About this time yesterday I was seriously starting to wonder if I would actually get my cortisone shot. Despite calling Dr. Boris' office twice, the secretaries seemed reluctant to have me come in...something about him being overbooked. Whatevs.
Then someone on the desk over here asked if I was waiting for a phone call. Some doctor's office had called her phone.
Long story short, the girls at Dr. Boris' office told me to come right away. I said, "Screw you, work," hopped the subway and then waited for and hour and fifteen minutes before he saw me. During that time I caught the end of Oprah, two evening newscasts and ate one jelly doughnut.
I thought I was going to have to really plead my case for a shot, especially since I had one back in March. Cortisone shots are steroids, and doctors generally don't like to inject them into someone's spine too often. They're pretty much a last resort for chronic pain. Perhaps I looked tired and scraggly enough for Dr. Boris to say, "OK, you want a shot, you'll get a shot."
The nurse brought me into the room with all the fancy equipment and asked me to pull my pants down. As I did, she laughed. "Yes! I remember you! I remember your tattoo." My tattoo is a red question mark on the small of my back that I got in a fit on needless rebellion on Valentine's Day, 2003, when I was 26 years old. Dr. Boris came in soon after and also chuckled at my body art.
"Oh, yes," he said. "Your tattoo. It is like you are giving me a target."
(In a different setting, his remark would be interpreted as rather dirty. But I digress...)
I laid down on my stomach and Dr. Boris started the show. You know you've got a condition when in order to give you a shot the doc has to bust out an X-Ray machine and drape himself (yet not you...?) in one of those lead smock things. He poked my back a bit and I watched it all on a screen above my head. (Note: Not recommended) It was kinda painful, not just because he was sticking needles into my spine, but because he was doing it when I was already tired and cranky. I apologized for flinching. Dr. Boris said it was all right.
I didn't go back to work afterwards to finish the double shift I was assigned. Instead I went home, stretched out on my bed and let the cortisone do its thang as I watched hours of the Style network. Eventually I fell asleep.
This morning I woke up with still a little bit of sting in my leg. I packed up some extraneous books, brought them to The Strand and then picked up my new painkillers. At three o'clock this afternoon I walked to work in the sunshine, for once not limping or feeling like I was dragging my left leg behind me.
In short, I feel amazing. No ill can come my way. Yay.
