Seeing Someone Else

I have always thought that a good friend and a good laugh can get you through anything. That has never been more true than the time I spent with my friend Megan. Three of the most ridiculously funny things happened when we were roommates in Providence (almost as funny as the week I lost any kind of control over my bladder, but that's a story for another day). I will forever be in her debt for keeping me in my best humors during some very black times.

Megan and I met while we were both working for City Year, just after college. City Year is an AmeriCorps program that runs after school programs for under-served schools and communities. Their logo is red, yellow and black. This will be important later in the story.

One afternoon we were working in the office, and Megan asked me what was wrong (apparently I looked funny). I told her that I was having chest pain. It went kind of like this:

Megan: You look bad. Are you okay?
Me: I'm fine.
Megan: No really, what's wrong?
Me: I'm having some chest pain.
Megan: What kind of chest pain.
Me: You know, just regular chest pain. My arm kind of hurts too.
Megan: Which arm?
Me: My left one.
Megan: HAVE YOU NEVER WATCHED A PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT?!?!? WE HAVE TO GO TO THE HOSPITAL!!
Me: I'm fine. I don't want to go to the hospital.
Megan: I'm not going to sit here while you die. We'd never get your body down the stairs without having to nudge you over the edge and letting you roll. And that's just undignified.
Me: Fine.

So, we go to the hospital. My chest pain gets worse. And then I can't catch my breath. And we are in the Emergency Room of Rhode Island Hospital, which is full of gun shot victims and crazy people, and that's about all I remember, because soon after I was taken into triage, I blacked out. I remember coming to briefly, and a nurse yelling at me to calm down (which I didn't really think was calming), and then blacking out again.

What was, apparently, hours later, I woke up and eventually Megan came into my room. She looked really drawn, and I asked her what was wrong. It went sort of like this:

Me: What's wrong with you? I'm not dead.
Megan: Well, David (our boss) is here with Mark (another boss).
Me: Why?
Megan: They're worried about you.
Me: Tell them to go away.
Megan: I can't really. I just wanted to prepare you.
Me: Prepare me? For what?
Megan: You'll see.

Well, we walked out into the waiting room together, and nothing could have prepared me for what I saw. Two grown men, huddled together in the middle of a bustling room full of grieving and sick people, with a giant bouquet of black balloons. Apparently, black was the only color left after the last City Year event. It was made funnier by the fact that they didn't really notice how shockingly and wonderfully inappropriate their death balloons were.

The second incident was a 3 am visit to the Miriam Hospital emergency room with chest pain.

I was laying on the exam table waiting for a doctor and trying not to die. Megan just returned from procuring delicious peanut butter and jelly sandwiches (I'm pretty sure she bribed someone), and looked over my head and started laughing. You know how there are things medical professionals use to look in your ears and eyes mounted on the wall in hospitals? Well, this wall had the SUCKUTRON 3000. I can't really repeat what jokes transpired, but needless to say, we were hysterical puddles on the floor by the time the doctor came in.

And the third incident was the look on Megan's face when she saw the size of the needle for my lumbar puncture. We decided then that she shouldn't play poker.

It amazes me how steadfast and good humored she stayed, even when I was crawling on the floor to go from the couch to the bathroom, because I couldn't walk. Even when I thought that I might just be crazy. Even when I lost the ability to talk. Even when I wanted to die, she always made me smile.

I think the cycle of crashing and getting well is one I probably would have stayed in forever, as I'm sure do many undiagnosed or misdiagnosed people, except that my mother has the world's most annoying habit.

It used to bother me, to no end, that my mother would talk to complete strangers about the intimate details of my life. One day my mom called to say that she had been talking to the receptionist at her vet clinic about me (Mo-om! Stop talking about me to strangers! Geeeeeez!). It turns out that the receptionist's sisters ex-boyfriend's aunt's gardener -- alright, not quite, but it seemed that way -- goes to a Doctor in New York City.

Mom: She thinks you have Lyme Disease.
Me: Uh huh.
Mom: You should go see this Doctor.
Me: Uh huh.
Mom: Well, he can help figure out what is wrong with you, even if it's not lyme.
Me: uh huh.
Mom: Just do it.
Me: Uh huh.
Mom: ALESSANDRA!
Me: Fi-ine.

So, I called. And that's the beginning of how Dr. R. saved my life, and how I lost it again.