and raising them next door to her so she can shower them with love and tell them they don't have to listen to me.
Also, if you a principal and considering hiring me to teach in your school, I am wholeheartedly against alcohol and its consumption and I respectfully request you to stop reading now. Thanks so much.
Dear Pretty in Port Hood -
Thanks so much for sharing your aging woes with me. So much to look forward to, I can hardly stand the excitement. Tomorrow, I am going to go to the Clinique counter at Sears and I am going to read this to the "pretty little thing" behind the counter, and when I am finished I am going to tell her to give every god damned product she has so that this does not happen to me.
Now I have a story for YOU, but it's not about the woes of aging. It's about the woes of youth and how catastrophically stupid we youngins are, myself especially. While you are wishing you were young and pre-menopause, I am wondering when I am going to stop making piss poor decisions. Enjoy, because this little ditty will make you want to kiss those cracks and wrinkles and hug your eyeliner pencil and thank God you are not young and half-retarded.
So I decided to go out last night with some of the girls in my class. It was a last minute decision, Alicia messaged me on FB and I was in my PJs, and should have stayed like that but I could hear my mother's voice whispering across the provinces, saying "If you don't go out and mingle I'm never going to get grandchildren, and I want yours to come soon because I know they will be close to me, and since your life is all about me, you need to get dressed and leave the convent. Now, ", or something like that. Not wanting to disobey the voice in my head, I tell Alicia OK, I am coming and proceeded to exchange my PJ pants and Red Sox t-shirt for my bitch boots and 'lady' paint.
After a 30 minute primping routine that will apparently one day take 6 hours, when I am old and things start to loosen and fall and crack and make me wish I was 26 again, I hopped in Arlene's van and off we went (Arlene is a 40 something year old gal that is going to school and living at the Mother House, or the "Mo Ho" as we have now begun to call it, with love). I have a drink before I go, and take one to have when I get to Alicia's. From there, the plan is to go to the campus club, called The Wall. I have no intentions of drinking any more than that, well, maybe one or two at the bar but that is IT! (I think we know where THIS is going...)
I get to Alicia's, the rest of the girls arrive and we are sharing stories and experiences about teaching, growing up, why guys suck, blah blah, ya da ya da. There is a bottle of vodka and rum on the table, a BIG bottle of rum and of course being from Cape Breton I opt for the rum, thinking "I'll just have a little jillick..."
The night progresses. I have one more, and ok it was maybe a big one but still, not unusually so, and we are off to the Wall for a night of dancing and man-attracting, supposedly. Only I am so much more drunk than I should be, like WAY more, and I'm kind of confused because I can't understand why, I haven't drunk that much, not really, this is really weird, etc. etc. By this time I am at the bar, and the only thing that made sense was to just keep drinking. So I do, and from here on in things are a bit 'hazy', but here is what I remember:
The flowers on Christina's shirt while we were dancing, they were little and white and all glowy and looked so amazingly cool until something else caught my attention, like the fact that somethig was happening at the stage. Was there a band playing? (Quite obviously there was no band playing, but a music machine, but somehow in my drunken stupor I got the message that there was in fact a band playing, and I needed to get close to the stage! So I take off, push my way through the sweaty crowd and before I know it I am dancing with random people I don't know, but it's ok because there's this competition happening on stage so no one is really paying attention to the uncoordinated fool dancing like she's got an electrical shock mechanism attached to her body, and the individual controlling said mechanism is suffering from uncontrolable tics. (You get the idea)
Ok, moving on. It's freaking HOT inside, and crowded, and loud, and I hop from different groups of classmates and squeeze by muscle-y guys in tight t-shirts that are obviously intended to showcase their muscles, but before I have a chance to ask if anyone wants to maybe make a baby tonight I am in a cab back to the "Mo Ho".
After some confusion surrounding paying the cabbie, I stumble into the convent, past the security guard who has probably already informed Sister Bernadette that one of her student residents is a falling down drunk and should be evicted, past the chapel where I should have stopped and thanked the good Lord that I made it home safe and sound, and into the elevator and up the three floors to my room.
Time elapses and the next thing I remember is this:
I am on the toilet, where I am pretty sure I passed out for an undetermined period of time.
From there, I am waking up in the shower, and have no idea how or when I got there. I am lying down and the Shower is ON, only it's kind of cold at this point so I try and sit up to adjust the temperature only my body is not responding with its usual speed and accuracy, so I very slowly lift my leg and turn the tap with my foot, but the wrong freaking way. Ice water is now shooting out over my body in what feels like sharp bullets of COLD and suddenly, my body realizes what is happening and starts to react, boobs flopping, legs flailing, arms reaching, arse sqeaking over the bottom of the tub until finally, the water is off. Thank goodness.
Eventually, i manage to get out of the tub and reach for my bathrobe (that I don't remember taking from my room to the bathroom. at all). I have to pee so I stop at the bathroom and am immediately hit with the smell of vomit, i mean it is intense! Only said vomit is nowhere to be found, nothing in the toilet or on the floor. and then I see the garbage can. And look inside. And yep, there it is. My vomit. Lots, and lots of vomit that came out while I was sitting on the frigging toilet, before or after I passed out, there is really no way of knowing at this point, but at least now I know why I opted to get in the shower. (I'm all about seeing the positive side, folks).
Luckily, there was only a few paper towels in there but I can't leave it, people will know exactly how big a drunken fool I was so I have to get rid of the evidence, immediately. So what do I do? I SCOOOP IT OUT BIT BY BIT and flush it down the toilet. And it is very scoopable, if you know what I mean. Ever clean up dog puke? Ya. That's all I am going to say about THAT.
Ok, so I finish that and make it back to my room, and head straight for my bed. As I am lying there, though, I realize that I can still smell frigging puke! Is it me? No, it is definitely not me. I just got out of the shower and I was Oh, so careful during the scooping bit. What is it then? WHERE is it, I realize, is the question I should be asking. And then I find it. It is all over the top I wore. In exactly the same spot that my right boob would be, if I was wearing it.
Shit.
I just bought the thing, this is the first night I actually wore it. And now it looks like something Catrina used to clean the toilet in the men's washroom at the Admiral.
Fucking fantastic.
And then I get a sinking, sinking feeling...oh no...WHEN DID I PUKE ON MY BOOB??? Was it at the Wall? Did I stumble out of the washroom with vomit on my tit? Did I do it in the cab? Oh my god, was I on the dance floor when it happened?
All of these horrible, horrible scenarios are running through my foggy mind, and I literally can not remember when and how the vomit landed on my chest.
I have since found out, though, that no one else knows anything about it which means it probably happened while I was sitting on the toilet, as there was nothing on my pants. Also, there was nothing on my jacket or the scarf I was wearing, and no phone calls from an angry cab dispatcher today, demanding I pay for the damage done to his poor unsuspecting cab. These are the types of questions that this 26 year old, who does not worry about filling in cracks or droopy skin, has been asking herself today.
So ya, how do you like your wrinkles and weird skin pockets now MJ?
Sincerely,
Brainless in North Bay.
Also, if you a principal and considering hiring me to teach in your school, I am wholeheartedly against alcohol and its consumption and I respectfully request you to stop reading now. Thanks so much.
Dear Pretty in Port Hood -
Thanks so much for sharing your aging woes with me. So much to look forward to, I can hardly stand the excitement. Tomorrow, I am going to go to the Clinique counter at Sears and I am going to read this to the "pretty little thing" behind the counter, and when I am finished I am going to tell her to give every god damned product she has so that this does not happen to me.
Now I have a story for YOU, but it's not about the woes of aging. It's about the woes of youth and how catastrophically stupid we youngins are, myself especially. While you are wishing you were young and pre-menopause, I am wondering when I am going to stop making piss poor decisions. Enjoy, because this little ditty will make you want to kiss those cracks and wrinkles and hug your eyeliner pencil and thank God you are not young and half-retarded.
So I decided to go out last night with some of the girls in my class. It was a last minute decision, Alicia messaged me on FB and I was in my PJs, and should have stayed like that but I could hear my mother's voice whispering across the provinces, saying "If you don't go out and mingle I'm never going to get grandchildren, and I want yours to come soon because I know they will be close to me, and since your life is all about me, you need to get dressed and leave the convent. Now, ", or something like that. Not wanting to disobey the voice in my head, I tell Alicia OK, I am coming and proceeded to exchange my PJ pants and Red Sox t-shirt for my bitch boots and 'lady' paint.
After a 30 minute primping routine that will apparently one day take 6 hours, when I am old and things start to loosen and fall and crack and make me wish I was 26 again, I hopped in Arlene's van and off we went (Arlene is a 40 something year old gal that is going to school and living at the Mother House, or the "Mo Ho" as we have now begun to call it, with love). I have a drink before I go, and take one to have when I get to Alicia's. From there, the plan is to go to the campus club, called The Wall. I have no intentions of drinking any more than that, well, maybe one or two at the bar but that is IT! (I think we know where THIS is going...)
I get to Alicia's, the rest of the girls arrive and we are sharing stories and experiences about teaching, growing up, why guys suck, blah blah, ya da ya da. There is a bottle of vodka and rum on the table, a BIG bottle of rum and of course being from Cape Breton I opt for the rum, thinking "I'll just have a little jillick..."
The night progresses. I have one more, and ok it was maybe a big one but still, not unusually so, and we are off to the Wall for a night of dancing and man-attracting, supposedly. Only I am so much more drunk than I should be, like WAY more, and I'm kind of confused because I can't understand why, I haven't drunk that much, not really, this is really weird, etc. etc. By this time I am at the bar, and the only thing that made sense was to just keep drinking. So I do, and from here on in things are a bit 'hazy', but here is what I remember:
The flowers on Christina's shirt while we were dancing, they were little and white and all glowy and looked so amazingly cool until something else caught my attention, like the fact that somethig was happening at the stage. Was there a band playing? (Quite obviously there was no band playing, but a music machine, but somehow in my drunken stupor I got the message that there was in fact a band playing, and I needed to get close to the stage! So I take off, push my way through the sweaty crowd and before I know it I am dancing with random people I don't know, but it's ok because there's this competition happening on stage so no one is really paying attention to the uncoordinated fool dancing like she's got an electrical shock mechanism attached to her body, and the individual controlling said mechanism is suffering from uncontrolable tics. (You get the idea)
Ok, moving on. It's freaking HOT inside, and crowded, and loud, and I hop from different groups of classmates and squeeze by muscle-y guys in tight t-shirts that are obviously intended to showcase their muscles, but before I have a chance to ask if anyone wants to maybe make a baby tonight I am in a cab back to the "Mo Ho".
After some confusion surrounding paying the cabbie, I stumble into the convent, past the security guard who has probably already informed Sister Bernadette that one of her student residents is a falling down drunk and should be evicted, past the chapel where I should have stopped and thanked the good Lord that I made it home safe and sound, and into the elevator and up the three floors to my room.
Time elapses and the next thing I remember is this:
I am on the toilet, where I am pretty sure I passed out for an undetermined period of time.
From there, I am waking up in the shower, and have no idea how or when I got there. I am lying down and the Shower is ON, only it's kind of cold at this point so I try and sit up to adjust the temperature only my body is not responding with its usual speed and accuracy, so I very slowly lift my leg and turn the tap with my foot, but the wrong freaking way. Ice water is now shooting out over my body in what feels like sharp bullets of COLD and suddenly, my body realizes what is happening and starts to react, boobs flopping, legs flailing, arms reaching, arse sqeaking over the bottom of the tub until finally, the water is off. Thank goodness.
Eventually, i manage to get out of the tub and reach for my bathrobe (that I don't remember taking from my room to the bathroom. at all). I have to pee so I stop at the bathroom and am immediately hit with the smell of vomit, i mean it is intense! Only said vomit is nowhere to be found, nothing in the toilet or on the floor. and then I see the garbage can. And look inside. And yep, there it is. My vomit. Lots, and lots of vomit that came out while I was sitting on the frigging toilet, before or after I passed out, there is really no way of knowing at this point, but at least now I know why I opted to get in the shower. (I'm all about seeing the positive side, folks).
Luckily, there was only a few paper towels in there but I can't leave it, people will know exactly how big a drunken fool I was so I have to get rid of the evidence, immediately. So what do I do? I SCOOOP IT OUT BIT BY BIT and flush it down the toilet. And it is very scoopable, if you know what I mean. Ever clean up dog puke? Ya. That's all I am going to say about THAT.
Ok, so I finish that and make it back to my room, and head straight for my bed. As I am lying there, though, I realize that I can still smell frigging puke! Is it me? No, it is definitely not me. I just got out of the shower and I was Oh, so careful during the scooping bit. What is it then? WHERE is it, I realize, is the question I should be asking. And then I find it. It is all over the top I wore. In exactly the same spot that my right boob would be, if I was wearing it.
Shit.
I just bought the thing, this is the first night I actually wore it. And now it looks like something Catrina used to clean the toilet in the men's washroom at the Admiral.
Fucking fantastic.
And then I get a sinking, sinking feeling...oh no...WHEN DID I PUKE ON MY BOOB??? Was it at the Wall? Did I stumble out of the washroom with vomit on my tit? Did I do it in the cab? Oh my god, was I on the dance floor when it happened?
All of these horrible, horrible scenarios are running through my foggy mind, and I literally can not remember when and how the vomit landed on my chest.
I have since found out, though, that no one else knows anything about it which means it probably happened while I was sitting on the toilet, as there was nothing on my pants. Also, there was nothing on my jacket or the scarf I was wearing, and no phone calls from an angry cab dispatcher today, demanding I pay for the damage done to his poor unsuspecting cab. These are the types of questions that this 26 year old, who does not worry about filling in cracks or droopy skin, has been asking herself today.
So ya, how do you like your wrinkles and weird skin pockets now MJ?
Sincerely,
Brainless in North Bay.
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