Just so no one thinks I'm still deaf

After getting to work n Monday and realizing it was going to be impossible to function, I went to my doctor, who looked in my ear, freaked out, and refused to touch it. Let alone the other one. Good use of a $15 copay. She then made me an appointment for later that afternoon with an ENT (also known as an Otolaryngologist - fucking great word) further uptown (but thankfully still on the West Side) so I went back to work for a couple hours, where I continued to convince myself that I was going to be deaf for the rest of my life. And made up obscene sign language with my friends.

So I get to the ENT, do the prerequisite waiting, and finally see the doctor. Who still talks too fast to really hear, which I don't understand, because this is her job, right? And she should be compassionate to my deafness? Either way, she gets the gist of what's going on and busts out what is essentially a vacuum cleaner, with a really small tube. Guess where that goes. Let the healing begin! Or sucking? Sucking. It was loud, and took a while (look, there was a lot of gunk, ok?), and let me tell you, when pointy metal things touch the inside of your ear further down than a q-tip could ever dream of going, it HURTS. So, of course, I tear up because I am a pussy, and the doctor freaks and stops. And I'm like, please finish this, and she's like no, I was just being extra thorough, and we basically go around in circles and she won't finish the job, but tells me it's basically done anyway. And then she starts inquisiting me about my nose, being all like 'are you stuffy? You sound congested' to which I think, 'duh, bitch, you just made me cry!' But I shouldn't be mean, she was actually really awesome and I can hear now. Anyway, she decides she needs to look around my nose, so spritzes this stuff up it and goes in with a camera. Now THIS freaks me out and makes me flash back to that time when I was like 4 and an ENT stuck a camera up my nose and all the way down my throat. Good thing I had already been crying, because there was no way this was happening easily. But it was actually relatively quick, despite the trauma, and I learned that I have a deviated septum. Which is really just such a shame. A Jewish girl, with a LEGIT deviated septum, who loves her nose. What are the odds, people!??!?



PS the new computer (specifically it's backlit keyboard, is AWESOME for posting at the asscrack of dawn when it's too dark to see in here.

Call me Helen Keller

My first blog with my new computer, and I know that usually this would mean ridiculousness abounding, but really, we have an issue.

Basically, I (finally) made it up to my dad's summer rental house this weekend, in Sharon, Connecticut, and got my ass into a pool for the first time this summer. I think I seriously made up for lost time. In the 22 hours we were there, I mut have spent at least 6 of those in the pool. Maybe more. The pool was up hill from the house itself, nestled in among trees and all you can hear are crickets, it's just delightful. However, I had an unexpected side effect from all this swimming. I appear to have gotten a serious amount of water in my right ear, and a less serious amount in my left. Essentially, I have been completely deaf in my right ear since I woke up yesterday morning. The left ear seems to come and go. I woke up this morning and everything was completely silent, which was really strange, until I played with my ear for a few minutes and got some sound back in the right one. Add this to the fact that I am useless without glasses on and it was pitch black in the apartment, it was all a very odd expereince, hence the name of the post.

So now I have to figure out how to deal with this. I've tried closing every facial orafice and blowing, but got nothing (just as well, I had visions of earwax spraying out of my ear. gross). I tried sneezing while holding my nose and mouth closed several times, eardrops do nothing for me, just make everything even more gooey in there, which really is unnecessary, and q-tips are BAD, even though quite gratifying. Which isn't to say I haven't tried it. I know that the best way to deal with this would probably be to go to a doctor and have them flushed out, but I had a really traumatizing expereince with this process. My first year at Smith I had an earache and went to Health Services, presuming that they were just going to give me some sort of prescription for something to make the ache go away. I should be so lucky. The nurse on duty tells me "oh, this is noear infection, your ears are completely blocked. We'll clean them out for you" She made this sound like a great idea, a simple process, nothing that wouldn't be done in 15 minutes. Ohhh no. I had to lie on my side, with nothing to do, for half an hour, with hydrogen peroxide bubbling in my ear. Do you know how wierd (read: ticklish) a sensation that is? Essentially, you don't need to waterboard people at Gitmo, just tie their hands up and put hydrogen peroxide in their ears. They'll be talking in under a minute. Guaranteed. Anyway, after half an hour of this unique senstation, it came time to clean out my first year. There's a syringe and warm water invovled; basically the just flush everything out. So the nurse starts, and everything's normal, until I feel something large moving around and hear the nurse make sounds of disgust and neausea. She tells me she got it all out, but she was definitely ready to get the hell out of that roof and barf. Lucky her! She got to do it again! More peroxide torture, and even more gunk and nurse neausea. But. I could hear. Unlike now. Which is why I should probably do it again. But this would mean getting to the doctor with an hour and a half to kill, which, with my busy schedule, just is not happening. And, while it was EXTREMELY gratifying (if somewhat humiliating) to gross out a medical professional, I'm not sure the chemical bubble torture was really worth it. So, I am feeling like perhaps going new age-y, and getting my ears candled tonight when I go and get a pedicure. Unless anyone can tell me why I shouldn't, that is.

This is all very discouncerting and uncomfortable and I don't really like not being able to hear a damned thing anyone is saying, and I want it to go away, stat. I just don't really know how to deal with it from here.

But, in fun news, while looking for the photo at the top of this post, I learned that Helen Keller grew up to be a socialist suffragist. Which is awesome in a normal woman, but add being deafblind into that mix, and that makes Helen Keller even more awesome than I realized! The title of this post is a link to her Wikipedia page, so feel free to click on that and learn more about my new favorite badass. Helen Freakin' Keller.


Ugh, POSTSCRIPT - I just took a shower, and now I can't hear anything out of my right ear, either. On a more permanant basis than before. Wish me luck getting through my phone-reliant shift on the research desk today. Not cool.