RIP Marla. I hardly knew ya.

So last week I had a bellyache for a few days. Not too bad. It started on Sunday and I took the ferry to Victoria on Monday morning, went to work Monday and Tuesday. Went out to dinner. The usual. I mean, sure, there was a relentless, throbbing pain in my gut that kept me up all night and wouldn’t subside no matter how much Advil I pounded but, you know, other than that I felt okay.

Still, on Wednesday I thought maybe I should hit the clinic, just in case. I saw the doctor right away and he poked around and ruled some things out (my wife was def relieved to hear I’m not pregnant). Then he said, if it walks like appendicitis, and talks like appendicitis, we treat it like appendicitis, and sent me to emerg. The doctor in emerg said basically the same thing. So in very short order they took blood and sent me for a CT scan, and I started planning a funny blog post about detonating hot organs.

Some observations:

1. Suspected appendicitis is almost as good as trouble breathing as far as getting priority in emerg goes. Apparently, if one of your organs looks like it’s trying to explode and kill you, they try to deal with that right way.
2. Nevertheless, there will be some waiting and the waiting room in emerg in October is cold AF. If you have to go to there, wear a big, warm sweater that will fit over the backless gown because…
3. When they say they’re giving you a blanket to wrap up in while you wait, it’s a trick. They’re going to call a “sheet” a “blanket” but, trust me, it’s not a blanket, and you’ll see right through them (and it).
4. When you have the classic presentation of appendicitis, and then you don’t have appendicitis, this will be a surprise.

The doctor was all “good news, you don’t have appendicitis. It’s a large, degenerating uterine fibroid.” And I was like okaaayyy, because it was, frankly, a little disappointing. It still hurt like hell but instead of a blog post about exploding organs (which is an awesome first blog post after nearly a year of ignoring your blog and, let’s face it, writes itself) I was stuck with a common gynecological condition that was only noteworthy because it was angrily resolving itself. That’s not funny.

Or is it?

More observations:

1. If you mention that your degenerating uterine fibroid has a liquid centre, or better yet, refer to it as a liquefying tumour, people will snicker and grimace.
2. If you describe the size of your liquefying tumour using fruit (say, an apple. Yes, you heard me, the doctor said it was the size of AN APPLE), people will snicker, grimace and be impressed.
3. If you name your cantaloupe-sized, liquefying tumour Marla in a nod to Fight Club, people will laugh out loud no matter how many times you bring it up, and you don’t have to do the dishes.

After a week of taking drugs and not doing the dishes, watermelon-sized Marla’s shrunk down to (I’m ballparking here) something like cumquat. At least, I’m no longer aware of her presence in any way and I feel like that’s working out for both of us. Do I miss her? No. Did I learn a valuable life lesson from her? Also no. But I did break my blog fast with her, and bring benign gynecological tumour humour to the people, and that’s something.