I closed my eyes and let myself enjoy being tended to. I knew if I asked my brother or my father to help me or do the same, they absolutely would. I also knew that neither of them would have any idea what to do, and that I would be too embarrassed to ever ask. Pride was such a silly thing.
But I would worry about that another day. For now, I was going to relish the primping and pampering.
It didn’t last nearly as long as I wanted, but that was always how it went. All too soon, Nox’s phone alarm went off, and they were jumping out of my hospital bed.
“Shoot, sorry! I gotta go! I can’t be late again for at least another month. I’ll text you when I’m done with my shift. Love ya!”
“Love ya,” I said back as they became a whirling dervish around my room, grabbing their discarded bag, their screaming phone, and rushing out. “To be young again.”
Although, sometimes it felt like I never even got a chance to be young. Between my mother’s illness, her death, and then my own illness, it just seemed one long march of “Wow, you’re so mature for your age!”
Ugh.
I didn’t have much time to ruminate on that thought before there was a knock on my door.
“Come in,” I said, already knowing it was the doctor. One, because my nurses would knock and then come right in. Two, because my family would text me as they parked. Three, because the doctor didn’t call my name as he entered the room. Although they were treating me right, I was just a patient to them. Which was nice in a way, I supposed. It meant I was too boring to sticktoo deep into their minds. And in this case, being boring was averygood thing. Being interesting in the hospital could be a death sentence.
“Hello there, uh, Miss Fischbacher. I was going through notes on your file and the last two years all show marked improvement from when you were at the worst of your disease, but now your state is not too far off from how you were then. You triggered a thyroid storm, and while it wasn’t anywhere near lethal levels, this is a huge backstep in your numbers.”
Jeez, rub it in, why don’t ya?
“I didn’t realize it had gotten that bad.”
“These things can sneak up on us. Frog in a pot and all that. But since you have an allergy to PTU and RAI wasn’t an option more than once due to thyroid eye disease, I’m going to have to recommend surgical treatments.”
I grimaced. While a total thyroidectomy or even a TAE worked for some people, the former came with a host of complications, while the latter hadn’t been studied enough to establish its long-term effectiveness or safety.
“What about my LDN? Can’t we just raise the dose?”
“Low-dose naltrexone is low dose for a reason. We can try lithium or beta blockers, but as with everything, there are risks and rewards. I’ll send some literature home with you. There’ve been a lot of advancements in the medical field since the passing of your mother.”
“I know.” God, I hated feeling like a child, but I was definitely completely and thoroughly chastised. “I think this was just a fluke. I’ve been doing so well with our course of treatment for so long, I’d like to stick to that a bit longer.”
“Very well. But if you have another incident like this within a year, I’m going to be rather insistent about changing your strategy.”
“Of course. I understand. It looks like I have a lot of research to do.”
The doctor waved his hand. While he wasn’t the warmest medical professional I’d ever worked with, he had a practical matter-of-factness to him that put me at ease a bit. But only a bit.
“Those can wait until you’re home and in a comfortable environment. For now, just rest. Also, since your weight is lower than we would like, I’m going to put you on a high-calorie, high-fat diet. I want you drinking an Ensure with every meal. I would also love it if you could get a solid nap in before the orderly comes up with dinner.”
“An Ensure witheverymeal?” I could barely finish one in the morning, often popping it back in the fridge and gulping the rest down for dessert at the end of the day. And he wanted me to drinktriplethat?
“Yes. It’s fine if you can’t polish the whole bottle off, but try to get past the halfway point. We don’t want to shock your system, but since you have such difficulty eating larger meals, it’s the best way to combat your malnutrition. Especially your electrolytes.”
“I’ll do my best.”
“That’s all we can ask for.” He gave me a very polite nod. “By the way, your hair crown looks lovely.”
“My hair crown?”
He gestured to my head, then left. Scrambling for my phone, I held it up and opened my camera.
Sure enough, there was a fairly thick and even braid of hair all around the crown of my head. It actually looked quite lovely.
“Huh, I guess Nox wasn’t kidding.”
Smiling, I settled back on my pillows. As I grabbed my laptop to watch mindless Minecraft or gardening videos, I paused. I had been really stupid lately. I knew better, I really did. ButI’d gotten so caught up in evaluation season with the kids and setting them up for the rest of their academic careers.
