Banner photo of Larry Eugene Meredith, Ronald Tipton and Patrick Flynn, 2017.

The good times are memories
In the drinking of elder men...

-- Larry E.
Time II

Sunday, July 28, 2013

When Your Finger Gives You the Finger

Am I elderly yet? I think I deserve to be. If you aren't considered elderly when but four years short of the life expectancy death year, when can you be? I don't leap up upon my feet anymore or bound out of my car as I did when I was younger, but I do groan a lot when I do those things and that means I'm old, doesn't it? I mean I'm not giving one of those marital arts yells to focus my energy, although it some ways it is kinda the same thing.

Still and all I was cruising along in pretty solid health for a lot of years, until this past April. It was as if the fates yelled, "Hey April Fool, you're a geezer, doncha know. Time to feel your age even if you won't act it."

I suppose it really began in March, as observed in my last posting. An ill wind hit me hard in my left wrist and turned this lion into a lamb going baaa, baaa, baa! It did teach me an appreciation for my left hand, an appendage I basically took for granted before this wreckage to my wrist. I hadn't realized I opened a lot of doors with my left hand or how many things one needed two hands to operate, such as opening a can of cat food or unscrewing the cap off an ice tea jug.

Still and all, the pain was the main thing, it being there with gnawing teeth in constant chew upon my bones. I am not a fan of medication and get by with as little as possible (which is growing less possible each time I pop in upon a doctor, as you will see), but I lose some of my stubbornness if the pain becomes too great. Thus as these two weeks of agony wore on the aspirin bottle became my best friend and therein lies the rest of this sad and degrading tale. The wrist bones connected to the aspirin tablet and the aspirin tablet is apparently connected to the digestive system and eventually you all know where to the digestive system is connected.

The agony of the wrist slowly faded away about a week before Palm Sunday, which fell on March 24 this year. It was upon Maundy Thursday that I nearly fell in the bathroom. I attributed my moment of faintness to the drinks I had with dinner that restaurant's concoctions seemingly being more potent than most. It was this and nothing more, quoting the Raven, and it will pass just like Lenore. (If you're scratching your head going, "Who's this Lenore and what's she doing in his bathroom," then you really need go catch up on your Poe.)

I had noticed a slight pain across my belly this particular week, but am unclear if it was before or after my brief dizzy spell that Thursday eve. I feared the return of the Flu something that had laid me low earlier in the year and had made some similar jabs to my midsection. On Saturday I felt fairly well and the same on Sunday morning. It was in the afternoon that things took a tumble down hill.

I returned home, ate some lunch and felt extremely tired. I lay down on the sofa and next thing I knew (or perhaps didn't know) I was asleep, and I slept most the afternoon. When I awoke and arose and started across the living room I was overcome with that faintness again, only ten times worst and I had to stagger to the nearest seat and sit. I could not that night walk more that three or four paces without this same need to collapse somewhere. I was like Superman surrounded by Kryptonite, powerless.

The flu must have me in her stifling arms again!

The first thing on Monday morning (and here is where our tale gets degrading or disgusting perhaps, for no one cares to dwell on bodily functions although they are universal) I had to run for the bathroom.  Now at my age I have to run to the bathroom every morning, but that is the stand-up situation (for us guys) whereas this was a sit down movement. I had a somewhat urgent diarrhea. Obviously an offshoot (no pun intended) of that cruel mistress Flu. That was my obvious consideration until I stood to flush and stared down to a bowl of black.

No, no, this should not be black, that is not good. Black meant there was blood from somewhere and that could mean there was cancer somewhere and that was definitely not good.

But I'm an optimist with great faith in my rather over active immune system. I stuck to my flu theory and decided to wait and see if this blackness would just go away. I still couldn't walk more than a few feet and I was cold and shaky, but I did nothing much but lie about and worry about the next time nature called.

I am, as it were, a regular guy. My next two visits on the next two days to the throne room were pretty normal actually, although the results were not. The deep, dark blackness remained, so on Wednesday I did what I seldom do, I called my doctor.

My appointment was set for the next day, Thursday. Thursdays were quickly becoming my special day.  I dutifully appeared in her office that fateful morning and filled out the form on the clipboard once again. (Why does one fill out such forms in every doctor visit? There is such a thing as a computer where this repetitive information could be kept and recalled.)

Dr. Sue ordered up a blood test and arranged an emergency colonoscopy for the next Thursday. (You can hear all about my preparation for that adventure on my post, How to Get Ready for Your Colonoscopy or A Night At the Races, by clicking on the underlined title.) The Blood Test was to check the oil level on my hemoglobins. If they were too low the good doctor threatened to put me immediately in the hospital.

Did she? Or was I resurrected for Easter? And was this just one more stepping stone in my deteriorating health, another moan and groan along the path of being elderly? More to come...

1 comment:

Ron said...

Well Lar, we're there now aren't we? Great post!