I had a staph infection. They are often harmless, but in the age of MRSA (so-called superbugs) they are also scary as hell. Because you don’t know if you’ve got a bad one or not until you see if it responds to antibiotic. Also, that shit spreads to children quickly. So when my Dad, MD extraordinaire, looked at my shin and said … you have a staph infection, I felt a wee bit of panic. Not for me (duh) but what if I had spread it unintentionally to my babies? What if it was MRSA?
Dad told me not to freak out, and he gave me some of the high-powered antibiotics he has handy. My Mom, who is a worrier of my caliber (the weird little apple did not fall far from the weird little tree) went and got the kick-ass topical antibiotic that she had used on my grandfather’s bedsores. I spent a few days with my shin swathed in yellow antibiotic goo and cotton bandages, and it healed up just fine. Thank you, God.
But while we were waiting to see if it was going to get better or go south, I made sure to explain to my husband that if this was indeed a Superbug, and carried a risk (however small) of being the Flesh-eating Bug Necrotizing fasciitis, have them cut my Fokking leg off at the knee rather than risk further spread. I don’t need my lower leg and foot that badly. They have prosthetics. I need to see my children grow up.
It made me think … what did I fear most about my own mortality? I fear that no one and nothing can love my kids, and care for them, the way I do. Sweet Babou loves them with an intensity that rivals my own, but he is still not certain where I keep their clothes and how to make their porridge the way they like. My parents love them, but they are squirrely and getting older. The thought of my children being ever left without the safety net of someone who loves them more than anything else on Earth makes me break out in a cold sweat.
Then I felt bad I was dwelling over a staph infection when people in New Zealand and Japan had real problems.
I wonder what it’s like to be a “normal” person who can have a little infection on their shin without having to plunge into big questions of life and death and whatnot? There are times when I can see real benefit in being shallow and thinking I’m entitled to special treatment from the Universe. For one thing, I would sleep like a baby.
Clearly, I need to reincarnate as a “reality television star” so I will never have to have another inconvenient thought. It’s a plan. My professional name will be Cinnamon McHooters.
My father died when I was relatively young (19), and I am of Irish descent, so I tend toward the worst-case scenario whenever my husband is late from work, or I am sick. I am so rarely ill, that I assume it must be something significant. Then I make all sorts of plans for the care of my children. I have already lined up my sister to move in with the Captain. She is the only one on the planet who could step in, and actually do my job with nary a hiccup in the transition. She wouldn’t love the boys like they are her own, but she would care for them that way. And that’s enough to let me sleep at night.
Ah, you are one of MY people. The doomsaying, break-a-hip-jumping-to-the-worst-scenario type.
I feel ya, fokker. I’m pregnant. My dear, dim husband doesn’t even take his clothes out of the dryer…he once brought his vomiting wife a popsicle (not the stick kind, the plastic sleeve kind) unopened and without scissors.
You didn’t TELL ME I was supposed to open it. He said.
I had a little talk with him about not handing an infant a folded diaper and expecting it to change itself because it didn’t TELL HIM exactly how and when.
So my terror is that I die and my dh has to raise the kiddo. I hope and pray that he would quickly find someone new who loved our kid because aint no way the two of them would survive.
Cinnamon McHooters, huh? I like it. It works for you. I, too, am a worrier. And not just about my own shit which I should worry about. No, I will take on all the worries of the world, given the time and opportunity.
So I’ll join your reality show and I’ll be Madam Yum Bum. Only for you.
It’s those little things that smack us upside the head and remind us what’s REALLY important- even if we know it and try to show it every day the little nudging wedgy reminders urge us to kick it up a notch.
Hug more, bitch less.
Bake more cookies, clean less toilets.
That sorta thing.
And even though my daughter announced at age 4 that her name was not, in fact Erika Ellen, but she was to henceforth be addressed as Tiffany Flamingo, she did not grow up to be a stripper.
Life is full of surprises…
May I just say that the four women who commented before me are brilliant?! Okay, there, I did. Well said ladies, very well said.
Daniel had one of those a few years back, it was horrific. And…. in his armpit. EW!!!
We lived. You did too. But yes, it’s scary and I hate those moments.
Julie
I’m glad you’re okay. MRSA has become so common, that it doesn’t even seem like a ‘super bug’ anymore. I’m sure that I, along with every other nurse I’ve worked with has it in some form or another.
When it turns into Nec fasch- THEN shit gets scary. Once had a patient who lost an arm and a leg due to a small itty bitty cut on her hand from a beer bottle. True Story.