Have you ever experienced something hilarious and horrible in the exact same moment? It can happen and when it does it feels like you are traipsing through the no-mans-land between Heaven and Hell (Heallven?).
If you manage to navigate this paradox without your head simultaneously exploding and imploding you will go away from that experience grateful. Grateful for what? To be away from that experience. This is about to get graphic.
16 Years ago on a Sunday I was sitting on the bench seat of my families maroon GMC Sierra fulfilling a church related duty with my dad and my friend Scott. I was feeling not only unwell but in fact Anti-Well. My head was spinning from a bad migraine and I was getting really sick. I expressed this to my dad and got the Chiropractic equivalent of rub some dirt on it, which is a really long explanation as to why I feel like crap. While that was highly informative, it didn't help my quickly deteriorating condition. Push came to shove, where my head was pushing and my stomach was shoving and all of a sudden IT WAS ON!
"SHTRAUGHHHLLL!!!!!" (Translation: Please stop the vehicle, I am presently going to be ill in a most unsightly and messy way. I would like to spare you, my travelling companions from witnessing this horror and by stopping this mini van you will allow me to do so.) Through watery eyes I grabbed the handle to the door of the van and slid it open while losing myself all over the plastic step into the van and the street outside. Now I've never had surgery performed on myself in the theater of a medical school, but I think I can relate.
My dad stopped the van and turned around in his seat, and these are his words of comfort in my moment of need: "Okay, now Scott check this out, we are going to see what is in Travis' stomach. Now that chunky that just came out was the last bit of undigested food in his stomach, looks like its time to eat because there wasn't much of that. Next comes the stomach acid, and there it is! He is probably experiencing what tastes like battery acid flavored Pop-Rocks, thus the grimace on his face. And finally, there is the fat. Everyone has a little fat at the bottom of their stomach, well everyone except for Travis right now. Travis will keep on heaving but there is nothing left in his stomach so nothing will come out, which is why they call it a 'dry heave'. You done? Okay, lets go."
Some might think that was little heartless (I did at the time), but the way my dad dissected the strata of my stomach while it was tumbling out of me was truly, truly hilarious. That created another problem for me, because as anyone who has heard a good joke in the middle of drinking a glass/carton of milk can attest, when you drink and hear funny simultaneously, your nose likes to get involved. Yes, dear reader, I'm not implying but explicitly telling you, my dad made me vomit from my nose. Heallven help me.
Story 2, a lot less gross, a lot more scary.
Last Thursday (July 19, 2012) I was working, which entails driving to businesses and doing sales presentations with some pretty heavy tools as props. I was on the way to do another such presentation when things started going down hill. I started feeling pain in the left side of my chest which isn't a great sign for anyone, especially the weight endowed. I called off my last sales call for the day and started heading home. I was thinking I would get home, rest and see a doctor the next day if I still felt the same. Fortunately I had some good friends who were aware of the situation call me and tell me they thought I should stop as soon as possible to seek help. In the moment I brushed that off and continued, but that thought remained in the back of my mind.
As I toodled down the road something else started to happen. My left hand got cold and then I noticed numbness creep up from the tips of my fingers on my left hand to the middle of my forearm. Now when the Starship Enterprise encounters a de-cloaking Romulan Warbird what does Captain Jean Luke Picard say? "Red Alert!" That is a sign that things may get crazy and everyone needs to get ready for that, shields up, weapons ready. Red lights were flashing in my brain and I was a little (a lot) freaked out. Something interesting happened in all this mental turmoil, I realized that I was listening to my comedy station on my Pandora Radio, and that one of my favorite comedians was on. Mike Birbiglia is hilarious (warning: not always family appropriate, but hilarious). While I was feeling the encroaching numbness in my arm he was doing a bit on a pizza neck pillow or something like that. It caught my attention because I love both pizza and sleep, and a product like that seemed right up my alley. My multi-tasking kicked in to high gear as I laughed, prayed, Googled the nearest hospital and drove my truck all at the same time.
15 minutes later I pulled in to the parking lot of said nearest hospital. I strolled in fairly casually given the circumstances, and approached reception. "How can I help you?" my reply: "I'm having some chest pains in the left side of my chest and numbness in my arm." Before I finished that sentence a couple things started happening all at once. The receptionist picked up the phone and repeated what I said to the person on the other end, and a very sweet lady who by her looks was probably Methusela's girlfriend apparated out of the nearest wall with a wheel chair. Notably, the wheel chair was extra wide. "Ma'am, I don't think I need a wheel chair, I can walk." I offered sheepishly. The sweet old lady said "Son, it will be easier for me to wheel you down the hall than for me to pick you up and drag you." Away we go down the hall, while I see the cast of Grey's Anatomy prepping my room with monitors and IV's and Sarah McClaughlan songs. When we reach the room I stand up from the wheelchair, the old lady morphs back into the walls of the hospital and I'm left looking around awkwardly while everyone continues busily prepping.
A sheet is shoved into my hands with a curt "Take off your shirt and put this on." I unfolded the sheet and oh! This is a hospital gown for a very large person. These people are ready for me. I'm instructed to lie down on to the bed, and while these guys are trying to determine if I'm dieing, I am busy formulating a way to make this fun. Questions were coming rapid fire, and I handled the questions by waiting for the person asking me to look up from their computer screen and look at me. I would then answer the question and then whip my head around to the person who asked the next question chronologically. This is how questions were answered and the result was some of the nursi (a gaggle of nurse) were weirded out, while others were doing all the could do to contain uproarious laughter.
Things got provocative when a male nurse pulled my hospital toga down, exposing my chest so that he could put stickers all over my torso to which he attached electrodes. I looked at his eyes the whole time and when he finally met my gaze I said "Hello." in a semi wistful tone. Luckily he laughed. My well coiffed Grey's Anatomy cast members did a great job taking care of me but were altogether boring (apparently we passed season 4 at this hospital already). A rotating cadre of nurse came through to check on me periodically while my tests were being run, and some just peaked in to see what was going on. Thankfully the tests came back looking good for me, I have to get a stress test done to make sure but hopefully that will look good as well. It was, in all seriousness, a big wake up call for me to get serious about losing weight and getting healthy.
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I love you Travis.
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