The Time I Fainted Regularly

So right around puberty, my body decided it could go fuck itself.

I mean, not literally. Well, maybe a little bit literally. But more like my body thought that betrayal of itself was the order of the day.

The first time it happened, I was in the kitchen getting some breakfast around 6:30 am before school. Suddenly, while in mid-sentence, I keeled over and thwaked my head against a counter before slumping to the floor unconscious. I had no memory of what had happened, but came to with my parents’ concerned faces floating above me, and a goose egg slowly forming on the back of my skull. After testing that I had my full wits about me, I was sent to go catch the school bus with little fanfare. My head ached the rest of the day, but I otherwise felt fine.

This scenario would replay itself several more times over the next few months, finally culminating in a fainting session where I stopped breathing and my mom had to call 911. By the time the paramedics arrived, I was conscious and talking, but couldn’t stand up without immediately passing out again. But I refused to go into the ambulance, and simply sat on the floor slowly eating cereal until I could get myself onto the couch.

We never really figured out what the problem was, but it seemed to be related to blood sugar. I started swallowing spoonfuls of sugar whenever I started feeling a bit out of it, which usually preceded a fainting spell. I began carrying hard candies around with me always, for a quick sugar boost on the go. To this day, I know I need some candy or soda if I start getting the “sweats and shakes,” as I call it.

It’s bizarre, but luckily the days of collapsing like a felled tree seem to be behind me.

The Time I Was a Slacker

So, yeah, I didn’t post on Friday, and my post here for Monday is going to be kind of crappy. Let me explain why.

Thursday was just a ball of pain. My post-op foot was killing me, and as soon as I woke up, I immediately passed out in the bathroom. Home alone. The entire rest of the afternoon/evening was just more passing out and throbbing pain, so I was pretty much a mess. My theory is that the fainting was due to low blood sugar, but even after I ate, I was still feeling extremely woozy. Then maintenance came by and carved huge holes in our apartment ceiling. Evidently, there was a flood on the floor above us last week, and we’ve had leaks ever since. Nobody will come to patch the holes until sometime next week. And then I fainted in front of the maintenance guy while plaster fell all around me. So, yeah, not a great day.

Friday, I was still in pain, and still on painkillers. I also worked from home all day, so much of my time was spent doing HTML and copyediting for a company website launch on Monday. By the time I was finished, I was so tired of typing that I just couldn’t face writing a blog post.

Saturday, Sunday, and today, I’ve continued to work from home on the website. My foot is elevated and iced, and seems to be finally improving. The first 72 hours post-surgery are apparently the worst, and I will confirm that based on my two recent procedures. The first three days are BRUTAL. I managed to chew up my entire bottom lip, which is a terrible habit that tends to come out when I’m stressed, or in pain, or bored, or hungry, or whenever really. Usually I chew gum to avoid eating myself, but I ran out and can’t get to a pharmacy or grocery to get more.

I watched the Olympics opening ceremony on Friday night, and was continually pissed off by NBC’s shitty coverage. Luckily, I’ve discovered a way to watch live BBC Olympic coverage on my computer using Expat Shield. Check it out if NBC, Bob Costas, Matt Lauer, Ryan Seacrest, and Meredith Vieira are driving you up the wall. Expat Shield is PC only, but you can try TunnelBear if you’re on a Mac. Or try Canada’s CTV Olympic coverage. Basically, there are many ways to avoid NBC, and I recommend you do so since they have shat the bed SO BADLY so far. Just check out how #nbcfail is trending on Twitter, or this compendium of failure, ignorance, and sadness.

So, yes, an uneventful weekend of pain, HTML boredom, and bitching. This is why you get a post like this. I will try and do better for Wednesday! Like writing an ACTUAL STORY. Remember when I used to do that?

The Time My Brother Passed Out In High School

My brother has been mentioned here a few times before, namely when he tortured me with Shakespeare and grew a second asshole.

A talented actor and writer, my brother also has some…idiosyncrasies. One of which is his unfortunate tendency to pass out at the sight of blood. Or even when thinking about blood. Or when just thinking about bodily functions in general. For someone with such a vivid imagination, this means that even a passing mention of a horrific accident or disease could send him reeling straight towards the ground.

Despite the frequency of his fainting, I’ve never actually seen him do it in person. I’ve seen him close, pale and clammy, but never completely unconscious on the floor. But I’ve heard the stories, one of which I’d like to share with you all, dear readers.

This was back when he was in high school, perhaps sophomore or junior year. He was living life as only a young man in late 1980’s Florida could, which meant that he had one of the most glorious mullets that I’ve ever seen. Majestic wavy black locks flowed over the back of his head, so it’s safe to say that he was stylin’ back then.

Anyway, one day, he was in health class, or perhaps a biology class. Regardless, Hepatitis was the subject under discussion, and the teacher began describing some of the symptoms. Orange urine, yellow jaundiced eyes, clay-colored stools, male breast development. My brother’s mind went into overdrive, imagining himself as a bitch-titted man with yellow skin who pissed Sunkist and shat rocks. The thought of liver disease alone was enough to make him nauseous and light-headed, and he stumbled from his desk and bolted out the door. The idea was to get to the bathroom in case he vomited, but he never made it that far.

Instead he woke up in the hallway, with people stepping over him on their way to their next class. He had collapsed only steps outside the classroom door, and worst of all, he had peed himself. Student gingerly crept by in an effort to avoid the puddle of urine spreading across the linoleum.

I think it’s a testament to how cool my brother must have been back then since he SURVIVED the remainder of his high school career without being a social pariah. Had that been me, the peeing nicknames would have followed me all the way into adulthood.

The Time I Stabbed Myself (Part 1)

I wish this had happened longer ago than just a year. It’s such a story of stupidity that it’s difficult to grasp that I was 26 rather than 16.

I was in Las Vegas visiting my brother last summer. He was acting in one of the shows on the Strip, and we hung out at his house and generally had a grand old time. I’d tag along to the Strip while he performed in his show, wandering around from casino to casino, and playing penny slots because I am the cheapest being on Earth.

I actually had a strategy for maximizing my free drinks at the casinos. At the penny slots, only pay one cent at a time, but sit next to someone who is a chain smoker. 99% of the time, that smoker is also going to be a heavy drinker who tips the cocktail waitresses well. Park yourself next to them, and if you can ignore the clouds of smoke, you’ll see waitresses practically fall over themselves to serve them (and by extension, YOU). Reeking of smoke, but happily drunk for only pennies, I’d while away the hours. My brother would then pick my drunk ass up and drive me home. Good times!

During this painfully hot August trip to Vegas, we saw billboards advertising the LAS VEGAS GUNSHOW, in all caps. At first we joked about it, wondering the types of people who would attend such a thing. But after I shot an uzi at a store near the Strip (all you need is a driver’s license!), I started getting curious. I had never been to a gun show before – would we be the only liberals present? Would somebody start shooting? The possibilities were endless! We decided to go check it out during my final weekend in Vegas.

Upon handing over $10 at the door, we entered the show and marveled. Guns were absolutely everywhere, along with survival gear and scantily clad women who acted as “booth babes” for the sparsely attended show. One tried to demonstrate the “power” of a magnetic balancing bracelet on me – the “before” example had her practically knocking me over, while the “after” one, with the bracelet, had her barely touching me. I called her out on her chicanery, and she asked me to leave the booth.

I picked up some reusable chemical hand warmers for the New York winter ahead, and also browsed the powdered meals which took up the entire rear of the show. These were emergency rations for the apocalypse, and they were handing out samples. Hungry and intrigued, I took a taste, and let me tell you, I’d rather die in a nuclear winter than eat that shit again. Once again, I was shooed from the booth.

Exiled from approximately half the show, I headed on to the main event, which were the guns and knives. Every table tried to hand me a pink handgun, “For the little lady,” each burly man behind the counter said with a wink. Ugh. I tried sighting some of the larger revolvers, but who was I kidding? At 5 foot nothing and 95 pounds, the recoil alone would knock me on my ass. But I refused to touch anything pink with HEARTS (yes, there was a gun like this), so I also looked at the tiny pistols designed to carry in your purse. Tiny enough to be shot by a child, I found them pretty unnerving. A man at a table full of shotguns recommended that I just use a flashlight to scare a robber instead. Actually shooting a shotgun at close range indoors would destroy much of the room, and he stressed that because of the difficulty of aiming the damn thing, shotguns were mostly just to scare people anyway.

After it was all done, I was a little disappointed to come away with nothing but hand warmers, and so lingered by the knife cabinet. Inside were about a dozen varieties of butterfly knife for prices ranging from $15 to over $100. I had seen my brother do flipping tricks with a similar knife years ago, and wanted to learn for myself. Cheap as I was, I felt a little ridiculous getting the $15 knife, so I sprung for a $20 model – the second cheapest in the case. Excited to try out my new toy, we headed home.

My brother had to work at the theater all day since he had both a matinee and an evening performance, so I decided to stay home and learn my way around this new knife. Alone. I looked up some videos of flipping tricks on YouTube, and attempted to follow the tutorials closely. I began very slow and cautious, but wasn’t too worried since the knife wasn’t particularly sharp. Lord knows how long it had been lying in that cabinet at the show, but it was dull and not particularly clean.

I was doing pretty well for a while, when I decided to try and speed things up, and I got overconfident. While spinning the blade around my hand, I miscalculated and lost my grip on the knife. It spun around in the air, then planted itself tip-first straight into my palm. The edge might had been dull, but the tip was plenty sharp enough to cut through my flesh like butter.

I gave a gasp of pain as the bloody knife clattered to the floor, then nearly passed out. The pain was incredibly intense, and I immediately started cursing until I ran out of words. I knew I was in deep shit since my ring finger and a portion of my palm had gone instantly numb. I grabbed a paper towel, then collapsed onto a nearby couch, trying to fight off the blackness creeping around the edges of my vision. I held my hand above my head, applying as much pressure as I could while I watched the towel turn red at an alarming rate.

Freaked out beyond all reason, I frantically called my brother, but he was on stage and nowhere near his cell phone. I considered calling 911, but chickened out when I thought of the cost of an ambulance. Resigning myself to the inevitable, I called my parents. With a doctor and an ER nurse at my disposal, I figured if anyone would know what to do, it would be them.

“So, uh, hi,” I began, my voice high-pitched and breathless. I was attempting to wedge the cell phone between my face and my shoulder while holding my throbbing hand a foot above my head. “So, uh, I kind of maybe stabbed myself. And I can’t feel part of my hand.” My parents were, understandably, ALARMED. They first asked HOW it had happened, and I panicked. I didn’t want to tell the truth. Who wants to hear that their child bought a knife at a sketchy gun show in the desert, then STABBED herself with it? I hastily concocted a story about about a cooking accident, which my parents accepted without much scrutiny since I was, you know, bleeding to death.

My mom told me to wash out the wound, which I attempted to do for about half a second before I thought I would faint. “Oh, yeah,” she said. “In the hospital, we usually have to hold people down for that part. You probably have an exposed nerve in your hand.” Indeed I did, as I would later find out.

But the bleeding eventually stopped, my brother came home after his day at the theater, and we headed to the nearest pharmacy to get myself a tetanus shot. Without knowing where that blade had come from, I was taking no chances with lockjaw. My dad even called in an antibiotic for me to start taking right away.

As for what happened next, I will leave that for later. Tune in tomorrow for the exciting conclusion of “Playing With Knives Is a Terrible Fucking Idea!”

(Click here to read Part 2 of the stabbing saga!)