“Day turned black, sky ripped apart
Rained for a year ’til it dampened my heart” ~ George Harrison

Bad diagnosis. Bad prognosis. Bad words exchanged with my doctor today. All that bad makes me not want to go to Boards tomorrow. What’s the point? What breaks my heart the most was that during it all, I was alone. I was alone when I got the bad diagnosis. I was alone when I got the bad prognosis. When I tried to explain to my thick-headed doctor that I am still in pain, and that since I have advanced liver failure now, there’s no point in not making me an addict, he still denied me pain medication. “Take Tylenol.” “Oh, okay. I’ve been doing that for the past two months. I take three 150 count bottles per week. You think this might have caused the advanced liver failure?” “No. I think it was all the drinking you did as a teenager. Plus your weight.” Of course. It’s always my weight. I’m not obese, but the ten or fifteen pounds that I am overweight is the thing that is going to kill me. Makes perfect sense. So that is where I kind of lost it. I told my doctor that I was in severe pain, it has been here for a good four months now, and I wanted him to prescribe me something. If he didn’t, I was going to the nearest dealer and get heroine. I wasn’t kidding. Apparently, being aggressive pissed him off, and though I was still speaking, he told me to shut up, started rummaging through the drawers in the exam room, eventually pulling out a needle and a vial of something yellow, then injecting me with it. He told me it was morphine, but it wasn’t the same consistency as the morphine I got in the hospital. It didn’t even make me drowsy or sick.

After the injection, he dropped the bomb on me: The only cure he could possibly think of for my advanced liver failure is surgery. Of course since I’m ‘too scared’ of surgery, he said I could just live out the next ten months of my life suffering and on street drugs, and he didn’t want to see me again for another five months, to see if I’ve changed my viewpoint on life. WTF? I argued with him because I want a better quality of life! I sat there in silence in the exam room after he left, wondering what he meant, when the nurse came in. She calmly explained to me that without surgery, I have about ten months to live. Oh, and the doctor is convinced I’d rather do drugs and party than have surgery to save my life. Brilliant man, he is. I didn’t even bother making my appointment for October.

I left the clinic in tears. My husband’s guitarist had taken me to the appointment because my husband was tired and wanted to sleep. On the way home, I had to explain what happened, and he was barely listening. “Ten years is a long time!” Oh lord. I just shook my head and focused on things passing by the window.

I did tell my husband what happened, when he finally got out of bed. In response to my health issues, his band is only going into the studio three days per week, starting next week, and they’re going to go in at a different time so he can spend the nights with me. I hate that I have made such an impact on their lives. If I could have this all be over, I would. If I could have it be different, I could. I don’t want to become that sick person who is a burden to everyone they come in contact with. I’m actually making an effort to get around more on my own, even if it is painful.

On that note, I’m going to go off and spend some time with my family. My husband and I are going to the cemetery tomorrow, for the anniversary of our daughter’s death. I don’t know if we should take the other kids or not. It’s probably not a good idea to get them hanging out in cemeteries at early ages.