Indeppendix Day!

I want to wish everyone a happy Indeppendix Day!

April 15th is the day that people around the world come together in peace and harmony to celebrate the triumph of good over evil, the victory over pain and suffering, the removal of rebellious, traitorous and infectious members in order to promote a healthier body.

In other words, it’s the day that I had my appendix removed.

Independence from my appendix !

Four years ago, my appendix’s multi-year reign of terror over my gastrointestinal system came to a glorious end. A surgical strike removed the tyrant and life in the upper-abdominal region has been pleasantly uneventful ever since. From everything I’ve ever heard about appendixes going bad, it’s usually a sudden and painful event that ends in surgery a few hours later. That’s if you’ve got one of those average appendixes that doesn’t know how to pace itself.

My appendix wasn’t average. He was methodical, he had patience and apparently a grand master plan. I began to compare him to Darth Vader, but that didn’t sound evil enough. He was more like the evil emperor. He learned to orchestrate elaborate evil schemes, masking his involvement with ease. There was no reason to suspect that he was behind any of the upheavals that plagued my upper GI over the years. The finger could always be pointed at some other cause; stomach flu (it’s been going around you know), too many sweets before bedtime, bad brazil nuts, you get the picture.

When I was just a kid, he was content to strike without warning in the middle of the night. Aware that making a child sick for too long or striking too often would result in the parents taking the kid to a doctor, his attacks would occur randomly, months apart, always in the middle of the night. I always felt fine as soon as my stomach was empty, no reason to go to the doctor.

For a few years, it seemed that he had given up. In retrospect, he was just biding his time, making his plans and laying the groundwork for when the time was right. Knowing that college kids will hardly ever go to the doctor, he began his campaign again. Now, as before, his attacks were unpredictable but there was a new twist. The experience now lasted 10 to 12 hours with no relief. A few years later, he activated the next phase of his plan and increased the occurrences to about once a year. Visits to the emergency room would help end the misery at that moment but no one ever followed up for a cause. It was always a bug that was going around.

Realizing that no one was catching on to his deeds, the dark appendix became even bolder and increased his attacks to every two or three months. Then one day, I began to feel a lingering pain in my lower right side. Finally his arrogance had given us just the slip up that was needed. Unfortunately, even with the tell tale pain in my side, doctors, scans and tests could not connect the sinister appendix to my ailment. He had learned how to play the healthcare system. He knew that if I called an made an appointment to see my doctor while I was in the middle of an attack, he’d be looking healthy by the time my appointment rolled around a couple of weeks later.

Four years and two days ago Julie had had enough. She called and got me in to see the doctor during one of my bouts. The last thing you want to do when you feel like you're going to turn inside out, stomach first, is sit in a doctor's office waiting room. Fortunately, you're holding the "Get Out Of the Waiting Room Free" card. You just have to have the "guts" to play it. I bet the next time someone tells that receptionist that they need a place to lay down because they feel like they might throw up, she'll be a little more concerned and won't just point to the chairs and say, "you'll have to wait there."

Anyway, to wrap this up, the doctor decided to send me to get a CAT scan, they discovered what my appendix was doing to me and they checked me into the hospital and ripped that little sucker right out of me.


FREEEEDOOOOOOMMMMM!!!



Happy Indeppendix Day!