Falling from Grace in Normal entries

Few days ago, let’s call it Tuesday for the sake of continuity, I tripped on the stairs before dawn and fell hard and heavy on my ample and expensive butt. My ample and expansive (it’s expensive too, but that’s not what I meant. In this instance, I don’t like talking business on PB) ass is attached to my creaky back. I can feel it, unless I’m abnormal my ass looks a lot like yours only I can see yours (little bit to the left, back up, perfect). There’s a gap in my fitbit nagging. There are two sayings from the old country apropos at this juncture; 1) Fitbit can/may go fuck it’s bits” and 2) “My ass hurts”.

The first day wasn’t bad, I felt sheepish and foolish more than I felt hot pain. The next day was bad. The third day, when all the glorious yuckiness fully blossomed I had an early appointment with a Neuro-ophthalmologist. I’d like to make a joke or allude to one. The first time I went to this clinic and told them my shoulder was hurting they referred me to radiology for a neck x-ray. Granted it could have conceivably been a pinched nerve in the neck, but it seemed like a poor start. The Neuro consult was set up before the ass spill. Ewww, that seems like a saying but it’s not. Ass spill, when you say it out loud, sounds like a side effect of Lyrica.

The neuro lady said “the good news is that your eye looks fine” after doing all the standard full eye exam stuff. Then she stopped talking. It’d be like if that Led Zepplin song went “ Way down inside, woman, you need …” it feels unfinished. So I said “That means it’s in my brain, right?” I said that because I’m a fucking genius and my butt hurts. She offered an MRI, giving me that sad smile vets use to tell a kid their dog has gone to “the farm” but she wasn’t enthusiastic. Then she offered a referral to a headache specialist, I didn’t have an answer quick enough, so she offered the option of not doing anything and seeing her again in a year. She smiled. It’s my favorite plan too. I’ve seen three ophthalmologists in the past two years and everyone had a different attitude.

The guy who is also a surgeon told me I had cataracts and probably migraines. The one at lenscrafters said my eyes looked fine, and the neuro lady said – the good news …

I don’t have a butt doctor. I don’t want a butt doctor, and, more to the point, there’s not really anything to be done about it except let it heal. Like the back it’s hard doing things that don’t involve the butt. A butt. I am not referring to My butt as The butt, though you may if you wish. I’ve imagined several short stories and flashes but haven’t been able to sit long enough. I’ve been writing this in pieces and am of a prosaic mind today. The good news is my eye is fine. My brain not being fine is not news. If I thought an MRI would lead somewhere … I’d still hate going into that damn tube.

They train the doctors to be patient and kind at MSU. I know what that sounds like, but it’s true, and if you think about all the medical attention you’ve had in your life, you might appreciate that training, though, I’d rather have someone trained in medicine than human resources. I told her and her two interns the story of how I had come to have an E.E.G. I told it funny and they all laughed, but the punchline, no matter how I tell it, is that conventional medical practice in this country has gaps in competency. The short version is that in college I had these episodes of dizziness and loss of balance. I was bounced around and some doc suggested brain tumor or something. When I finally referred myself to a naturopath he gave me that awful glucose drink and when I started doing the funky chicken was diagnosed as hypoglycemic. I changed my diet for a few weeks and my blood sugar has been more or less normal for the past thirty odd years.

The E.E.G. was normal too.

My butt hurts, I’m butt hurt, if I had an asshat I’d wear it.