Champion of the Semicolon

Prefacing: I told myself (and Kyle) that I wouldn't read anyone's livejournal until I got home because it made me miss everyone too much. Unbearably. It made me grumpy and kind of hard to deal with, so I decided to butt out for a little more than a week. Today I broke down and read a few, though, and now I don't know what to think. Will someone fill me in? I keep thinking the worst.

That said, today didn't exactly turn out as planned, what with the ending up in the emergency room and all. I woke up this morning with tear-my-uterus-out bad cramps. Kyle and I trudged over to the dining hall with ibuprofen in our pockets, and sat down to another disappointing meal. I had some breakfasty potatoes, some salad, orange juice, two ibuprofen, and a coffee-like product, but I still felt shitty, shittier by the minute -- dizzy and in severe abdominal pain. When I put my tray into the dish-washing conveyor belt, my cone of vision started to do wonky things. Blackness irised in, and I fainted. I have never considered myself the fainting type -- there's no shrinking Scarlett over here, I tell you what. Nonetheless, I passed out at the crescendo of dizziness and pain. Some guy caught me, and I wish I knew who because he saved me the hassle of a head injury, and I'd like to thank him for that (first typing: "tank him for that.") Apparently, I was only out for a few seconds, but I remember it being longer. Everything was surreal when I woke up. I was dandled from dining hall manager to DPS (campus police/cop in the box) to the EMTs. There was vomiting and unpleasantness all around -- emphasis on all around, as I was still really dizzy and my cramps/abdominal pain was killing me. Two or three friendly EMTs loaded me into an ambulance and whisked me away to Sacred Heart hospital, which is about a five minute walk from campus (even needing Kyle and dining hall lady to help me walk, I felt bad about using an ambulance -- and I'm sure the inevitable bill will have something to say about that.) Once there, Friendly Nurses Kris and Natalie (two names with Anchorage counterparts of whom I've been thinking of) ascertained that A) my blood pressure and heart rate were just dandy, B) NO, I was NOT pregnant (the dining hall lady, the DPS lady, the EMT, a nurse, and the doctor asked me if there was "any chance" of that, C) I could use a steady IV drip of saline and some blood work, and D) that I was all snuggly in my gown and thin blankets (it was cold, and I was shivering anyway), they let Doc take over. Get this: Kenneth Starr, MD. Not the same Ken Starr by a long shot (you think I'd let that guy near me?) -- this Ken Starr was tallish and clearly not enjoying the thought of giving a girl (on the first day of her period) a pubic exam, but examine he did. With the speculum from hell. THEN they took a "cath sample" -- cath...catheter...get it? Never again. After all of that, I gradually stopped shaking, the pain went to a totally tolerable level, and my head stopped doing loop-de-loops. Doc Starr told me that they weren't really sure what was wrong, but it could have been a number of things, most likely dizzines (my official diagnosis) and a helluva cramp. One of the nurses postulated the flu, but the whole affair, from getting up to leaving the hospital took less than 5 hours. My dad, when I called, thought it was food poisoning (entirely likely), and Mom decided dehydration played a role (unlikely, but I'll let her have it). I'm going with a combination of all of these and what Kyle calls "the body hitting the restart button." At any rate, I'm fine now, although a bit more careful than usual. Kyle, by the way, was there the whole time, proving how awesome a girlfriend she is.