OK, so I told this story to some friends today and was inspired to put it down on "paper."
Disclaimer: The following story does involve some brief mention of bodily functions, but will in no way be graphic. So have no fear.
Also, my old neighbor Mark resurfaces in this story. If you haven't already, please go and read my posting titled "Nutty as a Fruitcake" to gain some perspective on our relationship.
When Amanda and I moved to Slidell in 2004 I was stationed in the USCG command center in NOLA. I worked from six in the evening until six in the morning. Therefore, I had breakfast for supper most days. I would come in from work, wake Amanda up, and fix a big ole omelet stuffed with all of the goodies. Little did I know that my frequency of omelet intake was going to cause me some significant issues in the near future.
One peaceful fall Saturday morning, I sprang from the bed, looking forward to a day filled with college football. I barely even noticed the slight cramping feeling in my big toe. It was a small sting that felt almost arthritic, but I paid it little mind. While sitting in the living room talking to Amanda, I began to complain about this sore little piggy and decided to grab it and give it a good popping. As soon as it popped, I howled in pain. Apparently, my hardcore strength had broken my toe, or so I thought. I really needed to be more careful with these guns I called arms. After all, I had a young child now. What if he were to fall victim to my superhuman strength. I could never live with myself if I accidentally ripped one of his little arms off whilst trying to retrieve him from his crib. While these ludicrous concepts flashed through my mind I noticed that my foot was turning a very bright red and swelling to nearly the size of a cantaloupe. Yep, I broke myself alright.
After some discussions with a corpsman combined with the fact that I could only apply pressure to my heel without letting out an embarrassing, and all too feminine squeal, I decided that a trip to the emergency room was in order. I stumbled into the back room and alerted the nurse that I needed an x-ray because I definitely broken the joint that connects my big toe to my foot. She looked closely at my swollen piggy, which was almost visibly pulsating and informed me that it most likely wasn't broken. Based upon the concerned, and somewhat confused look on her face, I certainly didn't have visions of sugarplums dancing through my head. A few minutes later a doctor strolled in and asked me about my dietary habits. I told him about the omelets and my love of chicken. He nodded and asked me if I drank red wine. As a man of high society, I informed him that I would occasionally drink wine, but only the finest boxed "red" wine would grace the Nolan house. He gave another knowing look, which I interpreted to mean that he obviously recognized class when he saw it. Apparently I misjudged his look, because the next words out of his mouth were some of the most traumatic I've ever experienced.
Doc: Mr. Nolan, you have gout.
long awkward silent pause
Me: uhh, that's impossible.
Doc: Why? People get gout all the time.
Me: Yeah, really old people who wears orthopedic sneakers.
Doc: Well, now you have it.
Sidebar. If you are creeped out at the idea of gout, you're not alone. I had no idea what it was, and assumed that it was most likely some type of age related flesh eating disease that somewhat resembled leprosy. Great, now my foot's going to fall off. I then envisioned me limping around on a wooden peg for the rest of my life making up manly stories about how I lost my foot in some sort of combine accident, or maybe I was a child laborer who escaped the perils of the industrial revolution with only this damn peg as a reminder to live the remainder of my life to it's fullest.
I was quickly brought back down to earth by the facts of gout. Gout is the body's inability to process uric acid. Once the acid stores up, it crystallizes in your joints, usually a big toe. This causes the toe to become inflamed, and potentially demon possessed.
After a quick anatomy lesson, he proposed my treatment options. This conversation went something like this:
Doc: OK, there are two basic treatments. It's your choice which one to take. Treatment A is really bad and will take three days to completely relieve your symptoms. Treatment B is the worst thing you've ever been through, but will relieve your symptoms in 24 hours. Your call?
Me: Did you say 24 hours?
Doc: Uhh, yeah.
Me: I'll take it.
I completely glossed over his prophetic descriptions and chose the path of shorter pain.
We dropped my prescription off at the wal-mart pharmacy and I hobbled over the the shaving isle to retrieve some other needed essentials. After a few minutes I heard my name being summoned back to the pharmacy. When I reached the counter, the pharmacist looked very troubled at me and my prescription. She immediately asked me if I had gout. I embarrassingly responded yes, and gently hushed her volume level to keep the rest of wal-mart from knowing of my illness. She then asked me if the doctor explained exactly what he'd given me. I told her no, and this was her response:
Concerned Drugist: Well, the amount of medicine you were prescribed is really dangerous. I won't even fill this drug for the elderly because it could kill them.
Me: Did you say kill? What did he prescribe me, drano?
Concerned Drugist: No, but it's almost that bad. Mr. Nolan, please follow the instructions on the bottle to the letter. If you over do it, please go immediately to the hospital.
Me: How will I know if I've over done it?
Concerned Drugist: Trust me, you'll know.
She handed me the medicine bottle and asked me to read the instructions in her presence to ensure that I took her seriously. The directions were as follows:
"Take one pill with a glass of water every hour stopping at the onset of explosive diarrhea."
Me: Come on, did you really have to add the adjective "explosive?"
Adamant Drugist: Yes. This isn't a joke. Please don't deviate from the instructions.
To say I was freaked out would be an understatement. But the good news is that if I have any left over I could probably use them to clear a clogged drain or flush the fuel injection on my saturn. Like a good little soldier I started the regimen. Ten hours later, the pills were all gone, and my foot still hurt. I became very cavalier about the whole scary meds conversation, feeling that somehow that idiot pharmacist clearly couldn't fathom intestines as sturdy as mine.
The next day Amanda and I traveled to my parents house for a visit. You would think that staring down the barrel at "explosive" issues would encourage me not to travel more than twenty feet from the nearest potty. You would think. Our visit went well. I'm not sure what I showed off more, my new infant or the cantaloupe foot. Sometime around four in the afternoon, I began to realize that we may have a problem as a tummy tingle or two sent instant panic rushing down my spine. I graciously excused myself to my parents unsuspecting restroom and was truly humbled by the gravity of modern medicine for the following forty five minutes. My cavalier attitude was instantly erased and replaced by the fact that I was now an hour from home. By this point, an hour seemed like an eternity of "cleansing."
As wave one of the storm passed, I rushed Amanda out to our car, threw her the keys, and curled up in the fetal position in the passenger seat. She spent the next hour laughing hysterically and warning me to be proactive about my condition. If I felt the slightest of tingles she would hit the shoulder of the road and I would be remanded to "recuperate" on the side of the interstate.
Hopefully you are caught up on who Mark is, and why we didn't seem to see eye to eye. We were loud, party throwing neighbors who were seemingly unconcerned over the uniformity of our grass height. He was an anal retentive psychopath.
As we neared our neighborhood the tingle had turned in to a gastrointestinal tornado. Mark stood in his yard, horrified as the following scene played out in front of him. Showing no care to the safety of the kids of our neighborhood, Amanda flies down our street, barely breaking as she slides our honda into the driveway, mere inches from our garage door. As the car violently slams to a halt, I kick my door open and projectile vomit a good ten feet in to the yard. Nearly falling out of the car, I stumble across the driveway and slump against the wall until Amanda can unlock the door. His jaw rested ever so gently on his perfectly manicured lawn, mind racing at the crazy guy next door who is apparently fall down drunk on a Sunday afternoon. I never told him the real story. He wouldn't have believed me if I did.
Thanks to the healing powers of gatorade, I survived the next twelve hours or so and my foot slowly returned from Quasimodo-like proportions. Since then, my gout has never returned. Thankfully, I've never had to make the choice between medicine and peg leg again. Next time, peg leg will probably win by a nose. To this day, I still shutter when some fancy chef on the food network makes an omelet. Don't they know they're playing with peoples lives?
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