First off, I started the week in constant terror due to the fact that I had to go take an STD test. Yeah. Fun stuff. Woo-hoo! Remember that gal I had meaningless sex with, a little while back? Well, despite the fact that I wore protection and because, let's face it, I'm Hal the Hypochondriac, any sensation in, well, Little Hal sounded off alarm bells in my head, leading me to the Very Reasonable Conclusion that, yep! I must have a deadly STD.
Now, I don't know if any of you guys reading this have ever had an STD swab test, but apparently...they're very painful. You've heard of shrinkage, right? Well, let me tell you, the very idea of someone sticking something up My Little Friend gives me chills to the point where It damn-near shrinks backwards to the point where I may as well have a vagina.
Well, thank G-d it wasn't anything I had to experience. Yep, on Tuesday, my doctor--after all of the hype--said to me the most beautiful five words a guy in my current position, at the time, could ever hear: "here...just pee into this." I also took an HIV/AIDS test, just to be on the safe side. With that one, they just took a vial of blood. Yay.
So, here's the deal: I know I'm fine. I may not have gotten my results back, but I know that I am going to be just...fine. But still, there's that part of me, that tiny little voice in the back of my head that says the words that can be the stuff of dreams, but usually, in my case, the stuff of nightmares: What if?
But moving on...
Then there was the case of a new medication my doc put me on to help me sleep. Well, she never mentioned that it was an anti-depressant. So, on Thursday, it kind of made me freak out. Like, seriously...freak OUT!!! I felt like I was coked out of my head. My heart was racing, as was my mind; to the point where I could barely talk.
And for a moment, everything went quiet and I started crying at my desk; not because of how I was feeling, but because I just couldn't keep it inside anymore. Keep what inside? Well, put it this way: I wish I could just function normally. I see people just living their lives and being happy and doing all kinds of wonderful things in the world and, try and try and try as I might to do just that, here I am, constantly freaking out that I might be getting sick or that I'll be alone for the rest of my life or just my constant second-guessing of every little thing that I do. Simply put: It was in that moment when I just broke down and realized that this is not the life I ever imagined for myself. So, I cried. At my desk. It didn't last but for a minute or two. But there it was.
[BLOGGER'S NOTE: Yeah, I know...poor, pitiful me. Hey, it's taken me a long time to own these feelings, these emotions. If you've got a motherfucking problem with them, you're reading the wrong blog. So, with that, either get on or get the hell off! Notice the defensiveness in my "voice?" Good!]
It wasn't until later that I realized that the Mt. Dew I was drinking was causing me to have some sort of a reaction. Funny how something as small as a can of soda can throw your entire universe and everything you know about it into upheaval.
So, once my crying jag came to an end, I called my doctor to see if she could just prescribe me some Lunesta. That's been pretty helpful for me in the past. I also called the lab dept. to see if my test results had come back. They hadn't and the nurse who is a bad word that rhymes with "runt" says to me, very tersely, "ahhhh, no. If they were in, we would have called you." I kid you not when I say that the bitch done hung up on me!!! Not cool.
But that's not the worst part. Later that same day, a different nurse from the doctor's office calls and leaves a voice mail telling me that the doc just left the office and won't be back until Tuesday of next week. She goes on, in this chipper voice, to tell me that they have my file and as soon as the doc gets back in on Tuesday, they'll have her look at it and decide what "course of action" to take from there. It was about at this point that I lost all color in my face and I felt faint and nearly shit and pissed myself. I would have done all of the above had it not been for the fact that I was at a picnic for work.
I frantically called the nurse's station back and spoke to the very same Tinker Bell of a nurse that left that dandy voice mail. I basically was like "what the FUCK?! 'Course of action?!' What are you talking about?! Is it bad?! I can't wait until Tuesday!! Are you nuts?!" Still very chipper, she's like, well, the doctor has to look at it and sign off on it before we can really tell you anything.
I calmed down as best as I could and finally asked, "we are talking about the tests I took on Monday, right? The STD test?" There was a brief silence and I'm like, "hello?" and she goes, "no. You called about your medication, didn't you? That you wanted to change your meds." I was like, "yeaaaaah. We're talking about two separate things, aren't we?" She responds with, "I don't know about the STD test, but once the lab is finished getting the results, they'll call you. In the meantime, there's nothing we can do about changing the meds."
I have never felt such a wave of relief wash over my body. It was almost euphoric. I hung up with the nurse and headed back toward my co-workers who were playing charades.
***
Look, I understand that most of my problems are all internal. I get that. I know that most of the things that I freak out about are probably small and insignificant (read: having a panic attack when my iPod briefly malfunctions) and that, for the most part, I cause my own problems, my own drama. I wish I could make all of those fears and insecurities and doubts just--POOF!!--disappear. But I can't. They are my problems, and my problems are my burden to bear. And as I've said in the past, I am trying so very hard to work through them, but sometimes, I am on my knees, powerless to them.
And then there's something else that's coming back to haunt me. It's not something that I will specifically write about in this entry. No, I'm going to hold on to it and chew for a while. I will say this, though: Because of this particular issue, I constantly have had to reinvent myself over and over and over again. I thought I had nipped it in the bud, but--I dunno--maybe I was wrong. Who knows, right? I'm sure this is coming across as very vague, but I just need to figure things out on my own for now and I know that whatever I decide, the people who matter the most will be there for me in the end.
And that--THAT!!!--is what gets me through the day or, in this case, the week.
I want to believe that this upcoming week will be better than the last. I have to believe it. It's already started off so well. I hung out with one of my favorite people and had a blast with them, the other night. This morning (er, technically, yesterday morning), I brought a friend of mine to shul and he wants to make it an every-Saturday thing and he's hoping to convert in the next little while (WOO-HOO!! SCORE ONE FOR THE JEWS!!! WE RULE!!!). Later on, I worked for a few hours and then went to the gym and burned off 632 calories on the stairmaster. On Thursday, I'll be celebrating my mom's fifty-ACHEM!!
And, ya know, as I am writing this paragraph, I can't help but smile and think to myself, gosh...this week might be the lift I've been looking for; some positive shit, by G-d!!
And yet, at the same time, I know that I have a lot of thinking to do. Something big is going to happen. Soon.
There's a storm coming...
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