Honey Daiquiri
“Don’t wound what you can’t kill”? Absolutely wound it, makes it harder for it to kill you! #logic #survival.
by Miniq Brown
Honey Harpooned
‘We’re off to see the Wizard!’ I sing to myself as I skip off the bus at Croydon University Hospital and across the traffic lights to my doctor’s surgery. Yep, it’s that time. I, Honey Marie Saks-Adams, am going to the doctor voluntarily.
Then again, I guess the blinding pain in my stomach and butt cheek every month when I’m about to come on my period left me little choice. Nevertheless, here I am.
I am not afraid of the doctor. I am not one of those people who thinks that going to the doctor will cause more problems than it solves, unless of course you’re spending any significant time at Maydie- I mean Mayday- I mean Croydon University #WhoAreYouKidding. I am, however, appropriately suspicious of any so called professional that uses internet search engines as the main tool for diagnosis.
My doctor and I have had a fraught relationship ever since I got a cold a couple of years back that hung on for two months, and even though I really really didn’t want to go to see him I did anyway. I waited an hour only for him to tell me that viruses sometimes take a while, and to go home. Two weeks later I developed head-destroying, tooth-erupting, nose-clogging sinusitis that required three bouts of antibiotics which caused two separate yet potent urine infections. So yeah, Doctor Rogers and I aren’t friends, but as, unfortunately, my extensive research by way of Doctor G Medical Examiner, and my dedication to the CI network haven’t yet materialised into a medical degree, I guess he’s the only person who can help me. Besides, he can write prescriptions for The Good Stuff.
An hour I wait. A friggin’ hour. And no, I will not be grateful that my healthcare is free, it really isn’t. It is paid for by hours of my life that I won’t get back, taxes stolen from my paycheck before I get a chance to put food in my mouth, and years of paying for my life-sustaining asthma medication while my diabetic buddies go debt free. When I finally see Doctor Rogers he takes his time to sit down and shuffle papers around on his desk. I don’t know why, like I’m not aware that all of my files are digital.
‘How can I help you today Mrs. Adams?’ he asks, a curly smile that reaches both bald spots either side of his ears swipes across his face.
‘Hi, um…’ Right, because even though I’ve sat at home in agony for months and then in the waiting room for an hour to see him, now I’m actually here my mind goes blank. Why am I here? I should leave. Definitely leave before you start talking to the smiling madman about your periods. I mean why is he smiling? If I’m here, I’m clearly not happy.
‘Mrs. Adams?’
‘Yes. Periods.’ I say. Eloquent. I feel like I should cringe, but actually I’m not ashamed. I am a woman! I have periods! As a doctor he should know that. And furthermore, I am sick and tired of men acting all grossed out when adverts for tampons come on the tele. You don’t see women squirming when erectile dysfunction ads come on, or worse, Lynx ads.
‘Periods?’ Doctor Rogers repeats, and bless him he doesn’t seem surprised or offended.
‘Yes, periods,’ I say again. Relax Honey, you rant when you’re nervous. ‘I’ve been having irregular periods.’
‘What do you mean by irregular?’
‘I mean that sometimes they come. And sometimes they don’t…’ We hold each other’s gaze.
‘Could you be a bit more specific?’
‘So I had one about six weeks ago and nothing since.’
‘Was it particularly painful?’
‘They have been since I was eight.’
‘Wow, that’s early.’
‘According to all the girls in my year four P.E class, yes.’
‘Any possibility that you could be pregnant?’
‘I hope so.’ I take a deep breath and look at my hands in my lap, because if talking about your periods with a stranger-man isn’t mortifying enough, talking about attempted- and failed- conception takes the ham. ‘My husband and I have been trying to get pregnant for about eight months now. And I’m concerned.’
‘These things take time, ninety percent of couples trying to conceive do so within a year.’
‘A year?!’
‘Yes.’
‘Skanks make it look so easy,’ I mumble.
‘Excuse me?’
‘Nothing. So a year. Then there’s probably nothing wrong with me.’
‘Probably not. But about these periods. You say they’ve always been quite painful?’
‘Yes. And the last doctor I saw round about when I got married told me to go on the pill to help regulate them, and I guess it worked a little but since I’ve been off the pill to conceive it’s, like, ten times worse. And I get this agonising pain in this spot…’
‘Where?’
‘Like… my lower… coccyx area…’
‘Your…’
‘Like, at the bottom of my back, before my legs. Like, in between that area.’
‘Your buttock?’
‘Like, in… between…’ He looks at me blankly. ‘Like in the crease.’
‘Neonatal cleft.’
‘That’s the next thing I was gonna say.’
‘Can you feel anything there?’
‘It’s like a lump, like a pocket. And hurts like bloody murder, like screaming, kill-me pain. And it happens every three weeks whether I have a period or not but it seems to be linked to my cycle.’
‘Interesting…’ Doctor Rogers says, and then flicks on his computer screen. ‘Let me just check something.’ He turns the face of his computer away from me and loads up a web page. It’s Google. I know that it’s Google.
‘Yes,’ Doctor Rogers continues, ‘this is just confirming my suspicions. Based on the symptoms you described it sounds like you may have a condition called endometriosis.’
‘Endo-what-now-again?’
‘Endometriosis. It effects around twenty-one percent of women at childbearing age.’
‘Then how have I not heard of it ever before.’
‘It’s only recently come into prevalence. The first thing I’ll do is take a urine pregnancy test and just rule that out completely, and then I’ll prescribe you some medication for the pain, and I’ll also give you a referral on gynaecology. They should be able to help you further.’
‘But wait, when you said the thing about childbearing… Will it affect my fertility?’
‘Some women experience infertility associated with endometriosis, yes.’
‘Great, I say as my heart drops into my stomach.
‘But like I say, endo is only a guess. Pee in this cup!’ says Doctor Roger.
August 2015
‘Three, two, one!’ I counted down the end of the game as my dad threw up a three that rolled around the rim and out, but it didn’t matter, we’d won the match by fifteen.
‘Legacy!’ the team shouted in the huddle and then ran off the court to shower. I took this as my cue to grab my ball from behind the bench and start shooting around.
I took my place behind the three point line and let a few fly while I was joined by a few stragglers, the kid from basketball I met at camp a week back, Bic. For some reason dad decided to invite him to the game and as he apparently had nothing better to do or no one at home who loved him, I mean travelling to Horley in a stranger’s car in the middle of the night?, he decided to ride along.
‘Youwanabllkgks,’ he said.
‘Er, what?’ I replied as he caught my rebound.
‘Youwanabllkgks,’ he repeated.
‘Are you trying to make words?’
‘Do. You. Want. To. Play. One. On. One.’
‘See, was that so hard? And no.’
‘Why not?’
‘Because I like a challenge.’
‘I could beat you at one on-’ The rest of his sentence is drowned out by my laughter.
‘Aw, you poor, delusional little boy.’
‘What? I could beat you at one on-’
‘Stop! I haven’t taken my asthma medication today,’ I sputtered in hysterics.
‘Come on, right now.’
‘I am wearing tights and biker boots.’
‘So you can’t play?’
‘No, I just wanted to let you know that’s what I’m going to tell everyone when I beat you.’ I threw him a hard bounce pass. ‘Check,’ I said.
It took twelve minutes to serve him my victory- I had to stop for three because I got a flake of mascara in my eye. It was satisfying, especially when he started complaining and whining that I hadn’t really won, we weren’t finished playing. Sigh, boys. He sulked in the car home.
‘You teaching that boy a few tricks?’ Dad smiled in the car. I nodded. ‘Best shooting action out there apart from me! You know you’re better than half the guys on the team.’
‘I know,’ I breathed. And yet I’ll never get on the court, I thought as I stared out the window and considered the complexities of #girlballerlife.
‘Endro-meaty-what-now?’ Daks asks as I sit, a little shell-shocked in my parent’s living room. I had been consulting Doctor Google since I left the doctor’s office. Needless to say it had been an informative and terrifying walk home.
‘Symptoms include moodiness, depression, painful cysts, irregular periods, and infertility.’
‘At least that explains your personality.’
‘I feel like a whale. Like I’ve just been harpooned.’
‘Okay, your ass is big, but it’s not that big.’
‘Hey!’
‘I mean it as a compliment!’
‘I know, but perpetually skinny girls don’t get to make jokes about asses.’
‘No fair.’
‘I know, it’s like ninety percent of your vocabulary.’
‘Don’t worry Honey. Everything will be fine.’ Daks changes her tone and rests her hand on my shoulder as I try to take a complete breath without hyperventilating. ‘And even if it isn’t, I will give you my ovaries. Do you want my ovaries?’
Sorry, I totally meant to put in a picture of Zooey Deschanel a la New Girl, but then I saw Hannah Simone… Sigh… Hannah Simone
‘Of all the people in the world to be given infertility. I mean She-who-shall-not-be-named a.k.a Jezebel got pregnant twice! And I, who got married, has gainful employment, and is nothing-teen get this.’
‘I’m sorry Honey. This really sucks.’
‘You said it Sissy.’
‘But look on the bright side, if you never get pregnant your ass will never be wider than it is now.’
‘You’re a jerk.’
‘You’re welcome.’
‘I’m making an ostrich face at you right now.’
‘I love you too.’
‘I’m going home.’
‘Byeee Honey.’
