Fed up

I’m so over feeling like this. From the constant dull throb in my head to the raw feeling in my anus, having diarrhea that causes you to soil your underwear with alarming regularity is not a fun way to spend a Sunday night, or a Monday morning.

This has been happening a lot lately and I’m yet to pinpoint a reason. My kidneys are failing so that certainly has a lot to do with it, but there’s definitely something I’m doing–or more likely eating–that’s triggering these episodes.

Aside from the diarrhea I also feel on the cusp of vomiting. When I burp it tastes like I have recently thrown up, and I have the metallic taste in my throat that usually precedes a violent regurgitation (I think that’s adrenalin). And yet no actual regurgitation happens.

It’s 8am, I’m almost out of clean underwear, and even doubling up on the underwear hasn’t saved my bedsheets from recording my failures to get to the bathroom overnight. Frankly, I’m a mess.

It was supposed to be such a good day. I’ve got a new colleague starting at work today. Finally someone to take on some of my responsibilities, to lighten the load a bit. But I’m not there to make him feel welcome and to start training him because I can’t spend more than about twenty minutes away from a toilet, and the prospect of not being able to control my bowels at the office does not appeal in the slightest, especially when what comes out is almost pure liquid so would definitely soak through whatever layers I decide to wear.

So instead I lie here in my bed on fresh sheets listening to the washing machine spin while trying to read the signals coming from various parts of my body so I can avoid creating a need to wash even more of my clothes and sheets. It’s exhausting!

And while I lie here I’m ranting to anyone who’ll listen about how unfair my life is and how I just want to have a normal week for once. A week where I don’t need to work from home at all. A week where I don’t feel like I’m letting my colleagues down and where I don’t feel like the leper of the company.

Just one week where my primary concern is more than getting from one hour to the next without completely falling apart. Just one week, please.

My therapy appointment finally came through after a few weeks on the waiting list. This Wednesday at 10am I will sit down with someone professionally trained to look deep into my psyche and help me figure out why the hell I think the way I do, and more particularly why I view myself the way I do.

It’s a terrifying prospect to be hoping that some stranger will be able to identify and fix whatever went horribly wrong with the way your brain developed. To be quietly wishing that it’s something relatively simple while also hoping it’s not, because if it’s simple why did you need help to fix it?

But more terrifying is that they won’t know. What if I’m broken at such a fundamental level that no amount of talking, medicating, or wattage can help?

My batteries are already leaking corrosive fluid; how long before the damage is permanent? Is it already too late?

Stay tuned for more on this story as it unfolds. For now I’m going to fold myself up into the smallest ball I can and try to ignore reality for as long as possible.