When One Thing Takes Over

You get diagnosed with a small bowel obstruction once, and in a millisecond, that’s all you become.

Not John, the retired engineer.
Not Molly, the retired second-grade teacher.

A small bowel obstruction.

Because now, at 70, that’s your life.

Gastroenterologist visits every few weeks.
Nephrologist once a month because your ankles are swollen.
Primary care every six months because your amlodipine got bumped to 10 mg after your blood pressure spiked.

A list of pills long enough that nobody reads it twice.

And two weeks ago, you got diagnosed with a small bowel obstruction.

So that’s what you talk about.

The obstruction.
The constipation.
The laxatives.

You press the call light five minutes after the nurse leaves.
Not because anything changed.
Because you need someone to stand there and listen to the same thing again. With care. With tenderness.

Because you realized– from the very first moment your PCP put you on a mix of antihypertensives– that this is how you get people to listen.

When there’s something wrong. When something hurts.

And you learned soon enough, that they’ll stop coming over once you’re fixed. And the attention stops. The knock on the door quietens.

Until the next diagnosis.

This time, it’s your kidneys. You didn’t really pay attention to the guy– I mean, if it’s not the heart, then it’s the lungs or the kidneys, and you’re tired of it.

Right. Except you’re not. Because now they have to keep you “for a few nights for observation”, you already know the drill–

Dilaudid at your fingertips.

A warm blanket at 2 AM.

“Is there something to eat?” at 11PM. “What?! What do you meant the kitchen is closed?! Not even a turkey sandwich?? What kind of place is this?”

‘I’m not a bad person,’ you tell yourself. ‘I’m just not feeling well and I’m very tired’, you tell your daughter on the phone.

But there’s a sick sense of satisfaction creeping in your chest watching the young nurse scramble for a turkey sandwich.

Or listening to the nurse manager in the white coat trying to find euphemisms to explain how the hospital kitchen operates–desperately avoiding ‘negative’ words in an attempt to appease you and get that much coveted patient satisfaction score.

And if by chance, some smart-ass nurse doesn’t fall for your stories, you call the patient liaison because– why not?

Nobody here takes your small bowel obstruction seriously!

And some guy in a business suit enters your room, nods his head sympathetically as you weave the 30-year story that started with the back pain and now has evolved into a small bowel obstruction and you really “just want to get better, you know?”

They know.

Oh… they know.
Every one knows.
Your daughter in California knows.
Your neighbor knows.
The nurse knows.
You know it.

But nobody says it out loud.

They know– you know– that this is what happens when nothing else is going on.

One thing takes over.
Then it fills the space.
Then it becomes the only thing you have.

It’s about a life that’s been reduced to maintenance.
Appointments.
Medications.
Monitoring.

Surviving, over and over, with nothing else layered on top.

So when the admission nurse asks you, “Have you traveled outside of the country in the past month?”

You begrudgingly shake your head. Because if this damn kidneys just worked, and this damn thing in my stomach just worked, and if I just took a some days off from the office 20 years ago, I would’ve been on that cruise.

You know damn well she wasn’t asking for pleasantries’ sake.

But you don’t care.

Because you know deep down, even if you deny it, that the time to travel has long passed. That ship has sailed, both figuratively and literally. The only thing that takes you one place to another is your motorized scooter.

Or the ambulance, if the couch at home is starting to feel too familiar.

And when they wheel you in the next time, and the doctor peers down his mask to ask you, “Mr. Smith, what is it this time?” without you even having to say your name, you sigh.

“I’ve been having this chest pain since last week….”

.

.

.

Sounds familiar?

Too familiar, if you ask me. Because in my 14 years of clinical experience, I’ve yet to hear a different pattern.

But lately, my life doesn’t look that different.

Work.
Sleep.
Teach.
Repeat.

Same conversations.
Same patterns.

Nothing technically wrong. Just… nothing expanding either.

I’m not sick.

And really, this isn’t about small bowel obstructions or illnesses. This happens to everybody. Remember your coworker with a 3-year old?

What was the last thing she talked to you about? Right, her son painting their kitchen red with a marker.

Or what about your other coworker who got engaged? Right, the night her fiance proposed 11 months ago.

And the secretary? What was that story she told you about her husband’s truck? Right, that they never got the chassis working or whatever so he brought it to a shop and the mechanic charged him a hundred dollars more so he’s gonna take it to the other shop.

I’ve seen how a life turns into one topic.
One loop.
One version of itself that just keeps replaying.

And if you stay long enough, that becomes your whole life.

Not because you chose it.

Because you didn’t stop it.

And I refuse to find out how that story ends.

Not if it means staying in a life stuck in a routine.

So I’m getting the hell out.