Here But For the Grace of Aspirin.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QM5pPuFcJw0&w=320&h=180]

Whenever I venture out in public, I make it a habit to carry my bag with an aid kit and a 1.5 litre bottle of water, along with a host of expendables and other oddities. Within the aid kit is a good stock of bandages, antiseptic cream/wipes and a suture kit. Airway masks, wound pads for sucking chest wounds and saline tubes with the means to mainline it to someone in dire need of hydration. Assorted medicines such as paracetamol, ibuprofen and opiate-based analgesics. But one medicine I have used on more than one occasion to good effect is aspirin — something I never leave the house without. I’d do that as a matter of knowing that a stroke can strike anyone at any time. It doesn’t give two fucks if you’re in the middle of lunch or simply browsing your email at your work computer. It’ll hit you and you’ll have absolutely no way of hitting back. I’ve seen it strike down real fit cunts and lazy bastards alike whether young or old, which is why you have to respect an enemy that’ll tear down anyone it pleases, knowing fully that it can pick off who it likes at will.

I guess it doesn’t surprise me that I’d end up having a fuckin’ stroke. A small one at that, but a stroke nonetheless. Getting on the train I felt my entire right side grow limp. Usually if it’s anything to do with my lower leg I’ll discount it, but once I felt it creep up my arm and strangle me around my neck… I couldn’t pop that damn aspirin any quicker without opening a wormhole or some shit. That had to be the longest train journey of my life, and I’m thankful the carriage was empty so I could monitor myself on my own. It was a slow death march walking to the bus and getting to the hospital, but I got there eventually. Overnight stay, follow-up appointments scheduled and a host of other formalities organised — I only wanted out of the place, if for no other reason than to spare me the sight of concerned medical staff.

Fast forward two weeks and I still don’t feel recovered in the sense that I personally believe I won’t run the risk of either a repeated or much worse attack. My right arm is still fucked, as in I can’t feel the part between my elbow, which makes benching and push ups more psychedelic than they ought to be. My neck tightens up on the right from time to time, almost as if someone is trying to choke the life outta me. My heart doesn’t feel like it used to, that’s for sure. I s’pose the most concerning part is the headaches and associated trauma, which makes sense when you consider that a stroke is the result of a lack of blood reaching your brain. All these signs and symptoms… Well, to be honest I prayed to the flying spaghetti monster for a brain tumour, but the universe with its sick sense of humour gave me this instead. Ah well, I’ll make the most of it.

Think I’ll go out for breakfast tomorrow. Haven’t really been eating much lately, and need a decent feed if I’m gonna drag my sorry arse to the hospital. I know how my body operates and I do not feel good. Not so much the post stroke symptoms, but my head. I shouldn’t still be having headaches two months after they started. Bite the bullet and let them nuke my head so they can see what’s going on in there? Risky, but necessary I’m guessing. We’ll see.

I’m out of aspirin as it just so happens.