Tummy Troubles

You may remember back in May, Dan and I were really sick with a stomach flu/food poisoning/something. I went to the doctor and got some medicine that made me feel instantly better, but my doctor decided to run some blood work just in case. Long story short, my blood tests revealed that I might have an ulcer. I was really surprised because I never have stomach issues, don't have any symptoms and feel perfectly fine. I went to a stomach specialist who decided that the best way to investigate is by sticking a tube down my throat to look inside my stomach.

So last week, I took a day off from work and went to Kips Bay Endoscopy Center. I had to sign all kinds of paperwork asking about living wills and all sorts of things. I had butterflies in my stomach, which was weird, since they were going to look inside my stomach (would they notice anything fluttering?) Dan was even required to be there to escort me home. Luckily, the people who worked there were the nicest health care professionals I have ever encountered and were joking with me before I went under. My anesthesiologist was a bit of a flirt and at one point went down on one knee, holding my hand.

"Are you proposing to me?" I asked. "Because I am taken."

"I am proposing to your vein." he replied.

The whole thing went down without a hitch, and my doctor concluded that I have some kind of bacterial infection that causes ulcers. He prescribed to me eight giant horse-pills that I have to take every day for 2 weeks, saying that they will make me feel better. (But I already feel okay, so will feeling better feel absolutely amazing??) Since Dan and I have no prescription coverage, I had to pay $450 for the pills (and this is where my European readers pause and wonder, wait, why don't Americans want socialized health care? And my answer is because we'd rather make health insurance and drug companies rich than pay more taxes? I dunno. I don't get it.) Anyway, that must be some crazy bacteria in my stomach if it needs that much medicine to kill it.

The pills give me a horrible metallic taste in my mouth. It's awful. For the first time in many, many years, I bought myself a roll of Lifesavers to take away the flavor. It works pretty well so yesterday I got myself an entire bag.

Now, the reason why I write my health condition is not to gross you out, but because I have been thinking lately: Don't anesthesiologists have the strangest jobs? Isn't anesthesia so weird? I love that the day I received my procedure, I was told that I shouldn't make any important financial decisions in the next 24 hours.

Isn't it also weird that you can be sick and not know you are sick? And isn't it more weird that last week, someone stuck a tube down my throat? Too bad someone wasn't around to record it because I would be fascinated to see what that looked like. It gives me the shivers just thinking about it.


One day's worth of drugs.