The pain could only be described as excruciating. Even taking a sip of water shot pain up her neck and straight into her ears, making her tear up. Her scabs scraped up against her uvula, causing her to choke and start coughing violently. The nausea pills that came with the original round of meds stayed untouched in their bottle until the moment where the pain was so bad she almost always felt like she was going to throw up.
It became far too much to bare. She couldn't function, and she couldn't take any more time off or she'd be unable to pay her rent the next month.
She felt weak, like an utter loser, but she called her doctor's office. The nurse took pity on her sob story and said she would give her a "few more days" of hydrocodone. At least it would help her to sleep. She'd have to muscle through the work days as best she could.
Then her period started.
After picking up far more than 3 days worth of meds, she went home and did all the laundry that had been piling up since her surgery. She made her bed, one of her favorite things to do to make her space feel clean again.
The laundry had taken longer than she expected, and it was late as she was heading to bed, already a little off from the medicine. Her toilet flushed, but as she was walking away she heard it bubble. Curious, as it never seemed to be an issue before. Everything looked okay, clean water in the bowl. But the bubbling made her nervous. She reached out and flushed again.
And it overflowed.
It kept going. It wasn't stopping. Her hazy mind panicked. She tossed everything on the floor into the nearby tub and pulled down her freshly washed towels onto the ground.
It kept coming. She became deathly afraid it would start to leak into the apartment below her. She ran.
"Be Back in 10 Minutes" That infernal sign was up in place of her false sense of security guard at the front desk. She looked all over the perimeter of the building, they were not out for a smoke break. She called SD and rambled about her Titanic-Situation until the security guard showed up.
She told him hurry, there wasn't much time, call whoever he needed to call to shut off the water. He calmly asked her if she owned or if she was a renter.
"THERE IS ABOUT TO BE A GODDAMN FLOOD IN MY APARTMENT REGARDLESS OF WHETHER OR NOT I RENT OR OWN!!!! ARE YOU GOING TO HELP?" She near-screamed at him.
"Maybe...call a plumber? If you are a renter we can't do anything without the owner's signing off on it. I'll call the building handyman and see what he says."
"That's great. Well it's about to be everyone's problem from my floor down if it doesn't stop, so you might want to help." She gave him her apartment number and ran back upstairs. SD said she would be on her way with towels.
The minimalist lifestyle was all fun and games until you try to clean up a mess with four towels.
She got back up to her apartment and left the front door open and slowly made her way around the corner. She was again grateful that her apartment tilted, as all the water had made a clean turn around to make a puddle under her bed. She moved the bed aside and exclaimed loudly at how much water had pooled around her floor.
She tried desperately to keep the water from going further. SD walked in, handed her the towels, saw the puddle and said "Ohhhh....ohhhh...I'll go get my mop."
Shortly after the doorman came and, with the instructions from the handyman to turn off the shutoff valve, even if it had already stopped on it's own. The doorman told her that the handyman would come around 7AM the next morning to take a look.
A half an hour later, every single absorbent fabric in her house was soaking wet and in her shower. She was shaking like a leaf because her medication had worn off and she was again in agony.
"Your voice sounds funny" SD told her. It sounded like she was losing her voice, again. She took a shot of her medicine, and 20 minutes later still didn't feel any relief.
She thanked SD a million times over, realizing in that moment that because she was so doped up she didn't think clearly about the situation at all. She would have been cleaning up slowly all night, going downstairs to the laundry room to dry her 4 towels and start all over again.
SD left, and she moved her bed back to the lower side of the room. She sat on her bed, in the most pain she'd been in in her life...and she started to cry. This was her breaking point.
"I'm just so fucking done with my entire existence right now. It's been such a rough recovery....hell such a rough year." She messaged a friend. "It's things like this that make me think I made a mistake. I should have stayed with my ex. Even if it was loveless and he basically took all my money...he never did anything vindictively. He would have been able to help me tonight. I wouldn't have had to call SD practically in the middle of the night. I'm a burden. I can't take care of myself."
"Stop it. You know that's not true." Her friend replied. "It'll be tough for a bit but you'll get the hang of this and find someone better for you."
She tired herself out with worry over her life and slept until her alarm went off.
The handyman didn't show up until she was getting ready to leave for work. She left them to do their work and told them the door would lock behind them when they left.
Walking to work she got a call from her doctor's office. They were billing her the entire surgery because they couldn't find her insurance.
"We've already danced this dance. Y'all almost canceled it because you couldn't find my insurance, and then you called me and said it was all good. The surgery center has it because they billed me and I paid them on the day. I'll give you the numbers again but I'm in the system."
She was sure she sounded plenty authoritative when her vocal range was still limited to "whiny Disney Princess." At least it matched her attitude about life in general these days.
