Spiraling

I’m a baby when it comes to not feeling well.

If I have the sniffles, I will break down like at the end of Saving Private Ryan and cry out to whoever is near, “Tell me I’ve led a good life. Tell me I’m a good man.”

The sniffles. A sickness that hasn’t been deadly since before humans invented toilet paper.

I’m a fucking baby.

I would take a reassuring word from anyone during those moments. If I was in a Wal-Mart dumper in Tucson, Arizona and having an episode, I would want to believe the guy waiting to use the stall would at least give me a firm “you got this buddy” look when I walked out.

Add a bro hug to that and I’m on cloud nine.

Now that I’m dealing with something far more dangerous than the sniffles, I’m doing my all to not be the most insufferable person anyone has ever dealt with, but shit this is tough.

While undergoing chemo, I’m also fighting off the stubborn remnants of the awful pneumonia I contracted.

Like that friend who stays too long after a party when everyone else has already gone home and you’ve just uttered your fifth “it was great to see you” the chemo side effects are just sitting there on my recliner not taking a hint, way overstaying their welcome, mumbling the names of all the guitarists The Red Hot Chili Peppers have had.

The big bad side effect of the pneumonia for me is the coughing.

The coughing fits are fucking hell.

That shit hits me… with no warning. And I mean HITS!

Sometimes, the coughing fits can be merciful and leave me as fast as they showed up, but for the most part the coughing fits last seemingly, oh I don’t know between around thirty seconds to forever.

The fits seem to go on even longer than the In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida drum solo and that was I think, at least forty-five minutes!

The most difficult part is the second the long coughing fits hit, the spiraling begins.

My chest sinks and constricts, my oxygen level drops and I feel like I am one hundred percent about to die.

Hell yes! As if the physical trauma wasn’t enough, let’s toss some mental health spiraling into that gumbo of misery.

It gets to the point where I’m certain I would be relieved if the coughing fit ended with an Alien bursting from my chest.

I’ve long since lost count of the number of coughing episodes. This Substack is a testament to the fact that I’ve survived every damn one of them. But even with all that evidence I still think it’s the end. I feel like Fred Sanford, “You hear that, Elizabeth? This is the one. I’m coming to join you!”

The spiraling is real and awful and something I wish I could self lobotomize.

I’ve never had asthma, but now, after talking to friends and family who do, they tell me that’s exactly how an awful asthma attack feels.

My heart goes out to all those who suffer from asthma!

I had no idea it was that bad.

Then, when it seems the spiraling can get no worse, the panic really begins.

My anxiety floods in like it’s channeling not only the Cleveland and Texas baseball players on the field, but also all the blitzed Cleveland fans storming the field during the 1974 Ten Cent Beer Night Riot.

I’ve never dealt with significant anxiety until this illness, (at least I don’t think I ever have) but now, after being written off by an entire staff of doctors, (as you may have read in my previous post) I carry a lot of anxiety about my health.

My heart goes out to all those who suffer from anxiety!

Asthma attacks.

Panic attacks.

Like butt-stuff and attending college, two things I knew would never be for me, and yet here they are blitzing my soul several times a day.

I was never rude to anyone with anxiety or asthma. Ever! So why the fuck am I having these ghosts visit me like I’m the Ebenezer Scrooge of that shit?

Each time the spiraling happens, I come out of it sad, ashamed, pissed off and bummed out.

Sad and ashamed of how weak I feel.

Pissed off that I let hopeless feelings take over. Bummed out knowing the shit will happen again.

What makes the coughing fits even worse is that for as long as I can remember, I’ve had issues where I swallow down the wrong pipe.

Mercifully, it has only happened twice since the pneumonia shit started and both times, my oh my, that “I’m gonna die” spiral not only happened, but it tagged in a partner, and they spike piledrove me into a seventh-level-of-hell panic attack.

Again, at least it’s only happened twice during all this, but once was more than enough.

My mother and grandmother both had the same issue. I figured that “swallow down the wrong pipe” shit must have been bad luck hereditary issues.

Nope, not at all.

Heart disease is hereditary. My mother, grandmother and I were just fucking animals who had no idea how to slow it the fuck down when eating.

I loved the Hungry Hungry Hippos board game as a child, so I must have decided then, that was how I was going to consume food till the very end.

You’d think with my fucking life on the line, I would not try and eat a sandwich like it was the last one I needed to down before I would pass Joey Chestnutt.

No matter how bad or dire, I need to learn to fight off the spiraling.

Maybe I just need to accept that it will happen. Maybe that will put me in a better place when I’m in the middle of it.

It’s okay to accept that some things scare the shit out of me and always will.

If something traumatic is happening, it’s probably normal to feel the trauma. I’m hoping that at least accepting that feeling will help calm it down.

Why bullshit myself anymore, thinking that showing some bullshit air of machismo is important at all?

I ain’t trying to impress anybody.

I still get through the roof excited when my buddy Eddie comes to visit and has a brand new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle or Wolverine action figure for me.

I am, no question, at the show-up-to-a-formal-event-in-sweatpants-level of not trying to impress anybody.

I already have a wonderful life partner in Andrea. She stuck with a guy who not only cries during movies but also during fucking movie trailers, (I got choked up watching the Seabiscuit trailer when it ends with Tobey Maguire tells the horse, “Don’t stop boy! Don’t ever stop!” And I could give less than two fucks about horse racing.) She stuck with a guy who needed help changing his ostomy bag. (There was a time when I needed an ostomy bag for several months) After all that I’m pretty sure I got the gig.

I don’t think after all that she’d be like, “I was okay with him crying at the last Final Destination movie we saw and him shitting out of a hole in his torso for nine months, but come on, him thinking he was going to die when he had a lot of trouble breathing was the last straw.”

In fact, what she does during the spiral is hold my hand, remind me that I’m still here, that it will soon be okay and before I know it, I’ve calmed down a bit and I’m feeling better.

I just need to work on getting to the calmed down phase a touch sooner.

I just need to remind myself that I chose to fight this horrific disease.

Speaking of fighting and me crying at movies, something that will always choke me up is the scene at the end of Creed when Rocky tells Adonis about referencing his cancer, “I’m gonna fight this thing, but if I fight, I want you to fight too. I want you to go across this ring and knock that son of a bitch down.” Adonis promises Rocky he will do just that, then the OG Rocky fanfare music plays and tears are streaming down my face.

Every. Single. Time.

I love it, too.

I remember jumping out of my seat crying and cheering during that moment when I saw Creed on opening night.

I tell you, maybe the only other time that has ever happened to me was Keifer Sutherland yelling, “Billy! Let’s finish the game!” in Young Guns II, easily the best Western ever made.

Okay maybe also during Captain Chaos’ first appearance in Cannonball Run.

Fine! Also, every Jerry Reed moment in Smokey and The Bandit 3.

That scene in Creed though, it has legit inspired me to fight my cancer. I watched that scene a few times on the night of Christmas Eve when I was finally home from the hospital.

I wept each time. And each time I told myself with steely determination, “I am here to fight this.”

It’s very rare to go through any fight without taking some punches.

That’s what these coughing fits are.

They are punches being thrown at me.

Sometimes they are severe, Ernie Shavers level punches, but I’m still here.

I’m hoping that instead of spiraling when they come, I can now, instead, roll with them, Steve Winwood style.

So, I take back that part about wanting to lobotomize that part of my brain that spirals.

I’ll try something different. I’ll treat my emotions like a set of gears I can shift in and out of, a less messy and inexpensive lobotomy.

I can’t be The Fonz during every situation.

Shit, I’m not The Fonz about any situation, except maybe for being able to transform any of the generation one Dinobot Transformers figures really fast.

Yeah, I deserve an office in a bathroom stall for that.

Just make sure to give me a “you got this buddy” look if you ever see me spiral!

Thank you so much for reading this and hope you come back!

Tip Jar (if you wanna)

I Need to Get Out More, but It’s Physically Kinda Rough Soooooo…

VIDEO GAMES:

Metroid Prime 4 Beyond is fucking dope. I don’t get the shit being tossed at this game. I’m almost done and it’s been fun. I love riding around on that fucking bike and having loved the first two Prime games (I somehow missed out on the third one) stepping back into that kick ass style is just fine. When I’m done with that, I’m diving into Outer Worlds 2 and the Ghost of Yotei. I’ll be happy to give you my months after the fact review of them one day.

BOOKS:

Only God Can Judge Me: The Many Lives of Tupac Shakur by Jeff Pearlman

I finished this book well over a month ago and I can’t stop thinking about it. It’s a beautiful, tragic, enraging, fascinating , eye-opening biography of one the great music artists of our time. Well worth your time. Even if you believe that Lawrence Welk was the peak of “Thug Life” musically, it’s still a wonderful read.

MUSIC:

Sir Victor Uwaifo Guitar Boy Superstar 1970-76

A fucking KILLER collection of tunes from a Nigerian Renaissance Man/Music God. There is not a bad track on this. All great stuff. I mean it!