on making friends with necessary evil

On Christmas Eve I was still recovering from a stomach virus. But I wrote some words, went on a possibly ill-advised but much-needed run in the fog, and then puttered around the house, cleaning and tidying, getting ready for the family celebration the next day.

In the afternoon, I strolled over to the drugstore to pick up my prescription—blood thinners for life. Factor VIII blood clotting disorder. This for life bit was quite an adjustment. After giving birth in my house, on purpose, I did not need medical attention for twenty-one years. Until I really did. I was cocky, had absolute confidence in my body.

Because all the doctors told me I should be feeling fine, and I was really not nearly fine, for a year I thought that surely it must be the medication that was dragging me down. So far down. And I hated those little pills. Hated. Sure, I wanted to be alive, but I do not like being dependent on big pharma to stay alive.

This past week, on Christmas Eve, I’d been on the couch for days watching delightfully terrible TV and feeling sorry for myself. The fog had lifted, and it was overcast but not rainy. I needed to get out of the house.

It was quiet in the neighborhood until I heard a lone saxophone inside a dark house. I thought it was a recording until I heard a squeak and a “SHIT.”

For nearly two years now I have chatted up the same pharmacist. So far I have been unable to get him to crack a smile. Not for want of trying. And he never seems to remember me—I suppose he sees so many people, so many pills, that it all becomes a blur. And that my tearful litany of questions about side effects a year ago wouldn’t have been so far outside the norm to leave an impression. Still. The same drill: I make jokes, he is sullen.

Per usual, I handed over my co-pay and set off home again. Two years prior, maybe two months after the PE, I had made the same walk to the same pharmacy and talked to the same guy. It was bitter cold and snowy. I was barely stable, had to walk slowly and carefully. Every joint ached. But the walk felt like victory.

This past week, I remembered that first trip, how confused I was, and how elated to be not dead. On that same stretch of side walk, holding the white bag with the receipt sticking out—I could feel the squareness of the bottle through my mitten. On that first walk, I thought I’d be done with medication and discomfort by June. And here we are. Square bottle. Tiny pills.

There is a scene in A Gentleman in Moscow where the count, on house arrest, makes a distinction—he is resigned to his situation but not necessarily reconciled to it. The idea that I would never be free of this dependency was impossible at first.

But something happened on Christmas Eve, before my run. All the chairs by the front door had items on them, gifts and whatnot. So without thinking, I plopped on the floor to put on my shoes.

And then I looked around.

Even just a few months ago, it was painful and humiliating, getting up and down from the floor. I may only have a few decades left, but for now, I am loose and free in my body again, this body I took for granted all those years.

On the way home I passed another architectural abomination in my sweet little neighborhood. That was new since my first stroll two years ago. And I realized that while it’s not ideal, and not what I wanted, I have accepted this new reality. I may even be managing a shift from resignation to reconciliation.