Happy Anniversary. Here's some vomit.
Monday was the two year anniversary of Rod's and my first date. So, I celebrated it by nearly dying.
Or at least it felt like it.
I've been taking medication for my epilepsy for an age. I take five orange pills (100mg each) twice a day. It's pretty much the maximum dosage I should be on - still makes me a bit dizzy in the mid-afternoons unless I eat a big lunch. Even 25 mg more tends to make me woozy. Recently my doctor asked me if she could prescribe pills of a higher dosage (so I wouldn't have to take ten a day) and I said, sure, why not? So Monday, Rod and I were trying to get out of the house quickly and I grabbed the pill bottle with the blue 200mg pills in it and downed 5 of them. Twice what I usually take. I was running on autopilot and just didn't think. On top of that, I didn't have breakfast and had just had a granola bar for lunch.
It was pouring out on Monday - Rod called it the kind of heavy driving rain that they have in horror movies to set the tone. We were on the highway and I just kept getting dizzier and dizzier. I was looking ahead and it seemed like there were three cars, one in each lane ahead. There were not. There was one. Thankfully, I wasn't the one driving.
I kept getting hazier. My face was hot and I couldn't look through the windows. It hadn't registered yet what I had done. I knew that what I was experiencing was much worse than it usually was but couldn't grasp why.
Rod dropped me off at the store and went to park. We had come to Jordan's Furniture to buy a kitchenette set. Jordan's is a very odd place. Picture a furniture store... now picture Bourbon Street in New Orleans, an IMAX Theatre, a BOSE audio center, and a family-style restaurant. Put those together and you have Jordan's. It's a bizarre place, and even weirder if you are completely drugged up. I got out of the car. listed to one side, and walked into a column in front of the building. I shook my head and aimed for the door. I managed to get inside - I still have no idea how I managed that, in that they have one of those giant revolving doors. I got in and wedged myself between a sign and a fake column, leaning up against the wall. There were people all around and it seemed like I was seeing lots more than could reasonably be there.
By the time Rod came in, apparently there was no iris to my eye, it was just all pupil. I told him that I needed to sit down but couldn't really move. Rod assured me that since we were in a furniture store, there would be places to sit. My stomach had started churning at that point and I felt like I needed to put some food in it to make things better, to balance the drugs, so we went into the family restaurant, and I was immediately hit by a wave of scent - the place was largely seafood. All I could smell was fried clams. My body immediately went into an allergic reaction - this doesn't usually happen unless I've actually eaten something but I guess my system was just shutting down. Rod led me across to a couch and I could feel my tongue getting thicker in my mouth.
I told Rod that I needed ginger ale. He went off, came back and told me he could get water or iced tea from a vending machine. Then he went off again and brought back some water. In the meantime, I was going south. I felt like I needed to vomit, my eyes were crossing, I was practically falling off of the monumentally ugly salute-to-NASCAR sofa. It was then that I figured out what I had done with regard to the pills and I got very, very scared. Rod came back with water and I sent him away again to find the bathrooms. I'm not sure if he knew just how bad things were, but I felt like I was holding on by a thread. I had a sudden realization that if I fell asleep, I really didn't know if I was coming out of it. I couldn't stand up, I couldn't walk, it was getting so I couldn't see more than four feet in front of me; everything else was a complete haze.
When Rod came back again, I was barely able to complete a sentence. I told him I needed to leave and that I needed help. Rod has since informed me that I attempted repeatedly to apologize for being unable to look at dinette sets. We got halfway to the door of the place and I realized there was no way I was going to make it to the car without vomiting. He practically carried me to the ladies room and I stumbled in with my hand over my mouth - there was a line, but I think I waved at them and got out as best as I could, "I'm going to need to cut the line." Thankfully, they let me.
I barely made it in there before I started vomiting. And once I started, I couldn't stop. My body was just trying to get rid of the medication but by that time I was unable to get rid of all of it. I sat on the bathroom floor for about what seemed like forever, vomiting and then holding myself up by pure willpower. Essentially, I forced my body to pump its own stomach.
I got out of the bathroom holding onto walls. Rod went and got the car while I clung to one of the columns outside. I got in the back
seat and passed out almost immediately. Thankfully, at that point I had gotten enough out of my system to sleep rather than really lose consciousness. I got home, slept again for about four hours. I was not in good shape. I was slightly dizzy for most of Tuesday as well. It was not a good day. Yay for vomiting!
Feh. Stupid epilepsy.
Feh. Stupid Joy for not paying more attention.
(Hit more. G'ahead. Hit it.)
This, by the way, is what a monumentally ugly salute-to-NASCAR couch looks like.
And just think, it's only $1998!
