Completely Betrayed

(Potential TMI warning)

Today was a little demoralizing.

Okay - it was A LOT demoralizing. My feelings are still quite fragile. Today we experienced severe betrayal of the body. I'll try to limit the TMI, but we had an unusually bilious morning. I thought I was safe. I had happily munched down my Frosted Mini Spooners, and swigged my milk this morning, with a deceptive lack of pukiness. Apparently, it was to lull me into complacency. This happy state of affairs didn't last long after arriving at work.

Idiot me, last week I made the fatal error of realizing how very lucky I am not to have vomited at work. But that winning streak has now ended. Yep, this morning, while slaving away in my cubicle I began the felicity of wondering if I was going to faint, puke, or expel violently from the other end. All of which are horribly unprofessional behaviors! Fortunately, only two of those actually happened. While I will try to limit to description of these agonies, I will express gratitude that 1. the toilet was my new best friend, 2. no one else was in the bathroom at the same time, and 3. that I was the very first person in the bathroom since the cleaning lady, so I could persuade myself the floor wasn't really too gross. Unfortunately, due to the nature of the upward expulsion, all I could smell was vomit. And I really worried that somewhere in the process of trying to keep my body from exploding in multiple directions, I might have left traces of the unpleasant process on my clothing. Happily that was not so. But I remained pretty isolated in the cube all day -- just in case. Yes, that all was bad enough. But that’s not even the complete trauma!! It was just an unpleasant overture with thematic elements of what was to come.

I also had to go to the dentist today. I did the exam and stuff last week and went in for the torture, er, filling the 2 cavities today. And really, I went pretty optimistically, thinking it wouldn't be so bad.

Perhaps you are not aware of my passionate disregard/loathing/fear/horror for all things dentist. I'm pretty sure there is nothing a dentist inflicts on his patients that is enjoyable to endure. I admit, it makes me pretty darn anxious to go to the dentist - I hate the cleanings and the spraying in the mouth, and the sucking tool that never quite seems to get where it needs to, and the yucky tasting things, and the drilling, and the Novocain shots, and the bits of tooth dust filtering through the air. I really hate it all. But I have actually found a NICE dentist. He doesn't even treat me like a complete idiot. He is actually COMPASSIONATE. And he even acknowledges that the tools of his trade can be painful to the subject. And the treatment itself wasn't too awful. I was determined to be brave. But horror of horrors, my body decided on a completely different course of action! I spent just about the entire time trying not to faint or puke. After numbing me up and injecting the Novocain, I felt kind of faint and I was sweating. They kindly blamed the Novocain and sat up the chair and put ice packs on me. It was a little humiliating when they hooked me up to the blood pressure cuff and heart-rate monitor. Like I needed any additional proof of my body's anxious response. Apparently, holding your breath to make it through is a BAD IDEA when you are pregnant. So, after pampering me and letting the anesthesia do its thing, we tried again. At least three more times, I came pretty darn close to totally passing out - I could feel my fingers and arms tingling and the tunnel vision closing in. And when they tried to cotton my mouth so they could actually put in the filling, I about hurled all over! Poor dentist raised up the chair so quick and shoved a garbage can my way before fleeing the room - which I am going to attribute to a gracious desire to give me privacy. So, I finally overcame the desire to faint, only to exert all my effort not to vomit, only to try my hardest not to burst into noisy tears. It was ultimately humiliating. And the odd thing is that I wasn't that bothered by what all scary implements were in my mouth - I just couldn't keep my body from freaking out!! I suppose I should just feel grateful that I didn’t wet my pants as well.

Apparently, resistance is futile -- I now completely espouse the philosophy that Junior here is taking over. Little parasite. It certainly makes me frightened for what havoc he shall wreak when he is OUT of my body, because he's certainly making a mess of things while he is IN.