Self-Medication

Now that this situation is over, per se, I can talk about it. Something strange happened to my right arm after the fiber festival and I had no idea what was going on. First, the muscles in my upper and lower arm, as well as the elbow joint, began to hurt very badly. There were dull aches and at times, sharp, dagger-like pains. Then, I noticed a really large lump under the skin of my forearm. Initially, I thought I had bruised myself helping break down vendor set ups, but the bump kept getting larger and the pain, more intense.


I went to the doctor and had the lump examined. In a nutshell, she said it was either a non-cancerous lipoma (aka "mutant fat cell") or a lymphoma. An ultrasound showed it was a lipoma (whoo! and yay!) and now it was time to deal with the muscular/joint issues. I went to the orthopaedist yesterday and after the examination, he stated that I have tennis elbow.

"Do you play?" Dr. Henning asked.
"Dude, look at me. What the hell do you
think?" I thought.
"No, I knit...rabidly," I replied.
"Well, we'll take care of this right now."

And I was given a cortisone shot in the ligament. I hate shots. Have I ever told you that? I really, really loathe needles. My veins are hard to find and my record of IV attempts is 12 tries! I've spent the better part of my life trying to avoid shots. Ask me sometime about avoiding a series of shots in the Cote d'Ivoire/Ivory Coast Airport in Africa. There's a little man in a dirty lab coat there who thinks Bill Clinton and I are lovers.

One railroad spike later, I do feel better. My arm doesn't hurt nearly as much, but that could be the codeine talking at this point. Anyway, next time my elbow kicks up, I plan on self-medicating...Aspercream and vodka. Wanna join me?