Life in the 10X Mirror

Men don't use magnifying mirrors. They don't really care. They'll let their nose hair get long enough to braid until a significant other tells them to do something about it. Women have magnifiers. We have valid reasons.  I got one of these super-duper magnifying mirrors that your can stick on your other mirror with suction cups.It was so I could look at my eyelashes. Oh, come on now, I am not THAT vain. It's because some of my chromosomes are just as directionally  challenged as the whole rest of me, and some of my eyelashes grow curving downward. Not a big deal in the whole scheme of human experience, but it can be annoying. It can also be painful and dangerous.

Once one of these little stinkers rubbed across my cornea, scratching it and causing an infection. It was painful and infected enough that I went to urgent care. I don't mess around with eye stuff. The doctor put in the numbing drops. Blessed relief. He put in the weird fluorescent dye. Yep, nice scratch right in the corner of my eye, and one little dinky invisible blonde eyelash turned inside out and grinding away in there.  He dug for awhile, apologized, and said he couldn't get it. He suggested that when the swelling went down I have a try at it with my magnifying mirror and tiny tweezers. I was able to do that.

I still have my 10X mirror. I look at my aging face, which looks like a lunar landscape. Chin whiskers like tree stumps. Skin like the surface of Mars. Broken capillaries snaking everywhere like fire hoses left lay after some huge house fire.   Why do I do that!?

Why do I do that about everything? If I step back and brush may hair, I don't look bad, for 52. If I look around, life is really good, I've got great friends. A wonderful husband, a son to be proud of who is talented and handsome and cracks me up. I have fun hobbies and interests.

Step away from the mirror. Yank out the eyelashes when they are problematic, and put it away.

Do you have a 10X mirror? What are you doing with it?

Migraine Wish List

A wish list for my doctors.

I wish for you the following things. This is not for ill will, but for understanding. First, I wish for you an an aura. Perhaps flashing lights, getting lost in your own hometown on the way to the grocery store, You know, the “you'd better get the shopping done before it hits” kind. You rush through the list, and dump everything on the counter, when you get home so you can crash in bed kind of aura.

For perhaps the headache itself. I could wish that for you. Kind of pain that makes you wish you could find a knitting needle and dig your own eye out of its socket so you can find the place in your brain that hurts so bad and dig it out too.

Maybe I should wish you the migraine hangover. When your scalp hurts when you comb your hair. When your skin feels bruised. When you feel foggy unbalanced and don't remember what you did the day before. Would you like that?

I think what you need is just living with the day-to-day idea of chronic pain. Of never being able to plan a life of knowing what you will do the next day. Never knowing if a date outside will end up being a day inside. Will you be out in the weather, for under the covers? Will your loved see you in nice clothes, or your pajamas? What would your medical records say for diagnosis? Annual check up? Or possible narcotic dependence? Do they really think we like taking drugs?

I don't really wish you ill. I just want you to know what it's like to be me. Perhaps then you will understand. I'm not here to get more medicine. I'm here to be understood. I'm here for you to help me. I'm not here to take up your time. I'm here to get better. I don't want you to feel sorry for me. I can do that myself. And I do. Just do what you've been trained to do. Use your brain. Search for answers to problems. The problem isn't something on paper, the problem is life, my life, and I can't live it right now, without your help, so don't send me off with more drugs and hope I will go away. Use your brain, and help my brain.

Thank you,

Your migraine patient.