surgery center rambles

Keith is in surgery right now, and I’m in the overly holiday-decorated hospital waiting room with other worried loved ones. He has a foot issue—several, like bone spurs and something else that I don’t understand, but I know it makes it hard for him to play his beloved drums and just makes him in pain, so we are taking care of it. I do hate the anesthesia. It terrifies me. I remember when I had Finn and had to finally relent to having a c-section because that stubborn baby was breech and refused to turn. I met the anesthesiologist, and all of a sudden I reached out and hugged/held him from the operating table and would not let him go (like wrapped my arms and legs around this stranger) and cried, pleading with him to please not let me die. I have always been dramatic. I kept saying “I love you, I love you, I love you” and “I believe in you.” He hugged me back and gave me lots of assurance and laughed a little, and it was a sweet memory of my madness. It is family lore now. I am forever whispering “please don’t die” to everyone I love in my head at a constant clip. I love that you know I am slightly off-kilter, spicy something or other in the brain, and you still come around. I like that about our relationship.

Anyways, this bitchy lady just stole my super comfy seat with a footrest in the waiting room where everyone worries. I had to put Keith’s stuff in a locker, and I left my hat and copy of Little Palace by Adam Gopnik on the chair to hold it, and I came out and she had put it on the floor and took my seat. I am currently eyeing her as she reads/scrolls on her phone, annoyed because she didn’t even care that I had to ask her where my stuff was. She is now added to my nemesis list. I have so many for being a kind and loving human.

It will be a holly jolly Christmas with Keith convalescing in the living room of our small house…him, the tree, and the open kitchen, and three giant boys, a dog, and girlfriends crawling all over the place. You should hear the music, how loud it is, as well as the gamer keyboards pounding and the shouts of “bruh” and expletives from the bedrooms. Why do they have to yell so much? And why don’t they like to sleep? I forget what it is to rage against the sleep, to just not need it.

There is randomly the best coffee cart here at the surgery center. I am drinking my third latte. This is dangerous but necessary. I had to run out of the house so early that I was not caffeinated. I had to run to the hardware store to buy some sort of toilet unclogging liquid and pray it works before I get back because it is the only bathroom on the main floor for Keith to use, and it is WILDLY clogged. He cannot be load-bearing for 4 weeks. YAY. The toilet is so clogged that I fear a plumber may need to be called. This only happens when the boys are home. I love Keith, but I will not be a bedpan nurse, I fear. So maybe stop wherever you are, if you love me, and say something into the universe about toilets working in the home of ATS. Prayers, spells, anything.

I just saw the lady looking at me. Sometimes I do this thing where I flip someone off by just holding my hand in a strange way, and it kinda looks natural, but I know what it means. I am not sure of the origins of my rage, but I assume it is no sleep, being sick, not enough caffeine, and always MENOPAUSE. I have to get my IUD out soon. Maybe I will bleed, maybe I won’t, they say. Then I can get HRT. If I am bleeding, I can get another IUD and then get HRT. Fuck all this noise. You can only get HRT if your IUD is less than 5 years old, even though it can really stay in you for 8+ years. Mine has been in for 6. Makes no sense. I am in the betwixt place of hormonal hell. Not to mention the idea of IUD insertion makes me queasy. If men had to do anything like this, there would be instant twilight sleep paid for and 5 days PTO.. It is brutal. Did I say fuck this noise already? Well, I mean it.

Tears run down my face and into my mask as I type this.

I am worried and I think there is a December mental illness that I have acquired.
I still can’t find a job. Maybe I am old and nobody wants an old LADY creative.
I am going to be a good nurse. (mantra for today)
What would it be to feel a bit less than I do?

I love you a lot. I hope you know that. Even if we’ve never met.

You all soothe my soul.

I’ll update you all in this post to let you know my handsome drummer is out of surgery and safe in my care.

He did make us all cakes last night before he knew he would be off his feet. Pizza too. I wish I could learn how to say lucky in every language.

Xo

Amy