Intolerable
If there was a time in my life when I didn’t get migraines, I don’t remember it. My neurologist says if I don’t grow out of them by twenty-three I’ll suffer forever. I only have five years left. I should probably drink some water, right?
Take some Aspirin maybe? Or Excedrin. That’s made for headaches. Actually what’s better than Excedrin is Naproxen. That lasts longer. But Advil is really what I want. That works faster. You know what, forget all the medicine.
I should just take a nap. Then when I wake up from my nap with my little migraine I’ll listen to some Mozart. Well, I probably shouldn’t listen to Mozart – too heavy on the low brass. Beethoven is who I want. He’s the sonata guy. But who I should really listen to is Michael Buble’. His rendition of Georgia on my Mind is the most relaxing song ever.
You know what I’ve heard works the best, though? Really the best thing for migraines is fresh air. But most people say I should just go to my happy place. I’ve heard all the studies show I could totally avoid migraines altogether as long as I stay away from chocolate, nuts, cheddar cheese, beer, red wine, caffeine, Chinese Food, oranges, grapefruits, lemons, limes, and lunch meat.
“Margy, let me show you how to use this thing.” My mom briefly knocks on my bedroom door before letting herself in. She has a bizarre container in her hand. It’s gray, with a blue dot and stripe across the front. My automatic shot has finally come in.
“Do you have a migraine now?” Mom asks.
“I just took something.”
“Okay look.” Mom reads the instruction booklet. “You open the container.” She says as she presses the blue dot and the top pops open. Intimidating. “Then you open one of these flap things.”
“Flap things…”
“I don’t know what to call them, Margy. Just let me show you how this works.”
“I’m going to school,” I say because this could last all day. I take my shot from my mom and hide it in my backpack along with countless pills and concoctions.
“Fine. I guess I’ll show you tomorrow. Try to have a good day.”
“I’ll try.” I start to leave and sling my backpack over my shoulder.
“And don’t forget to give the nurse that note from your doctor so they don’t think you’re a drug addict.”
“But I am a drug addict, Mom.”
“But you’re a legally entitled drug addict. So just give the lady your note so they don’t get upset.”
“That note won’t make the withdrawals any better.”
“I know, Baby.” Mom gives my backpack a pat as a gesture to hurry. “You still have to give that woman your note.”
“Okay.” I find my keys somewhere in the filth. “Are you coming to my game today?”
“In Austin,” Mom sort of laughs.
“Round Rock.”
“No,” she does laugh.
“Alright. Fine.” I walk out to my car. “I’ll score fifty just because you’re not there.”
“Good luck!” She smiles and waves.
I get in my car. The cool leather fires prickly chills up my back and around my neck. Mom opens the garage door before she disappears inside the house. I clench my teeth and tighten my chest. It’s a trick I learned a long time ago. I don’t know why, but when I do it everything gets a little quieter.
The cool dimness in the garage is blasted with intense morning sun. I squint my eyes, feel the familiar tension behind my neck. I can’t see passed my driveway yet, so I wait and count. The auras are swimming in my eyes and I know I’ll be happy for that shot in six hours or so. Finally I can see the road markers, fifteen seconds, clockwork. Since Kindergarten, after fifteen seconds the tension, the auras, and the road markers have accompanied me on the short drive to school. When I was five I thought it was normal.
“Holy shit,” M.L. laughs. It’s already been fifteen minutes since Athletics ended and instead of showering, she’s decided to read the instructions for that shot.
“Please don’t tell anybody,” I beg as I empty my locker for our long road trip.
“Why?”
“Because there are a lot people who might want it.” I snatch the instructions from her and stuff them in my duffel.
“No one wants to stick a needle in their own ass, Margy.”
“Don’t you think I know that?” I have to keep from shouting.
Coach Coolridge comes to check in with us. She’s wearing her infamous Lady Cats sun visor that she never takes off, even when she teaches Health. No one knows why she wears it. Our school’s mascot is a Buffalo. She’s scribbling on the Press Clipboard that she never leaves her hands of on gameday. Even though she knows our name and number, she has to check anyway. Coolridge has her own way of doing everything. It’s best when we just go with it.
“Margaret Marr. Number 12?”
“Margy.”
“Taking any kind of medicine with you?”
I show Coolridge the shot. She studies it for a moment, looks at its front and back. “Keep it out of sight.” She says and gives it back to me. She looks at M.L.
“Do not put Mary Louise on that thing,” M.L. demands. Coolridge did it once before, and it was hilarious.
“M.L. Matheson. Number 24. Since Angela’s hurt you’re going to have to play 3 instead of 2.”
“What?”
“Sorry.”
“Who’s playing 2?”
“Take a shower.” Coolridge throws a towel at M.L. and goes to the find other girls on the dress list.
M.L. slams her locker shut, and it’s like the sound pulls itself around my head and cranks tighter until it slowly withers away.
“Don’t do that.”
“What?”
“Shut your locker.”
M.L. laughs, “I didn’t know I wasn’t allowed to do that.”
“Sorry.” I prepare myself to shut my own locker. “My head just hurts. That’s all.”
“Your head always hurts.”
“Today it hurts bad.”
“It’s right after Athletics. You’re probably just dehydrated.”
“That’s definitely what it is…”
The tension behind my neck crawls slowly up to the crown of my head as I watch the hinges move. I listen to the latches creak, and my locker is shut. My crown grows numb, like if someone put Icy Hot under my skin, and the pain subdues for now.
“Here.” M.L. holds out a banana. “Potassium. I saw that hot tennis player down one during a break point so he wouldn’t pass out.”
“I don’t like bananas.”
“Excuse me for being generous.”
“You do need a shower.” I tell M.L. and leave the adventurous smells of the locker room for the pounding chaos of the Blair Senior High School hallway during passing period.
“Do you know why you get carsick?”
“Because your ears think you’re sitting still, but you’re eyes think you’re moving.” I look at M.L. For various reasons, my head hurts far too bad to keep my eyes on her, and I put my face back inside the cool, dark, seat in front of me.
“How do you know that?”
“You told me last time we were on the bus.”
M.L. shivers. “Margy, it’s freezing. Can’t you roll up the window?”
“I’m hot.”
“Take off your jacket.”
“No.”
“I’m not riding all the way to Austin freezing my ass off.” M.L. tries to climb over me.
Without a second thought, I elbow her right in the gut. She falls on top of me, but I’m fine. My head is still in the seat in front of me, being torn apart from the inside. M.L. punches me in the back. Everyone on the bus can hear a loud thud, but I can’t even feel it.
“Your head can’t hurt that bad if you’re able to play a fucking basketball game.”
M.L. doesn’t understand. No one does. She’s just pissed that Angela is disabled for a playoff game. I snap my head out of the seat.
“M.L. I would be playing with or without a fucking headache.”
“Sure.”
“You don’t understand.”
“Yeah, right. My mom gets migraines twice a year and she can’t even get out of bed in the morning.”
“I have migraines every day. I can’t stay in bed every day. I have to live.”
“That’s all in your head.”
“A little bit.”
“You know if you would just cut dairy out of your diet they’d get better.”
I pull my head out of the seat in front of me and stare at M.L. I knew she was stupid, but I didn’t know she was I think I’m a doctor stupid.
“Cut dairy from my diet…”
“Yeah, you had a cheeseburger for lunch.”
“You think a cheeseburger gave me a migraine?”
M.L. proudly nods. “Try it.”
It’s halftime. We’re up by eight. It’s not a substantial lead, and this team is a lot better than us. I can’t spend a second on the bench. The away locker rooms are a lot nicer than ours, and the manager has already laid out our bags and towels. I’m the first one in. I find my bag and dig inside. In twenty-four minutes I’ve taken two 5mg sprays, one 15mg pill, and one 60mg pill. I’m still alive. I’m still on my feet. I’m still in agony. The only thing left is that shot.
Coolridge has the team circled around a dry-erase board and she’s outlining a play. We’ve run that same play every day during Athletics and after-school practice, but still no one can get it right. I’m over it.
“Where are you going?” M.L. asks in a pissy fit. I don’t blame her. She’s getting thumped tonight.
“She’s fine. She knows it.” Coolridge taps the board, and everyone is back trying to get it.
I’ve been idle too long. There’s a bathroom section of the locker room. I run to it and fall in front of a toilet. In one fluid motion, I feel everything I’ve taken to soothe this migraine pour from the bottom of my stomach, and into the toilet. Over and over and over again – like my stomach is being turned inside out.
From the locker area I hear Coolridge echo, “Ignore that. She’s fine…Of course she’s playing the second half…Once you pull your head out of your butt and get out of foul trouble, then yes.”
I’ve got nothing left in me. I briefly read the shot’s instructions, simple. Kind of like an Epi-pen. I open the little flap thing and load the syringe. The warning buzzer sounds. I have two minutes to be on the court, playing basketball. I’m ready. If I sit around any longer, I’ll throw up again. I pull down my pants and stick the thing in my leg, turn it to the left. Like the container, the syringe has a blue button.
Don’t be a wimp. Press the thing.
I draw one long breath, look away, and press the button. As soon as I do the device makes a loud click and I feel the needle. It’s like a punch straight through my skin. I have no doubt this is what being stabbed feels like. I can hear a sickening squirt as the medicine leaves its syringe and mixes with my blood. My body tingles as the medicine swims around. Finally my head gets cloudy, and that’s how it stays. I rush to hide everything and catch up to my team out on the court.
Coolridge pulls me aside, “How’s your head?”
“A little better.”
“I called your mom. Once the game’s over we’re dropping you at the ER.”
“Why?”
“Margy,” Coolridge grabs my jersey. “I get it, but you just scared the shit out of the entire team.”
I start to run onto the court, but Coolridge grabs me again. “Yeah?”
“I get tension headaches pretty bad.” She says. “Try sleeping with a hot pack.”
I nod, “Thanks Coolridge.”
The second buzzer goes off, and it’s time to play.
We won in double overtime. Epic. Glad I didn’t overdose. I’m in the ER for the second time this year. It’s only March. They repeated my injection since it didn’t really work. I got several other painkillers, too. The only one I recognized was Loritab, and the nurse gave it to me through my IV so it started working really fast. I’m on my second bag of saline and I have to go to the bathroom.
There’s a little bathroom section in my room so I guess that’s where I’m supposed to go. I feel pretty good so I just get out of bed, but then I fall. Loritab, man. The IV rips my veins and my arm balloons. It’s full of saline, twice the size it’s supposed to be, stretched out, and feels like it’s on fire.
“What happened?” An irritated nurse tries to help me up. “Oh, my.” She pokes my arm. “Let me get some help.” Her voice shakes and she scurries off.
“I have to go to the bathroom,” I yell at her back.
She returns with three nurses, all carrying equipment.
“It’s all just saline,” one nurse says.
“I have to go to the bathroom.”
“Okay,” an annoying nurse takes out my IV. “We’ll get you back in bed.”
“I have to go to the bathroom.”
“Here we go.” The nurse takes my unaffected arm and nearly tears it off because she really wants me in the bed.
The nurses press on my ballooned arm. When I see saline shoot onto the annoying nurse’s purple scrubs, I turn my head.
“I used to get migraines,” the irritated nurse says as she releases, I don’t even want to know how much, saline from my arm. “Have you ever thought about getting Botox?”
I shake my head. It’s been a weird day.
I finally got to go to the bathroom. The nurses were insistent that I take another bag of saline, so now both arms hurt. The room is dimly lit and cool. My blanket is warm, and my head feels okay.
Someone knocks on the door, “Your mom is here.”
Mom walks in and sits in a chair near the wall. “A nurse told me about your arm.”
“They said it will go back down in a day or two.”
“Does it hurt?”
“A little.”
Mom slouches in her chair. She drove three and a half hours just to watch me take more medicine. “So your shot didn’t work?”
“No.”
Mom nods, “Maybe we should look into that surgery.”
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This was at his prom. He was trying to hide his hate for being photographed with "The Robot".
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