Monday marks a week since I opened my Yahoo! Mail to find the email from my doctor’s receptionist, kindly explaining how my doctor wouldn’t be able to assist me further with the results of the bacterial culture that had been processed by Peace Arch Hospital a few days earlier. Instead, he advised that I go to my local emergency room as they would be able to do any further tests required to make recommendations on a course of action for my foot’s latest malady. Specifically, three different bacterial infections were detected by the tests that were done, nesting in the second toe of my right foot, as follows: 1) Pseudomonas aeruginosa 3+; 2) Staph. pseudintermedius 3+; & 3) Enterobacter cloacae complex 2+. I made the mistake of googling one of them, & the results noted how: “Enterobacter infections are serious infections with a high mortality rate, even with appropriate treatment,” scaring the hell out of me. I’m on two different antibiotics intravenously, which I go for once a day, & I’m on a third high dose oral antibiotic, which I take twice a day. The medication knocks me out like nothing else before & will continue for six weeks right through the month of September.
Last month, a friend of mine said this when I expressed disappointment in not chatting with them more often, to which they replied: “…you always do that self pity thing you gotta stop doing that, not a good look.” It’s something that’s stuck with me. Between that & bombing my summer art history course because of the third leg infection that hit me mid-June & a request to have an extension on my final project for the semester was subsequently denied: both instances are examples of why I’ve avoided posting my daily selfies here. I was so excited to enrol in the fourth year open studio course this fall, I wanted to push my exploration of self-portraiture with two amazing professors but with a year of dealing with infections in my legs & feet, I fear finishing my degree is slipping further and further away. Not to fall back on the self pity thing but the heaviness in my chest is real, the feeling that I’ll breakdown in tears at any given moment, so asubstantial.
This was originally posted on Flickr and Instagram.
(230/365).