BC's Book of Thoughts

[Black_Cat320]

I suppose I could put an introduction here.

I'm BC or Cat, whichever works, I'm not picky. I've been on this site for ages, but never really knew there was a place to blog until I was just browsing around today. So I decided to jump on the blog train since it seemed like fun, and might as well make use of it if there's a section for it now.

I don't particularly mind if anyone wants to comment, so feel free, just keep it friendly. This is mainly just gonna be a place where I ramble, vent, maybe get some thoughts out, and so on. I can't really say how sensitive some topics will be, I guess I'll put a warning or whatever if I think I'm gonna post something that could be a touchy subject for anyone who happens to stumble upon this.

But yea, looking forward to posting whatever whenever I have the time.​

 

[Black_Cat320]

So not really sure how to start this bad boy, but I guess I'll start with what's currently on my mind?

It's really stupid but it's annoying and has been driving me crazy lately. Like I have no clue what is blooming right now, be it pollen or mold or whatever, but I hate it. I haven't had a day since fall started where my nose wasn't just congested, my throat wasn't sore, or my head didn't hurt from all this sinus pressure! I have humidifiers, meds, and more tissues than I can carry, but there's no end to this madness in sight!

Like I already have insomnia and so my night's sleep is just garbage as is, but not being able to breathe is just making it worse somehow. I actually didn't even know that was possible until now, but somehow it is! So I have lovely nights of no sleep because either my brain won't shut off or something wakes me up for the hundredth time or I just can't breathe, and then days of constant headaches because I couldn't sleep or because of all the sinus pressure that I can't seem to get rid of!

Oh, and the cherry on top is that my lung feel like they have lead in them all the time too. I know some of it is from all the junk that's probably in my lungs from my sinus issues, but I have to blame anyone within my living range that are burning leaves too. It's fall, I get it, people for some reason don't like leaves on the ground and instead decide to burn them into smoky crisps. But please! My lungs can't take this anymore! I have asthma and it's not helping my situation out AT ALL, I'm pretty sure I sound like I'm dying when I cough because I've scared my cats more than a few times since this all started. But my word, my lungs and chest actually HURT from all the coughing I've done and I'm pretty sure I'd make a Wheezing proud with how my gasping breaths sounds.

All in all though, I love fall, it's a beautiful time of year with some of the best weather in my opinion. But I hate the health hazards I have to deal with when it comes around.

 

[Black_Cat320]

So one of the most annoying things of being an artist, is the supplies.

They're expensive, they don't last, and unless you dish out the money for the good stuff, the quality is questionable in most cases. Not only that, but most of the good quality supplies are in the most ridiculously small amounts, you'd wonder if they were made for mice. Like, I'm not expecting top tier quality and longevity from a Walmart brand of all things, but you'd expect them to last longer than 13 days!

For context I got a pack of some grayscale alcohol markers, just to try them out and learn how to use them, and honestly they're fun to use if not a little hard. It's not like I've been cranking out the drawings all day every day. But I've done a few over a course of 13 days or so, maybe 1 a day, and already they're on their last legs!

I know this wouldn't be an issue if I did my stuff digitally, but I just have such a hard time focusing with digital and honestly, I don't think my work is as good when I do use it. But supplies are not fun to deal with when you use anything aside from pencil and I ain't willing to dish out an arm and a leg for a small amount of the quality stuff.

Maybe one day I can have quality and longevity for a good price, but today is certainly not that day.

R.I.P. my alcohol marker set.

 

[Black_Cat320]

Welp, I had to go to the dentist today.

Mind you, I don't particularly mind going usually. It's never really been a hassle for me and I don't have an aversion to going to them like some of my friends seem to have. Plus I needed to get some work done, so why not?

Apparently last time I visited, which was a month ago, they found that I had 3 cavities and a cracked filling. Now for me, as someone who is unfortunately prone to getting cavities no matter how hard I try, that's really not all that bad since it had been maybe 2 years since I last went. Like my teeth at this point in my life are probably 90% filling and 10% actual teeth

Not bad all things considered, but y'know, not good either.

Well turns out, that the crack was hiding another cavity underneath it, and then they also found another one kinda next to it. So that's a lovely 5 cavities in total I had to get fixed. In one sitting too I might add, because I didn't want to go back AGAIN so soon just to get it fixed.

So my appointment was at 1pm, all the numbing stuff and shots took 30min or so, and then I didn't leave until almost 4pm. That's a good 2-ish, almost 3, hours of me lying there with my mouth painfully wrenched open as they drilled at my teeth. Needless to say, my jaw is very sore now and pain meds are my best friends.

I'm also starving since I only had a light lunch before going, but the numbing stuff makes everything taste weird and I can't eat solids, so I'm living off of soup and milk shakes right now.

 

[Black_Cat320]

THIS IS MY WARNING TO ANYONE WHO DOESN'T LIKE SURGERY TALK, DON'T READ PAST THE LINE IF YOU DON'T LIKE

Anywho, so it's been a hot minute since I wrote anything here, not for lack of stuff going on but I've just been too busy to do much of anything

But let's see...I had a pretty quiet yet busy holiday season all things considered. Weird I know, but it was like this silent busy schedule that wasn't too much but was happen very close to each other if that makes any sense?

Anyway since it's just me and my mom now, we wanted to keep things low-key this year. No massive feasts or presents or decorations. Which is fine, because in the past we'd usually cook up a storm and do stuff and that's just exhausting! Fun yes, but still exhausting.

We were invited on Thanksgiving to have lunch with some old family friends though, which was nice, but a little chaotic since their family is HUUUUUGE and we weren't they only friends they invited. Christmas was actually nice and quiet though and same with New Years, we just had a lot of doctor's visits during that time and so our schedule was pretty packed.

---

Oh, speaking of which, I get to have surgery! I'm actually pretty excited about it! I've never had any major surgery before and I'm actually looking forward to it since it'll be a new experience! I already asked them if I could watch it happen, to which they said no because they needed to knock me out but I might be able to get pictures? They didn't say "no" but it wasn't a "yes" either so that remains to be seen...

I've also yet to ask them if I can touch the squish bit they're removing from me so maybe I'll at least get that? They certainly can't tell me "no" because it's a biohazard! This thing, which is a lovely 14cm diameter fibroid btw, has been in me for a couple years by now given its size so if it hasn't been hurting me from touching my insides, how can it do so from me touching it's outside?

This is my reasoning and I'm sticking by it

I know anyone who reads this may ask "why would you want to watch them remove a squishy fibrous mass from you or even touch it?" and my answer to that is simple.

Because I'm curious and it interests me, simple as that.

I mean, you only live once right? And really, you never know how many times in your life you'll need to have surgery. Could be once or more or never. So you might as well make the most of it by satisfying your own curiosity or learning something new. And for me, I'll be doing both since this kind of thing has always been interesting to me. I grew up watching all sorts of medical shows where they would remove tumors and whatnot from people and I found it to be pretty cool really. Sure I know a lot of people thinks it's gross, but it's all stuff from your own body, so how's that bad?

If I wasn't bad with people and actually had the smarts to pursue it, I would've totally gone into the medical field

Course I do realize that some people have to have surgery often and I knows it a brutal thing to recover from if it's frequent. I just know that personally, this is my one and only surgery so far so I want to make the most of it.

Not gonna lie though, the planning for it, so much rougher than anything else and I wish it was easier

 

[InfiniteBakuphoon]

You’re probably the first person I’ve met to actually be excited about that kind of surgery, haha, let alone, um… everything else. I won’t judge you for it, though! We all have our interests, yeah? And given yours, this is a really big opportunity for you, isn’t it? Like a potential dream come true! So I’ll be silently hoping that you’ll get at least something out of all… if you know what I mean by out, ahaha…

 

[Black_Cat320]

You’re probably the first person I’ve met to actually be excited about that kind of surgery, haha, let alone, um… everything else. I won’t judge you for it, though! We all have our interests, yeah? And given yours, this is a really big opportunity for you, isn’t it? Like a potential dream come true! So I’ll be silently hoping that you’ll get at least something out of all… if you know what I mean by out, ahaha…

Lol trust me, you're not the only one surprised. All my friends think I'm nuts for being excited about it and wanting to watch/poke, but ultimately they realize I'm just an odd-duck and roll with it Thanks for the well-wishes and puns though! Those are always welcome Even if nothing but my squishy softball comes out of this, I'll at least have an interesting story to tell of how they wouldn't let me look or touch

 

[Black_Cat320]

THIS IS MY WARNING TO ANYONE WHO DOESN'T LIKE SURGERY TALK AND GROSS THINGS, DON'T READ IF YOU DON'T LIKE

So I'm back and have more or less recovered from my surgery! And lemme tell ya, it was an interesting experience

First off, I wasn't allowed to watch like I'd wanted too and wasn't allowed to touch the fibroid that they'd removed from me, cause I was very much unconscious during the whole thing. But I did get to have a picture of the removed fibroid which I have since dubbed "Cursed Meatball". This sucker was a lovely 1070g, which is roughly about 2 and a quarter pounds. And about 14cm in diameter, which is bigger than the size of most grapefruit, and almost the size of a dodgeball.

So it was a big sucker for sure! I'd show the pic, but don't think that'd be a good idea...

Secondly, apparently I had lost quite of bit of blood during the surgery. I'm a fairly anemic person to begin with so I'm not too surprised really, but my friend who was with me at the hospital at the time, informed me they had to call in the emergency squad to my room to get my blood levels to a reasonable level after the surgery. She wasn't allowed in the room at the time and was honestly worried, and ended up pacing in the waiting room until they let her back in.

I, of course, was completely unaware of all this as I was high as kite and loopier than a bowl of fruit loops. But hey, turned out ok!

Third was that I didn't eat anything for a good 24hrs after getting cut open. Which was really really really annoying, and led me to throwing up, because apparently the body doesn't like it when you don't feed it some good stuff after a surgery! But of course they could only give me liquids and such, which is about as filling as cotton candy.

I downed 2 subway footlongs once I was cleared for solid foods, not gonna lie. Best thing ever!

Forth in my epic hospital stay was that this was during an ice storm! So my friend was stuck at the hospital with me, sleeping on the couch in my room for a week and living off of cafeteria food the whole time. I salute her for it! I'd have been bored out of my mind without her.

Fifth, and this is probably the worst of it, was all the needle poking that happened and the lack of sleep.

I had to have several IVs connected to me, one for fluids and another for blood and sometimes antibiotics, so that's both arms connected to one IV system from how much stuff they had to pump in me. So this IV system in my room was my constant friend that I didn't want to have that had to follow me everywhere.

I named him Beepsley.

Beepsley didn't like it when he wasn't plugged in long enough, when I bent my arms just so, when there was air in the tube, or when his bags were empty. And he made it known, very VERY loudly, by beeping constantly! A nurse eventually told me how to shut him up since I had to call one for each and every time he beeped, but there were sometimes that a nurse just had to come and look at him.

But lemme tell ya, no one liked Beepsley because of his constant noise and just how many times I had to call a nurse in the span of an hour to make him shut up and it was just awful at night!

Additionally, I had nurse check ins about every......3 hours? Which is fine during the day when I'm awake, but this was also at night when I wanted to sleep. It was always check temperature, check oxygen, check blood pressure, and scan QR on my hospital band.

I got very used to the routine....

But the worst was when they needed to take a blood sample at the end of each day. I have very stubborn veins, they don't like popping up to give blood. So a nurse will have to spend a great deal of time trying to find a good place to stick me, and half the time, they stick and stick and get nothing. So my arms are just riddled with poked places.

So yea, lots of ouchy arms and very little sleep, the bed being absolute garbage didn't help much either.

Sixth in this adventure! My temperature was ALL over the place, sometimes I was freezing and sometimes I was roasting. They worried I had an infection because of it, thus the antibiotics, but it was soon realized that I'm just incredibly sensitive in terms of temperature change My temp would be fine one minute, and then I literally sit up to go use the bathroom, and I've gone up to 100 degrees. It was nuts!

But that's more or less the main points of my hospital stay that I can remember right now, I'll post more later if I remember anything more but it was interesting and actually pretty relaxing since I didn't have to do anything. So all in all, a nice 7/10, would visit again

 

[InfiniteBakuphoon]

Your experience reminds me a lot of my own little adventure at the hospital not too long ago, haha. Especially all of the needles and shots in my arms, and all of the difficulty in getting them in (especially the IVs, oof), which I think probably dulled my fear of needles for life. Not to mention the food restrictions, constant check-ins, and my own “Beepsley” that mainly made their annoyance known when I had to get up and go pretty much anywhere that wasn’t my bed. Fun, right?

In any case, I’m glad that the surgery itself went well and that you were able to get that picture, haha. And that you had a friend with you throughout all of the madness, too!