I stuck my head under the shower, hoping the hot water would ease away some of the ache in the base of my skull. I felt the dull beginnings of a headache coming on, the third or fourth this week, and tried to remember where I last left the Motrin. I sighed as I soaped up. I was feeling rather crappy for a Friday. Maybe I just couldn’t get to the weekend fast enough. It wouldn’t be the first time my aches and pains were attitude-related.

That’s when I saw it.

I remembered the red mark on the top of my right hip from the previous day. My belt and jeans had been rubbing the spot, irritating it. I was surprised though that the discoloration was still there. I rinsed the soap from my side and examined the fainter pink circle surrounding the dark patch. That didn’t seem right. The bruise? blotch? whatever it was . . . it had to be five or six inches in diameter.

After I toweled off, I called my mom and asked her if the strange bull’s-eye mark could be anything other than what I worried it was. Minutes after our conversation, my sister (a PA who conveniently had the day off from the hospital) called. I repeated my concerns to her. She had me poke at the mark. I didn’t hurt and it “blanched” when I pulled my finger away.

“You have Lyme disease,” she told me. “You need to be on antibiotics. Call your doctor.”

I got a recording telling me I could leave a message that would be checked the next business day. My sister started looking up nearby clinics.

“This can’t wait until Monday?” I asked. I didn’t feel up to driving anywhere. Actually, a couple more hours of sleep sounded good.

“No,” she insisted. “People DIE from Lyme disease.”

I thought about the people I know who have had Lyme disease. They’re all perfectly fine. Although . . . there was that neighbor that couldn’t even walk for awhile.

“Hi, I have a bull’s-eye rash on my right hip,” I explained to the admittance nurse at the ER. “My doctor’s office isn’t open today,” I added apologetically.

I kicked my feet as I sat on the edge of the examination table. I wondered how long the wait would be. There was no one else in the ER when I came in, but, really . . . I didn’t have a real emergency. I didn’t even look sick.

After a seemingly lengthy amount of time, the doctor came in. He shook my hand and gave me his card, introducing himself with a friendly smile. “So you have a rash?”

I hopped off the table and showed him my blotch. That seemed to be enough.

“First time?” he asked jovially.

I stared.

He chuckled at my reaction. After a couple quick checks of my lymph nodes and listening to my breathing, he informed me that I’d be spending my next three weeks on the antibiotic my sister mentioned earlier that morning.

“Do you have a fever?” he asked curiously.

“Uh, not that I’m aware of.”

“Have you had one?”

“Again, I don’t think so.”

“Hmph.” He smiled. “It’s coming.”

“Thanks for the warning.”

“How much do you know about Lyme disease?”

“Not much,” I admitted.

This seemed to amuse him. The doctor asked a few more questions, continued some friendly chatter, and then left to write up my prescription.

In the meantime, a nurse came in to take my blood. “So you’ve been feeling lousy and haven’t been able to figure out why, eh?” she said as she arranged her tools in front of her.

“Well, uh, I don’t feel that bad . . . yet. But I saw the rash this morning and-”

“Oh! You have a rash?”

“Um, yeah.”

When she was done taking my blood, she casually brought up the rash again, eyeing my body as if trying to guess where it was. It was like a new tattoo that everyone wanted to see.

“Ohhhh. Yeah, that’s classic,” she said, nodding. She seemed impressed. “So did it start out small and get bigger?”

“I . . . I don’t actually know. I didn’t notice it until today. It’s right on my pants line, so I’ve just assumed any red marks were due to rubbing.”

I looked down at the sprawl of the rash. How long ago HAD I been infected?

When I got out to my car, I sent a text to the Captain. “I have Lyme disease,” I typed. It seemed surreal to me. One day I was perfectly healthy. The next I have a potentially serious bacterial infection?

He was upset when he read the message. I know because two minutes after getting a response of “WHAT?!” he called me. His mind was swimming with memories of a coworker who spent a month off from work after the same diagnosis. She came back with Bell’s palsy. One side of her face was slow and difficult to control and she drooled all over herself.

So . . . here I am. Seemingly healthy, albeit a bit slower and achier than usual, hiding a huge round rash on my side. Some people look at my with sympathy and concern and others shrug and say, “Sucks to be you.”

I find it hard to fathom that I’m sick. I’m pretty certain that’s a good sign that we caught it early. I have my bottle of antibiotics, and my mind is 99% sure that everything will turn out just fine. Because if I weren’t so confident, I might be scared.

This is going to take a lot of getting used to.

Me: No.

Him: It’s refreshing.

Me: It’s cold. Besides, I have a theory about the water. All these people lay around on the beach all day, but you never see anyone leave to use the bathroom. I think they take a quick dip in the water whenever they have to pee. They relieve themselves right in the water that everyone is swimming in and then come out and say, “Ah, that’s ‘refreshing.’”

Him: Of course! Hell, I did it yesterday.

Me: What?! That’s disgusting.

Him: Stacey, since the Pilgrims landed in 1620, people have been peeing in Massachusetts Bay.

Me: Ewwwwwww!

Him: My father peed in the bay, and his father before him. And so on and so forth. That’s just the way it is.

Me: Yeah, I’m not going in the water.

In my professional life, I’m always on top of things. I make stuff happen. I am a model of efficiency. But in my personal life? Here I sit in my room paralyzed while projects stack up around me. Appointment cards for the orthodontist spill out of my purse. Instructions from the vet litter my desk. Exercises I’ve never tried are posted on my bulletin board. Books I’ve started and forgotten pile on my shelves. Crumpled up drafts of blog posts are heaped in (and around) my wastepaper basket.

When’s the last time I called my sister? When’s the last time I went out with friends? When’s the last time I was able to breathe? Where the hell does my time go?

It shouldn’t be hard to focus my energy on a project. It shouldn’t be, but it is. The culprit, I suspect, is a fat manila folder on my printer. I’ve been avoiding that folder – for months now. Somehow in ignoring it, it has managed to become the center of attention. It is marked simply: WEDDING STUFF.

It’s amazing how fast you go from “Heh. The wedding is over a year away. We have plenty of time!” to “Oh shit. My first choice of photographer is already booked.” There are still so many decisions to be made – DJ, flowers, ceremony music, transportation, hairdresser, makeup, menus, invitations, cake, rings, favors, attendants . . . It’s overwhelming. For once, instead of jumping right in and checking off the boxes, I’m rendered incapable of doing anything at all.

I knew we should have eloped.

Him: That’s a great name for a punk rock band.

Me: What?

Him: Parasitic Cat.

I know, it seems like I just posted one of these, yet here we are again at another Fitness Friday. (Ok, it’s Saturday. So sue me.)

So, it’s been an interesting week. First of all, due to the eight gaping holes in my mouth, I’ve been more or less on a soup and pudding diet since last Friday. It’s difficult to make great nutritional choices when the hardest food I’ve been able to eat is pasta. God I miss steak.

Then there was the issue of exercise. I couldn’t even do yoga, my favorite, because the oral surgeon told me no being upside down (unless I wanted to make my sockets bleed, which, no thank you). Plus I had no energy to work out anyway since I hadn’t been able to eat much. I’ve been weak and tired whenever I’m not actually drugged and/or asleep.

Oh, and note to self: Pencilin makes you feel pukey.

Drama aside, let’s see how the week went:

Goal #1: Per my fitness fanatic friend’s advice, I will attempt to figure out what kind of food my metabolism requires to function properly. She seems to think my love of carbs could be to blame for my sleepiness.

In progress. I’m slowly reading through a book on metabolic typing. I’m going to have to actually pay attention to how my body reacts to different foods to be able to accurately determine what’s right for me. All I know is that the “healthier” I have been trying to make my diet, the worse I seem to feel. The book says that’s not unusual because each person’s dietary needs are unique and personal to them. I’m hoping my metabolism functions best on ice cream and doughnuts, but I’m not going to get my hopes up.

Goal #2: I will attempt to snack on protein-rich foods after my workouts. Above mentioned friend also informed me that this is necessary to keep my muscles happy.

N/A. My muscles didn’t need any rebuilding this week. They have gotten plenty of protein anyway since yogurt doesn’t require chewing.

Goal #3: If needed, I will cut myself some slack on the exercising and healthy eating because I’ll probably feel like hell for at least part of the week and won’t be able to eat anything much harder than pudding for awhile. I will not take the week off, however.

Achieved, I guess. I went for long walks twice during the week (when it wasn’t raining). Mostly I was forced to give myself time to heal. And somehow I managed not to eat loads of crap.

And now, onto my new baby steps to a kick ass body:

1. I will begin noting how different types of foods affect my energy level, mood, etc in an effort to determine why “healthy eating” makes me tired as hell.

2. I will get my butt back to the gym this week. At least twice.

3. I will do planks for 60 consecutive seconds every day. With minimal grumbling.

So, yeah, nothing too exciting to report here. If you’d really like to be inspired, Iasa biked 30 miles for one of her goals. And Jewelz? Well, she’s shifted gears from exercise goals to doing the Dr. Natura Colonix program. Good luck with that, Jewelz. I think I’ll stick with push ups.

Now I’m going to go watch it rain some more and remember the days back when the sun used to shine and I actually had the motivation for this fitness stuff. **sigh**

“A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.” ~ Lao-tzu ]]> http://touchedbymadness.net/2009/06/20/fitness-friday-week-6/feed/ 1 http://touchedbymadness.net/2009/06/17/im-on-drugs/ http://touchedbymadness.net/2009/06/17/im-on-drugs/#comments Thu, 18 Jun 2009 00:20:57 +0000 Stacey http://touchedbymadness.net/?p=825 Ten things I’ve found to be much more difficult to do while taking narcotics:

1. Sitting up (you know, without lolling your head all around)
2. Putting together coherent thoughts
3. Saying long words
4. Painting your fingernails/toenails
5. Geography
6. Handling ice cubes (those suckers are slippery)
7. Navigating stairs
8. Making intelligent choices
9. Spelling
10. Blogging**

* Something I may have randomly and dreamily announced to the Captain’s friends during a lull in conversation last weekend. Which suggests that if someone has passed out on the couch in a narcotics-induced slumber, maybe you shouldn’t wake them up and take them out to be charming and social.

** This post was totally written under the influence, but I think I did an awesome job. Mostly because I’m still conscious and know how to use spell check.