Well, the first two weeks back to school have been… interesting. “Interesting” is a good word to use.
Another good word would be “busy”, especially if preceded by “extremely”,”freaking” or any other variation of the two. I may have just bit off more than I can chew, but that’s what a bored kid who really wants to go back to school gets when he’s cooped up in the hospital with internet access.
Yeah, I managed to land myself in the hospital again, about a month and a half ago. This time it was an infection around the shunt, leaving my head immobile due to the pain and inflammation.
“But Sean,” you probably weren’t wondering, ” How on earth did you manage to get an infection?” I’m glad you probably didn’t ask!
My doctors and I aren’t completely sure, but the accepted hypothesis is that bacteria from the surface of my skin managed to make its way under the skin and latch around the shunt’s drainage tube, setting up a little command center, most likely through a zit.
So yeah, a pimple put me in the hospital this summer. How many of you can say that?
All in all, though, I lucked out, considering it was an infection around a direct line into my brain. The infection was weak enough to be quenched by an antibiotic drip line, and traveled downwards, rather than up and in. Also fortunate was the fact that the infection was around the shunt, and not in the shunt.
In the shunt would have meant two more brain surgeries: one to take it out, a week’s recovery, and a new one in. That’s no fun.
So I dodged that bullet over the summer, but I was grazed a little bit. I have serious issues with being in circumstances completely out of my control, so my condition hasn’t been the easiest to deal with. My hospital stay put me almost all the way back to square one, resilience-wise. I was again super-sensitive to personal failings and I had a really tough time dealing with adverse situations. I’m still working back to get even where I was before the infection set in.
But I’m getting better at the coping, though. I’m learning tricks and mind games to help make my outlook brighter, especially when I have time to think too much.
However, being back in the thick of it at college has helped immensely because, as I mentioned before, I’ve been too freaking busy to think about anything but academics. Mostly.
Actually, no, that’s a total lie. I’ve already had my ups and downs a-plenty for this semester. Heartbreak, equipment malfunctions and miraculous recoveries of said equipment, sleep deprivation, it’s already been crazy and has yet to show signs of calming down. Ugh.
So, on my plate this semester are six classes plus homework for each, plus my responsibilities for the school newspaper as assistant opinion editor, as well as assorted extracurriculars and maybe a lick of a social life (ha), and feeding/clothing myself. Crap. That looks a lot worse typed out than it sounded in my head.
And we haven’t even started work on the miniseries some friends of mine started up last year.
(SHAMELESS PLUG FOR ABOVE MINISERIES)
At least my classes are awesome at their best and bearable at their worst .
Oh well. Wish me luck!