Soulparking

Saturday, 30 April 2005

Now my stomach was punched full of metal staples on the outside and stitches on the inside.    The recovery process was the most painful experience of my life – surpassing breaking both my arms and my two fusion neck surgeries. 

It was the details that made me think I was dying – coughing, sneezing, and peeing…  My staples were keeping my skin together – but whenever I had to cough (which was frequently) I had to hold my stomach and abdomen together with my hands and fingers to cushion the impact.  If not, it would pop me open – or it felt like it.  Standing up or getting up from a sitting position was the most painful – because I almost exclusively used my abdominal muscles.  The antibiotics that I was taking – were very, very strong and they would make my piss smell something horrible.  This primal musk scent would hit me and make me gag.   When I would sit on the toilet, I held my stomach together so my stomach would not spill out if I pushed too hard. 

So I was getting rid of shit but holding in guts.

I had shared the room with 3 other guys.  One guy had a motorcycle accident and the bike had fallen over on him and crushed his testicle.  So it had to be removed.

The other guy was a black guy working at Pick and Pay grocery store and while stocking shelves fell off a ladder and fell smack on his head and fractured his skull.  He had no medical insurance and he had never seen the inside of a hospital before.  His skull was so fructured half of his face was sideways.  They were going to have to rebreak his skull and set it right.  He was so scared.

He would say to us repeatedly, “It doesn’t look that bad, right?  I don’t need to be here right?”

And me and the one less testicle man would look at him and be reminded of the elephant man.  And we said it at the same time, “No man, you have to do it.  Its necessary. Don’t be scared.”

So that room became a group of support.  It was like we were a rugby team.  We encouraged each other about the little things.  When the testicle guy had to have his stitches removed from where his ball had once been.  Or when the black elephant man gave them permission to do the surgery.  Or when I had to crawl off my bed to piss or poop on my own.  Sitting up with stables in my belly – felt like at any time – my stomach, spleen, liver would all spill out on the floor.

But now I was alone. Trying to sleep in my own bed. Holding in my guts.