03.06.23

The morning was woozy.

I have come to look forward to my morning cold showers (SORRY), but it didn’t snap me awake this morning as it usually does. I slept plenty, probably more than seven hours, but I felt unsettled. I pulled on my sweatpants (which are very dirty) and a tie-dye sweatshirt (which I wore yesterday, so… also dirty).

I drank my coffee and read my book — Invisible Child by Andrea Elliott, a book that has made me cry more than any book I’ve ever read in my life. My stomach refused to settle itself. I felt lightheaded and almost faint. My hands were shaky. I was nauseous. If I didn’t have my period right now, I would think I was pregnant. Any non-respiratory ailment always takes my brain straight to Round Two of Accidental Pregnancy. Even with my period I am not convinced that I’m not pregnant. Oh my God, am I pregnant? No… No. If I was pregnant, I would be like, five months pregnant (brag). Surely I would have noticed by now (double brag). This is what it’s like to be me, not feeling great in the morning. I wouldn’t recommend it!

I ate half of a peanut butter and jelly sandwich for breakfast. I think of my old roommate, who ate a peanut butter and jelly sandwich for breakfast every single day of the two years we lived together. I used to think that was insane, but, even as this one fails to settle my stomach, I’m starting to think he may have been onto something.

I have a doctor’s appointment at 10am. It’s 8 now. I am not feeling well. Not terrible, but not great. The appointment isn’t for the fact that I’m not feeling well, it’s just a follow up to the physical I got a few weeks back, to go over my bloodwork. In any case, I decide I’ll take a sick day, so I don’t need to worry about work when I get back from that. I text my boss to let her know, but she is in LA and won’t see it for hours.

I get myself ready and make my way to the train. It’s an exceptionally clear day outside. I ride down to 145th Street and walk up the hill to Amsterdam Avenue. Third floor.

I get checked in. The nurse calls me in and takes my blood pressure. I’m sent into the doctor’s exam room to go over my bloodwork.

The doctor is, again, on hold, this time trying to pay her water bill. She takes care of it in front of me. I feel like this is our thing now.

Once she hangs up, she goes through my bloodwork results with me. My Vitamin D is low, because it’s the winter and I live in New York City and I’m getting “northern sun.” She says my folic acid is also a little low, so I should take that because if I ever want to have a baby… I sort of stopped listening after that, after this morning’s half-pregnancy scare. I haven’t even tricked a man into falling in love with me yet. I mean found a partner. She prescribes me both, along with Thiamine, to compensate for the negative effects alcohol has on one’s liver. I don’t drink all that much, but if she’s telling me the state of my liver warrants a prescription, I’ll take it. Who am I to argue with the doctor who has paid two outstanding balances related to her home in front of me?

Going through my list of vaccinations, she says I have good parents. They did a good job taking care of me. I agree with her. I spoke to them on the phone the other evening, detailing books we’re reading and catching them up on my latest drama. I’m lucky to have parents who I feel comfortable talking to candidly about most things. They still do a good job taking care of me.

Per my bloodwork, I am not immunized for Hepatitis A, which my doctor says I can get from “dirty hands or dirty food.” She says it’s two shots — one I can get today, and the other six months from now. “If you were my child, I would say get it. It can only help you,” she says, when I ask whether she recommends I get it. Despite her time spent on hold with me in the room, and her insistence on following through on those calls when she is let off hold while I sit on her exam table with the uncomfortable backward slant that makes it feel like a torture device used to get terrorists to talk, she has a tenderness to her that I like. She sends me to get the first Hep A shot.

I schedule another appointment for six months from now, to get the second shot and also a pap smear. I’ve never had a pap smear before, but if I know anything about medical procedures that are specifically for women and people with vaginas, I’m sure it will be medieval and at least a little horrifying. Fun! Always fun to be a woman.

I opt to walk home, about an hour per Google Maps. I call my mom and talk to her about my weekend — a four-hour Saturday lunch with a dear friend I hadn’t seen in eighteen months, a long walk and dinner at my place with another on Sunday. She tells me about her weekend, a trip with my dad out to Worcester to see Elvis Costello. I quickly run out of things to talk about, as we spoke for a while a few days ago, but I stay on the phone with her for longer than I need to, just describing things that I pass by on the street.