For the Love of Jello

You know how people say, “Someday we’ll look back on this and laugh” about an unpleasant situation?  Let’s just hope this is one of those times.

It’s been nearly two years since I had a wee bit of a near-death experience.  It was July 2014 and I hadn’t been feeling good for, oh, about a couple years or so.  Let me start off by saying I had a MAJOR phobia about needles, doctors, hospitals, ANYTHING medical.  I avoided all of those things like the plague, which is ironic, because that’s how I caught “the plague.”  It had been a while since I had a check up.  I’m not exactly sure how long, but I was still putting down my pediatrician’s name on forms up until I was 35.

Well, I had developed a really nasty cough and I was feeling run down.  I tried all the home remedies and homeopathic thingies I could think of, but before too long I decided that I should face my fears, head down to Urgent Care, and get an antibiotic or something.

***Confession: I had nothing to do with this decision.  My wife told me I needed to go, and even though she said very little I could tell by the look in her eye what she meant was that if I didn’t go down there she would smother me in my sleep and hide my body.  Yes, I’m afraid of her, and any of you guys out there who say you’re not at least a little terrified of your wife, you’re totally lying.***

Anyway, I got to the Urgent Care and they took me back to check me out.  I had a couple x-rays and then they hooked me up to the EKG to check out my heart.  I had never had one of those before – it was kind of nifty.  That is until they finished the test and I was told that since they didn’t shave my chest I would need to pull those little circles off myself because the tech didn’t want to hurt me.  If you’ve never had this test, it is totally painless except for the fact that they attach the sensors to your skin with Gorilla Glue!  By the time I got done, I had little bald patches all over – I looked like a fuzzy domino.  Then the doc-guy came back in and told me that I should probably go to the hospital because I had a touch of Congestive Heart Failure and my blood pressure was too high.  Now, he never told me how high, but by the way he was talking it sounded like it would have rung the bell at the carnival Test of Strength.

I got to the hospital and walked up to the ER admission desk and told them I was sent because my blood pressure was too high.  She gave me a funny look and asked if I was having chest pains.  I said, “Nope.”  They took me back to the triage area and took my blood pressure again (they didn’t let me see the screen) and gave me a funny look and asked me if I was having chest pains.  I said, “Nope.”  They took me to a bed behind the triage, gave me another EKG (they aimed for the bald patches, luckily) and took my blood pressure again (they didn’t let me see the screen either), gave me a funny look and asked if I was having chest pains.  I said, “Nope.”  They brought me back to an exam room and took my blood pressure again, gave me a funny look and asked if I was having chest pains.  I said, “Nope.”  This time I looked at the screen because all this talk about chest pains was making me think that something may be a bit awry.  Apparently a blood pressure of 120/80 is good, but my blood pressure of 280/190 was a wee bit out of the normal range.  Now I should have been more focused on the whole situation at hand, but I couldn’t help but wonder what the Guinness record for blood pressure was (I later found out I didn’t break it – better luck next time).  I knew I was in a bit of trouble when she wrote my numbers on the wrapper of an alcohol swab and told the first person she saw to give this to any doctor who was around.  When they don’t care if a dermatologist or a proctologist was the next person they bumped into, you know this might not be a good time.

Now, remember how I said I had a phobia of needles?  The nurse came at me to start my IV with the BIGGEST NEEDLE IN THE HOSPITAL!!!  Before you get it into your head that I’m exaggerating, I knew this was the case because the nurse told me she was using the BIGGEST NEEDLE IN THE HOSPITAL!!!  Not gonna lie, that hurt.  I needed a second IV for potassium and she told me she would be using a smaller needle.  I relaxed a bit, but then she stuck me.  Not gonna lie, that hurt.  You know who lied? The nurse.  She used another one of the BIGGEST NEEDLES IN THE HOSPITAL!!!  She even told me she lied and used the same size needle – I started having some trust issues.

My doctor finally came in (and he was not a proctologist, thank God, because that would have been a real pain in the butt…yup, I went there) and informed me that I was in pretty bad shape and I was going to need to stay at the hospital for a while. Which was a good news/bad news situation for me.  Obviously it was bad news because I was instantly in immersion therapy for my phobia!  But it was good news because I have always been a huge fan of Jello!  Like a ridiculously big fan – I get giddy about Jello!

So what happened next?  Does our hero survive?!! (SPOILER ALERT: I survived)  I guess you’ll have to finish this story tomorrow…I need to go get some Jello.

“My doctor gave me six months to live, but when I couldn’t pay the bill he gave me six months more.” ~ Walter Matthau