Chemicals and me.

When will I learn that I CANNOT DRINK COFFEE? I love it. I love the coffee. But I am a delicate flower who trembles uncontrollably after half a cup. HALF A CUP. Then I start to write in ALL CAPS.

This morning I had two caffeinated beverages. TWO. And OH MY GOD MY HEART. It can’t take it. I was out with my friend and our children were not there and we were so happy! So happy, and so drinky-drinky with the coffee! And now I am trying to find the right keys on this keyboard thing and it’s hard because my hands are a blur!

Speaking of chemicals in the body…

One year ago, the above-mentioned friend and I and both our children were standing on the corner, being neighborly, when two cars collided. We screamed at the sound of the crunching metal and screeching and then we ran out of the way when it looked like one of the cars was coming right for us. Then we stood there, trying to comfort our crying children, as everyone around us screamed and ran for help and we realized that the people in the cars—who were right there, the shattered glass was at our feet—were in bad shape.

But we were okay. We were safe. We backed away; we showed our children that the firemen and the ambulances were coming to help. We retreated to our homes to regroup and try to make sense of what happened.

That night my heart began to race. The next day it was still going at breakneck speed. My heart wouldn’t slow down; my hands wouldn’t stop shaking. I jumped at every sound. I kept thinking about those cars. If I had been at the corner a second earlier, the car would have hit us. If my friend hadn’t been there, I might have been crossing the street. If, if, if. I began to think about how my son wasn’t safe here, living on this busy street. Who knows what would happen the next time we crossed it? Indeed—who knows what will happen, period? There was no way I could keep him safe! Ever! In life! Because life is unpredictable!

I began to think about death. As in, all the time. Death! It happens! No stopping it!

So I began to clean, all the time. Clean clean clean. The cleaning wasn’t really working at drowning out the constant worrying and crying, so I strapped on my iPod while I cleaned and wept and I tried to think about something, anything else.

When I couldn’t wear my iPod or clean, I read the dictionary. You think I’m kidding, don’t you? But the dictionary was the only thing I could read that didn’t depress me in some way, that didn’t bring up some intimation of death. Or life—which just leads to death, as we all know.

My husband told me to go to the doctor, and I was furious. You don’t get it, I shouted! We’re all going to die!

I felt like I was surrounded by the pod people; like I was the only one fighting off sleep so that they wouldn’t come and take my brain. I had to keep up my frantic pace of worrying and fretting and weeping and cleaning, or else.

Finally, when my parents had to come and take my child away for a couple of days so he could spend a few carefree moments not worrying why Mommy wouldn’t stop crying, I thought, hmm. Maybe a doctor isn’t such a bad idea.

The doctor took one look at me and said, ooh, hello, post-traumatic stress lady! You’re nuts! (She may not have said “nuts.” Maybe.) She prescribed two things: A breathing/meditation course, and an anti-anxiety drug. First I took the breathing/meditation course. Which, oh lord, was the silliest thing I have ever done, but the first night of that class? My heartrate went down for the first time, from around 150 (I had been obsessively checking it ever since it began racing) to 65.

Although the course worked wonders for me (I would be happy to share details about it with any of you, if you want to email me), she still wanted me on the medication. So I, the obedient patient, took it. I didn’t notice any dramatic changes, but then, I was already cured, or considered myself to be.

So now, a year later, we’ve both agreed that I should go off the medication, which happens to be Effexor.

Here’s the thing. Effexor has the worst withdrawal of any of these drugs. (Except we can’t call it “withdrawal”! It’s “discontinuation syndrome”!) I have taken it before, and I have gone off it before, and I know what can happen.

But because I’m on a minute dose (see above, re: “delicate flower”) my doctor won’t acknowledge that I will have any problems, or that I need to wean myself slowly. Even though going off this drug cold-turkey is a terrible idea, a surefire recipe for physical and emotional misery, she insists that this is what I should do. Even though all evidence points to her being a moron.

So! I am now going to wean myself. And in the interest of public service, I am going to document here my weaning process. (Not in painful detail, you understand. I will try not to bore you overly. )

I’m nervous, but ready. I know what to do. I have done the research, and I am cheaper than my doctor.

Here’s hoping no more cars crash around me in the meantime.

Dear city: I chose you over the suburbs, and this is what I get?

Gack.

First of all: I’m all right. I’m all right! No one panic!

That said, here’s what just happened. Oh, my! The adrenaline! The freaking out! But I’m all right. Stop panicking. You must.

I was returning from Manhattan, back from my Day of Freedom—I was having lunch with my friend while my son made Play-Doh pies with my mother-in-law or whatever it is they do when I’m not around. (And she loves it! Everyone wins in this deal.)

Sitting on the stoop of the building next door was a gaunt, toothless man commenting on every woman walking by. I thought, Ah, I’m home, where the crazy people believe in the possibility of love. He muttered at me and sucked at his teeth. Well, his tooth. And I disregarded him, as I do all the crazies, and walked to my door, and opened it.

I turned to close the door. And there he was. He pushed the door in, knocking me back a little. We were about an inch apart in the tiny vestibule between the outside door and the inside door. He was staring at me.

And then, dear readers, I went apeshit.

Well, as much as I am able to, which is in reality not very much. Just as he began to inform me that he “just had a question,” (Oh! A question, dear sir? Well, come right on in!) I shouted “Get out get out get OUT!” and I shoved at his scrawny little chest with all my might and he stumbled out the door. And then took off.

Once my violently trembling hands managed to get my keys to open the door, I called 911, gave them a startlingly vivid description of the guy, and a few minutes later the police came to my door with—the guy! And oh, how we had a reunion. The police said, “Is this the guy?” and I said, “Indeed,” and the guy looked all sullen, like now he was going to get detention on account of me, and then I gave the police all the details of the (brief) event, and then I watched them from inside as they stood on the sidewalk and berated him. The guy was waving his arms all around, and I was trying to figure out how he was defending himself. “I was lonely, see? And I knew she wasn’t going to invite me in. Even after I sucked at my tooth for her! What choice did I have?”

Alarmingly, they then proceeded to let him go. Thanks, NYPD! I called the precinct, and the guy who answered the phone said, “Well, I’m sure they didn’t just let him go.” Who are you going to believe, little lady? Me or your lying eyes?

Meanwhile, I’m okay! I’m fine! Except I will never leave my house again. So I’ll be posting more frequently, albeit with less interesting content.

Fretting is like aerobics for the mind.

So my dad’s going in for surgery at 9:00 a.m. tomorrow.

This is insane, but I might as well tell you: this surgery seems impossible to me; I mull it over and read up on the gory details and every time I end up feeling altogether poorly about it. And here’s the crazy part: it’s because I can’t figure out how such a surgery is possible. Are you with me? If I can’t figure out how to do something, it stands to reason that no one can. I don’t know when I got so egomaniacal, but there it is. Operating on a heart! Who ever heard of such an insane act? You need the heart at all times; you don’t go fiddling with it. Much less opening it up and sticking pig parts in there.

If I were a surgeon, I’d be in the operating room saying things like, “Okay, let’s just, you know, start cutting this nice person open, and—hold up a minute here, I have to vomit for an hour or two. Okay. No, I’m good. No, wait, still sick. Wow. Didn’t think a person could vomit out through their eyes, did you? Well, we all learned something today. You know what? This whole surgery thing doesn’t seem right to me at all. Who’s for lunch?”

Obviously we’re all grateful that I didn’t pursue a medical degree.

In general I tend to be unable to relax when I’m not in control. You should see me in a plane. I’m the one in 34F, flying the plane with my mind. It’s not easy but someone has to do it, and what, I’m going to trust those drunks in the cockpit?

In conclusion, I am insane. Thank you. I have to go fret now.

You deserve better but this is all I have.

Yesterday, probably still reeling from the psychic trauma of Thanksgiving Weekend With Every Living Relative, I forgot to take some Very Special Medication that Mommy Takes Because of Something You Did. I’m such a delicate wee thing that my dosage is extra-extra-low because that is all my willowy frame requires, but the bad thing about being on the teensy-weensy dosage is that once it leaves my body I’m WHOOPSY DAISY paddling around in a sloppy hell of withdrawal. So today I woke up soaked in sweat, reeling around my suddenly tilt-y apartment. When I saw two Henrys reaching for me from their two cribs, I knew I was in trouble. Fortunately the Husband is working nights this week, so once I roused him from his slumber, which I did by gently calling “GET UP I’M DYING OH CHRIST,” I quickly medicated myself and returned to bed, where I had dreams that I was Buffy the Vampire Slayer (how sad am I, still dreaming about a show that ended years ago? Quite sad) and a Herbie-the-Love-Bug-type car was roaming the streets of Brooklyn, announcing that it was the harbinger of the apocalypse. (If I wrote the script to this movie, I would title it DOOM BUGGY. That is an excellent title, and you, privileged reader, can take it. There, it’s yours. Don’t say I never do anything for you.) And I was all “bring it on” and I was tossing my pretty pretty hair this-a-ward and that-a-ward because I was Buffy and my hair was so blonde! So blonde and so pretty!

When I woke up, it was 1 p.m. This pretty much set the tone for the day.

Another thing that happened yesterday is that I went for a physical. I haven’t had a physical since the 80s—I remember the nurse instructing me to remove my shoulder pads and leg warmers before putting on the day-glo gown--so it seemed time. I didn’t realize I was getting the extra-vigilant doctor who would alert me to every possible thing that could ever be wrong with me, so I left there a little freaked. Extra-enthused doctor informed me that I have a GOITER (well, okay, “enlarged thyroid,” but isn’t that a goiter? Isn’t it? Oh, why didn’t I buy the iodized salt?) and HIGH BLOOD PRESSURE (okay, just a high reading, but my reading usually peak at 90/70, usually they’re so low that by all rights I should need to do a handstand to get the blood away from my ankles before I’m conscious enough to sign a check) and also several other things that I can’t mention here. Oh, and apparently because there’s so much cancer in my family, I’m a fool for not seeing a genetic counselor because I’m a ticking time bomb, people! Tick tick! So I’m scheduled to get all kinds of tests and she gave me the name of this counselor with the words “FAMILIAL CANCER SYNDROME” underlined next to it.

I called my mother looking for more specifics on the dead in our family, hoping that perhaps I had overstated the cancer running amok throughout the generations. It was a mistake, because my mom distrusts doctors and their voodoo practices. She truly believes that if you have something wrong with you and you don’t know about it, it will simply vanish. Poof! But if you make the mistake of going to a doctor and getting it treated, you, my friend, are doomed. Not just doomed. Doooomed.

So there I was just trying to get the facts and my mom is on the other end shrieking YOU’RE NOT GETTING CANCER! STOP IT! And then the rest of the conversation went like this (facts have been altered not to protect anyone but because I am simply too lazy to rise from my chair and find my notes):

Me: So how many brothers and sisters did grandma have?

Mom: 8? Wait, let me think. 12. No. No, 8. 6 brothers, 2 sisters. Including her. So she had 7 brothers and sisters.

Me: And did they all die of cancer, or…?

Mom: They were so old! When you’re old it doesn’t count. That’s what my doctor said. It’s not genetic if you’re old. They weren’t 35! They were OLD!

Me: What were their ages?

Mom: So let’s see, there was Mama, she was 74; there was, hmm, Salvatore, Uncle Sally, he was 62…

Me: Cancer?

Mom: Oh, cancer, yeah. Terrible. Colon cancer. Because all he ate was sausage. Seriously, it was all he ate.

Me: [Making a note never to eat sausage again]

Mom: Uncle Maddy, 60s, also colon cancer.

Me: Let me guess--sausage eater?

Mom: [dreamily] Uncle Maddy loved the sausage.

It went on like this for a while. Apparently my family is evenly spit between lovers of sausage and lovers of booze and/or cigarettes—or, hell, all of the above! Italians are fun!

Do you know what else is fun? Talking about dead people! There are so many of them! Think about it--they outnumber us. They could totally rise again and they would so kick our asses. And in reality my slaying power is minimal and my hair is short and brown. We are so screwed.