Often, it's the little things
I find that the littlest things affect me, mentally, especially recently. I was always like that, made "happy" for the rest of the day after finding a tulip on the ground, or made "sad" by having a bad dream about someone dying. I have a love/hate relationship with the way things affect me; obviously I am more partial to the happy things.

Yesterday, I went to the hospital to have blood taken (again), as that is part of my routine, being on immunosupressers. Because of my various (negative) memories in this hospital, I am careful about what I wear, what I take, what I do, when I'm there now. I associate certain pajamas, toothpaste, foods, cds, sounds with this hospital, and many of them are "ruined" because of this association. I took a NYT magazine with me, instead of a book, b/c the magazine will get thrown away, but I don't want to associate a book with it b/c that book might forever be tainted. I do not want to crochet anything there because I can't remember that "I crocheted that there" unless it is something I intend to sell, i.e., not possess. The times I've been to the hospital, I have ended up doing nothing while I wait in waiting rooms. Again, I am careful not to make memories. It's strange how the mind works...

I hadn't been there in a while, so I was concerned about how I would react. The ER was redone and relocated, so when I looked at the new one, I wasn't immediately bombarded by memories. I have no connection to this ER...yet. When I saw someone on a stretcher/wheely bed, I couldn't help but look, but then I looked away, only hearing the screams. I remember how much I hated being stared at when I was wheeled around, looking up at fluorescent lights, trying to distract myself from all the older faces whose looks said, "she's young, why is she here? why does she look like that?"

When I was getting registered, the admin guy in his cubicle was typing in some of my info that has changed, such as my insurance. He looked at my blood script from my doctor, and asked, "Any particular reason you're having blood taken?" I laugh in my head, wanting to deliver the words "For shits and giggles, primarily." This guy looks like the guy from Office Space who keeps looking for his stolen stapler. I had him the first time too. I would answer "For shits and giggles, primarily," and then follow with, "Well, actually, I have no trouble with the shits part, as I have too much of that, which is actually the problem. So I guess for just giggles? I dunno...I don't really laugh at getting my blood taken for the umpteenth time...."

Of course, I don't say that. I stumbled on my words, "Well, I have...it's for a chronic condition...well, I'm on immunosupp--" He says without looking at me, "What's the condition?" I sputter out ulcerative colitis and he grabs a thick book of medical conditions and their corresponding codes. Is this the moment my mind sunk? The moment that negated the words constantly spoken to me by my mother, "You are NOT your disease" ? Is this the moment the rest of my day was ruined, the reason I'm still in this funk? I can't always identify what "little thing" it is, but maybe it was watching this man, who doesn't know me at all except by a computer entry. Watching him type in a three digit code that meant ulcerative colitis. I am a three digit diagnosis code. I am an entry in a hospital database, lumped with lots of other patients who share the same diagnosis code. 542? 572? I can't remember.

My fixation on how I correspond to a number is nothing new. When I first took the PSAT, they give you this little sticker with a barcode that (I guess?) we afixed to various papers and forms. It was at least 9 or 10 digits long. I remember I saved one, tacked it on to the side of the bookcase next to my childhood bed. I looked at it every night before bed, along with other stickers and postcards, and thought, I am a number. I am nothing to the PSAT people, I am nothing but a barcode. Not a Merit Scholar, but a score that corresponded to a Merit Scholar score range that corresponded to a barcode that corresponded to me.

Good or bad, I have never come to terms with being reduced and represented by an arbitrary number. And I'm smart enough to realize that it means nothing, that it is a means to organization and it has no bearing on who I am, or what I do. I know most people don't think of me as a disease, or a barcode, but I do exist as those superficial representations and I don't like it. I don't like it that those representations are out there, not showing the whole picture.

I don't react, wince, or move anymore when I have my blood drawn. I almost don't feel it. Maybe that is my reaction to the superficiality and disinterest of many things medical. I only point out the little hole in my arm that never heals, "This is where they take it" so that the nurse doesn't bother searching for a good vein. My precious blood is taken, a part of me that is no longer a part of me. I don't watch it, not out of disgust or being grossed out by blood or needles, but because it is mine and it is taken. It is put in a tube, given a sticker, and put in a tray with lots of other blood tubes. They all belong to people, with personalities of complexity and brains full of memories and lives (hopefully) full of activity. But there they are, sitting in identical tubes and looking the same shade of red, about to be part of routine lab work. Perhaps it was that moment that affected me, more than the diagnosis code?

I guess if I weren't negatively affected by such stupid little things like the unimportant blood tubes or numerical codes, I would not be positively affected by finding a flower on the ground or holding a baby's hand or smelling molasses. I am crushed by the weight of such little things.