Maybe I'm NOT Sorry

I've been sick for what feels like a million years (actual time span: one week of moderate cold; 3 days of hell on earth bronchial infection) and have been ignoring ... well pretty much everything other than couch, bed, kleenex box. I hate being sick. I hate the Hot Mouth thing I inevitably get going that makes me feel thirsty all the time so I am drinking gallons of water and spending so much time in the bathroom that I might as well make a little nest and move in permanently and yet no amount of liquid actually quenches my thirst or cools off the hellfire that is burning at the back of my throat. I hate the raw red nose look I get going because I have gone through a big box of kleenex in less than 24 hours. I hate the achy bones and muscles and sensitive nerve endings that make the slightest touch feel like you are being dipped in molten lava. I hate the inability to find a perfect temperature - I am either so hot there is literally smoke wafting off my body or I am so cold there are icicles.

I usually hate going to the doctor so it is a sign that I am feeling pretty icky when I voluntarily call to make an appointment (I think I still blame doctors for telling me that penicillin tasted like bananas - which I loved - and then the medicine tasted like ass and because I associated it with bananas, bananas began to taste like the medicine. For years I couldn't eat bananas without an instant gag reflex (I still don't do well with banana flavored liquids) and still when I am sick I get that medicine taste in my mouth and I want to die). Right ... Doctors. But the good thing about my new doctor is that when I called Tuesday morning I got an appointment for Tuesday afternoon (!!) and didn't have to wait in an overcrowded medicentre for several hours. So far I am pretty impressed with my new doctor. Very short wait times, able to be seen when you need to be seen and not 3 weeks later, pays attention when I am talking, answers my questions. All good things.

I'm not usually one to acknowledge that I deserve to be treated better but a lot of the time I do. I'm so good at making excuses: oh they're busy or they have patients who are sicker than I am or they're having a bad day or I'm being too sensitive or whatever. And I don't think that my excuse-making is going to stop overnight - I've had 25 years to develop a fairly complicated system of pretending everyone else is more important than I am 99% of the time - but I think it is something I need to look at and address. Because I don't ALWAYS have unreasonable expectations. And I'm not ALWAYS being overly sensitive. Sometimes the problem actually is exterior to myself and in those situations I need to be able to a)recognize them as such and b)say "I'm sorry. It's not me, it's YOU. We're done here." (Maybe even without the I'm sorry part. A girl can dream.)