Sigh…
Today. has been. a day.
Got some gass for $3.33 which was a steal from a Hess gas station.
I went my Sankofa conference. It was good! I ended up doing the ReAfrikanization track just because they required all first timers to, but I didn’t mind. I also got a nice bag and a really cute wrap dress made of mud cloth. I didn’t necessarily learn anything new though as I only attended a plenary session and one workshop because…
Do you ever get a sharp pain in your chest when you breathe in quickly? Well I noticed that has been happening since Wednesday and it hasn’t stopped. In fact, the pain got a little more intense as the days have gone by.
So…as I was at the conference the pain got progressively worse. I left and as I gingerly walked to my car, I called my sister (the pediatrician) to get a diagnosis. She said to get some Motrin (remember this for later) for the pain and go to the Urgent Care center.
I got the Motrin and thought I’d skip the urgent care place…since I felt a little better. I went to lie on the couch and read through my conference journal and the pain came back like times 1000! I thought I was having a heart attack!
I called the urgent care place and they said they’d close at 5:00…it was 4:30.
Luckily they are literally 1.5 miles from my apartment so I made my way to the car (that took 15 minutes in itself) and started driving over there…
And wonder of wonders…guess happened on my way there…
Of course.
The car broke down.
Once again, sitting at a light and it shuts off.
By this time I’m seriously thinking my chest hurts, I have no way of getting to the doctor, I’m in the middle of traffic, and the closest person I know is 10 hours away.
Called father. He’s telling me to try all these things and lift heavy stuff to get the car to work. When it didn’t I called the tow people, got out the car and waited for them to come.
Meanwhile, in 20 minutes, I counted 123 cars that passed by and did nothing to help.
The 124th person did stop to ask if I was okay, (they were Black) and then after that, three or four more Black cars stopped…and a white lady.
They all moved along though when I told them a tow truck was on the way.
THEN comes a police car…he comes over and the first thing he asks is my age. How about, someone had called and said a 10-12 year old girl is on the side of the road by herself and she looks like she’s crying.
Apparently they missed my car with the hood up and the emergency lights on in the middle of the street somehow…
I told the po po the situation and he insisted that he call an ambulance to check me out. I was like…I really don’t want to make a big deal out of it…
He promised they wouldn’t put the lights on or anything.
They came…checked me out…I had low blood sugar and my blood wasn’t flowing right to get samples so they hooked me up to an IV…
Meanwhile the tow guy comes and takes my car away…
They take me to the hospital…give me some feel good medicine, run more tests, take a few x-rays.
I’m pretty much okay. Have something generally called “Chest Wall Pain.” Somehow I strained a muscle in my chest and it got a little inflamed hence the pain.
They gave me…remember what my sister said? Motrin right? Well that’s what they gave me, but the 600mg version. I was like…well I could have stayed at home for this!
Since I don’t know nobody here, I got a cab ride home. Driver was trying to holler. I was like dude…I just got out of the hospital. I could be diseased.
Got home…my phone finally processed the 732 voice mails and 32 text messages from my parents that I didn’t get in the ER due to all the machines…they were mostly from my mother.
The End.
Lessons…
I REALLLY need to find some people to at least be partially cool with. If something really was wrong, the closest person I know really is in Atlanta and that’s 10 hours away by car and 2 by plane.
F my father’s “cars.”
Beware of Hess gas…just in case that was the problem.
Dictated and read,
KaNisa
