My Hospital Story

Why I No Longer Take My Health For Granted

In November of 2022, I had what I thought was a stomach virus. I was up all night vomiting and had severe stomach pain. Although at the time I didn't believe the two to be related, I was coming off a month of recurring and seemingly idiopathic GI issues. But because I've had stomach bugs before and they aren't typically emergencies, I pressed on. I figured the worst of it was over the next day since I was only left with mild lingering GI discomfort.

But a day turned into several days, and although the pain wasn't as severe as that first night, it would not go away and was starting to escalate. I was still training clients and had difficulty standing upright for more than 10-15 minutes at a time. I guess I looked miserable enough that my clients started to express their concerns.

Luckily, a client's husband, whom I also knew, was a doctor at a nearby hospital. His wife relayed my condition to him, and he called me. I still remember the conversation we had because it was the moment I realized I had to start taking this seriously. He told me the one thing that I didn't want to hear:

"I think you have appendicitis. You need to go to the ER."

I wanted to go to the ER as much as I wanted bamboo shards under my fingernails, but the shit wasn't getting better. And being stubborn like this is how dudes die. I eventually said, "Fuck it, you gotta take care of this," and drove to Emory. Even though he did what he could to fast-track me, it took over 5 hours to make it through the ER gauntlet. I was still in denial about appendicitis because the pain seemed to be in the wrong place, and I wasn't writhing in agony. I figured the doc would come back and tell me I had a GI disorder like Crohn's or IBS, which are terrible in their own right, but the thought of surgery scared the shit out of me.

The first thing the doctor said when she walked into the room was, "Yeah...you're not going anywhere. You will probably need to be with us for a few days." My heart sank.

In short, my appendix had perforated at some point, and an abscess had formed. It was leaking bacteria into my gut, which explains the GI unpleasantness. Judging by the size of the appendix—the docs specifically used the phrases "huge" and "pissed off"—there is no telling how long this had been going on. The plan was to keep me in the hospital long enough to take care of the infection, potentially have surgery to drain the abscess, and then come back a month later to remove the appendix.

As if my body was holding on for the diagnosis, shit started going downhill pretty quickly. I remember being in a room in the ER and wondering if this was really happening. I don't know if it was the infection or because ER rooms are kept at the temperature of meat lockers, but I was freezing. I had the attending nurse put a pile of warm blankets on me, yet they did little to slow the penetrating cold that was now seeping into my bones.

The first few days of my stay are a little fuzzy, but I remember walking down a hallway toward imaging or something, and I couldn't stand up all the way. I was stooping and shuffling like an old man, and my entire body shook. I felt like I had fast-forwarded 50 years into the throes of senescence. I was frustrated and laughing because I realized how pathetic I probably looked.

As an aside, being in the hospital can feel dehumanizing because all modesty goes out the window. You're being poked and prodded, are often naked or barely covered, and the staff are barging into your room at all hours of the night. You're exhausted because your body is going through it, but also because your sleep is constantly interrupted to check vitals, have blood drawn, or be administered medications. And then they have the gall to ask you how you slept! As the real cherry on top, if you're having surgery or potentially having surgery, you could not eat for a day or days if you have multiple surgeries. It's like the perfect storm to make patients assholes.¹ Anywho, back to the story.

My haplessness reached its peak shortly after the docs drained the abscess. I had diffuse but intense pain in my abdomen, and it was excruciating to move. It took everything I had to get out of my hospital bed to go to the bathroom.

I remember thinking that I went from being a healthy and strong 35-year-old dude to barely being able to get up to go to the bathroom in 24 hours. It was the ultimate cure for hubris.

The infection subsided, they monitored me for a couple more days just to be safe, and I was (finally) released on Day 5.

I was able to resume my normal life for the following month before heading back in for surgery to remove the appendix. The surgery was a cakewalk compared to my prior stay. From what I understand, laparoscopic appendectomies are about as routine as they come. They told me not to lift anything over 10 pounds for 8 weeks, a directive I partially ignored for reasons I won't get into here. I lasted about 3 weeks and was back to full strength by the 8-week mark.²

At the time, the ordeal was all-consuming, but I have mostly forgotten it. I think our ability to just forget shit like that is kind of wild. But I will never forget how miserable I was for those few days and how quickly my physical health took a turn for the worse.

The experience humbled me, but it also made me realize something else. Bad things can happen for no reason, and although health is often thought of as being able to do things, it's also being able to withstand things. It's, in essence, being harder to kill. I won’t be so dramatic as to say that being fit and healthy saved my life. I actually have no idea how much risk there was. But I do believe it put me in the best possible position should shit have truly hit the fan. And it certainly allowed me to recover more quickly.

Over two years later, I'm sans appendix and have only three small incision scars to commemorate the ordeal. Although I have never had a shortage of reasons to take care of my body, this gave me something else that was perhaps greater than all the other reasons combined. So now I'm saying to you: do not neglect your health, and don't take it for granted. It can be taken from you instantly, and you never know when it will come in handy.

1. I recognize this is part of the deal. The hospital staff was excellent.

2. I wouldn't have pushed this if I weren’t very confident in knowing my limits. But I’m body aware enough to know what I can and can’t do.