There is precious little in my life that I have control of.
People leave.
Relationships end.
Even my body is against me.
And yet, the world still spins on its axis.
Life goes on.
The chill of the ground seeps through my shirt and chills my spine.
I’m not doing my body any favors still lying here.
I pick myself up and drag my overly spasming-body back to my house. Gus briefly glances away from his computer as I enter. “That was fa—” he blinks, taking in my sullen figure. I don’t have the strength to hide how defeated I am. “I’ll start the fire.”
“You want some coffee?” I ask, limping into the kitchen and using the counter for balance.
“I’ll get it. Come on. Let’s get you out near the fire and sitting on a cushion.” He grabs me by the crook of my elbow and guides me outside.
“I can get the coffee,” I say—but my heart and feet following Gus suggest otherwise. Why am I still such a wimp?
* * *
While the white,sterile walls of the doctor’s room hold little comfort for me, an odd sense of calm settles into my chest as I roll off my leggings and climb back onto the table. Paper ruffles as I slide further up. Resting on my palms, I wince at the pressure of my scrapes, only a few hours old.
I still feel imprisoned by my limitations, but there’s a certain freedom in understanding the reasons behind it. However paradoxical that may sound.
I was right. Something was wrong. And while assertiveness isn’t a part of my nature, at the very least, there’s a sliver of confidence to advocate for my health that didn’t exist before.
The OBGYN who performed the emergency surgery on me, Dr. Smith, enters the room in yellow scrubs, her hair clipped up high with a claw. She narrows her gaze on me, peering through thin, gold-framed glasses.
Does she know how much of a hero she is in my eyes?
The woman who saw my endo when she was in there to fix my ovary torsion.
The one who removed it from my appendix, my rectum, under my ribcage, and sidewall. No matter how much pain I’m still in, it’s nothing like before. And I owe her that.
“Aurelie. Let’s see—” Dr. Smith smirks, flipping through the pages on her clipboard. “Well, that was a cute unintentional rhyme. How are you doing today?”
Not great. I fell this morning because the pain is still intense, and I’m frustrated I haven’t recovered fully yet.
“Alright.” I shift on the table, and the sheet over my lap falls away a smidge.
“Can you lay back for me?” She runs her fingers over my incision scars. “They look good. But seriously, if we were to omit the phrases, fine and alright from your vocabulary. How are you feeling?”
I pull at my fingertips. Way to call me out, doc. “Better. But I don’t think I’ve reached the place where most people function. Does that make sense?”
“It does.” Dr. Smith sits in a swivel chair in front of the computer. Her fingers fly over the keyboard as she assesses something on the screen. “Unfortunately, I don’t have the perfect solution to get you to that place. Endo can be a demoralizing disease but you’re a tough woman.”
I swallow a laugh because Dr. Smith is serious, but I doubt if she knew me, she’d think I was tough.
“I have a few things,” Dr. Smith continues. “That we can try to help manage some of your symptoms. Everyone’s journey with this disease is different, so I can’t make any guarantees, but these strategies should help give you a better quality of life: take what works, leave what doesn’t. That being said, although I removed a good portion of it, it’s next to impossible to excise the entire disease, so you’re always going to have endo to some capacity.”
My heart sinks. In my research since my diagnosis, I had stumbled upon that truth, but hoped however weakly, that the select few who claimed they had cures were actually correct instead.
But as always, I was a fool to hope.
