Mind out of Matter

It all started about four months ago; I started getting these terrible, incessant migraines. I'm a freelance writer. I write for a number of magazines, newspapers, blogs - what have you. Unfortunately, the only way to make enough money to support yourself as a writer is to do it religiously. For me that meant staying up late hours, often only getting four hours sleep a night - five if I'm lucky. Now I know what your thinking - lack of sleep is responsible for my chronic headaches. If it were anyone else, I'd say you might be right. But, I've been doing this my entire adult life; I've gotten used to it by now.

At first, I tried to ignore it, but when I found myself taking twice the recommended dose of Ibuprofen a day, I decided it was time I make an appointment to see my doctor. I had to wait another four weeks before he could make an opening for me. Once I made the decision to go see a doctor, I swear the pain increased tenfold. Maybe because I knew I had to wait and didn't want to, but I swear I almost drove myself to the emergency room. When I finally did get in to see my doctor, I left feeling neglected, and quite frankly, a little pissed off. He checked my blood pressure, shined a light up my nose, felt my thyroid... and that was about it. He prescribed a medication with a long ass name that even I, an English major, couldn't pronounce. It cost well over one-hundred dollars because I didn't have health insurance. He urged me to start getting eight hours of sleep a night and penciled me in for a follow-up visit.

So, I cut my workload a little, started working while I ate to make up some lost time, and set an alarm to remind myself to go to bed on time. The pills helped... at first. But, after the bill from the doctor's visit crashed into my life, the pain in my skull grew worse than ever. It was most painful right at the base of my skull, then spread through my brain like a toxic, thorny vine. If I had to put it into words, I'd say it felt like a feral cat had latched directly onto my brain, claws fully unsheathed as it bit the base of my nose without mercy.

I went back to the doctor determined to get results, but when I told him everything that had happened, he had the gall to tell me he thought it was psychological. He told me he thought it was stress related; that he would go ahead and schedule an MRI, but he recommended I see a therapist in the meantime. I had never been more infuriated in all my life. For him to suggest my pain was all mental, that it was something I had made up... I just.. I couldn't believe it. I marched out of that office fully intending to find a new doctor.

Then something funny happened on my drive home - I calmed down. I took a breath and I thought to myself, maybe, just maybe, he's right. Maybe I was just stressed; maybe I was bringing this all on myself. So, I decided to keep my doctor... My decision may have, in part, had something to do with the fact that I wanted that doctor to apologize when it came back that there was something medically wrong with me.

I went to see a therapist only slightly begrudgingly. I told him everything that was going on in my life, and about the pain I'd been experiencing. And by the end of the session, while he agreed I needed to make sure I got plenty of sleep each night, he didn't think there was anything mentally wrong with me. He didn't think the intensity of the pain I was experiencing could've been solely stress related. He recommended I see a physician.

I went to bed that night feeling utterly defeated. I was starting to feel like a difficult project that no one wanted to deal with. For all I knew I could have been dying, and not a single person gave a damn. It had gotten to the point where I needed three times as much medication recommended just to fall asleep.

When I woke up the next morning I found my pillow case drenched in blood. It looked like someone had stabbed me, there was so much red - sticky and matted in my hair. Enough was enough; I went straight to the hospital. By the time I got there I wasn't bleeding, so I had to wait a few hours before anyone would see me. But once someone did, they conducted all kinds of tests; tests I didn't even know existed. They x-rayed my skull, put me through a CAT scan, and genuinely seemed to care about what was going on with me. After what felt like an eternity, they finally determined I had ruptured a vessel in my sinus cavity.

I couldn't believe something so small could have caused so much pain for so many months. I was relieved. For the first time in months, I woke up the next day actually feeling alive. There was still a slight ache in my skull, but the medication they gave me helped.

I'm not entirely sure what compelled me; maybe it was the sensation of feeling like there was still dried blood up my nose, but I went to the bathroom to use my electric nose hair trimmer. The tiny hairs caked with blood that fell from the first nostril tested my gag reflex, but at least I felt cleaner. As I gently pressed the buzzing cone into my second nostril, watching little blood-encrusted hairs fall into the sink, a sharp pain shot through my skull. The trimmer's small teeth had caught on something. I had to rip them from my nostril.

Something long and pink came out, like a long, thick cord. The other end was still stuck in my nostril, and I stared at it with crossed eyes. In the dizzy haze the pain had induced, I thought I was looking at a worm. A tapeworm, maybe, that had somehow gotten into my nasal cavity and grown. Without thought I rolled the cord between my thumb and index finger; it was tough and fleshy.

Clarity came rushing as, to my horror, I realized that the substance I was twisting between my fingers was actually a cord of my own brain.