Cake or Death?

Ever since I was young, I've had it in my mind that I was going to die young.

Young, as in, I would never get to see my children grow up, go to college, get married.

Young enough that all the world would mourn my death and its tragicness for all the life that was wasted

and buried with me, along with a lock of my daughter's hair and my son's favorite stuffed animal.

Death would grow quiet and content inside me, a sneaking, painful disease that doctor's would only wring their hands over and look at each other in quiet, stealing glances, avoiding my eyes.

I resolved that if this should be the case, I wish to die in my own bed, in my husband's arms.

I have it all planned out, you see.

So you can imagine that when the symptoms actually begain 9 months ago, I was quick to dismiss them as nothing more than the overactive imaginings of a hypochondriacal mind.

I am my mother's daughter, I would remind myself.

But the discomfort in my abdomen that comes and goes, the sense of something being there that wasn't there before, resting beneath my ribs like a shadow playing hide and seek,

"Now it's there.

Now it's not,"

easy to ignore, easy to explain away...

well, it made the vision of an early death all too real.

So I decided to go in.

Urinalysis showed high levels of bilirubin in my urine and blood tests show my white blood count is low.

The Xray technician took a picture of my abdomen, and wasn't aiming higher up under my ribs where the Dr. needed to see, so those were useless.

The end result?

Perhaps the low WBC is genetic, so that's getting ignored.

There wasn't enough bilirubin to be of major concern, so that's also getting ignored.

She suspects that it could be gallbladder, based on some other minor symptoms

and in the end I walked away with a Rx for heartburn and constipation, scratching my head.

Constipation?

Is she serious?

I'm up to my eyes in fiber!

For god's sake, I've had black beans or broccoli, as an ingredient in my dinner for the last week!

Never mind that it is not possible to be constipated for 9 months straight, during which, I pointed out, I was and always have been quite regular.

And who get's "constipated" in one small spot under their left rib that is only uncomfortable when twisting or bending?

And really, even the word "uncomfortable" is a strong word. I just didn't know how else to describe it.

It's not painful, or even moderately annoying. It's just...a presense. Something my rib keeps hitting.

Is she trying to tell me my ribs are hitting poop??

To add to my confidence in her diagnosis, she says, "I'm thankful it wasn't anything more serious, but if those Rx don't work within a month, come back and we'll do an ultrasound right away."

So what you're saying is that you're willing to wait a month to find out if your wrong and it's something "more serious"?

Clearly, I was not satisfied with that, and didn't even bother filling the prescriptions.

Dr. Google here goes home to look for a new prognosis,

only to discover that I have stage 4 pancreatic cancer.

Why, God, does the internet have to be so comprehensive, thorough, and allow information to be so...accessible?

I have now banned myself from opening any new web browsers and am only allowing myself on Hotmail, CNN, and Facebook and am consoling myself with the devil of all constipaters...

BREAD! or to be more specific: Cupcakes.

And now I realize, I have answered one of life's deepest questions:

"Cake or Death?"

 I CHOOSE CAKE, PLEASE!!