Update

My grandma isn’t all better by any stretch of the imagination, but she is home now. My father got home yesterday and she had just been sent home from the hospital (mainly because her meds are all regulated and she wasn’t getting any sleep in her room– her roommate was up screaming all night, poor thing). Here’s hoping she feels much better.

Remember my earache? Oh my God people. Do not continue reading unless you have a seriously strong stomach because this is so disgusting even MY stomach kind of rolls when I think about it and it’s MY STUFF!

So I’ve had this earache. More of a pressure-in-the-ear thing. And lately my hearing in that ear would get all intermittent. Like, one minute I could hear out of it, the next I couldn’t. I made a doctor’s appointment but it’s in two weeks because my family doctor is all busy. I was considering going in to the walk-in clinic but I’m too lazy. Anyway. Yesterday was a day when I couldn’t hear out of my ear. It wasn’t really sore, but it was itchy. And so I did the thing I have sworn all my life not to do. I got a q-tip. YES I KNOW USING QTIPS IS BAD FOR YOU!

Anyway I got the qtip and I swiped it around in there and I felt something coming unstuck from my eardrum. I pulled it out and (here’s the gross part people) there was this big hunk of grossness there. Seriously. It was slimy. Grey, brown, black. About the size of a pencil eraser. I was at once repulsed and mesmerized by it. My body? Made that? And put it in my ear? WHY?!

Anyway I flushed it (aren’t you glad there were no photographs?) and then I revelled in being able to hear again. Phoned my mom. “I CAN HEAR!” and then described the above. When she was done gagging she said “you had an ear infection and whatever that was just stuck itself to your eardrum”. I said “But it didn’t really hurt…” “LOUISE YOUR EAR INFECTIONS NEVER HURT! DON’T YOU KNOW THAT BY NOW?!” It’s been so long since I’ve had one (15 years!) that I didn’t remember that. I was so used to the pain of ear infections, and the pain of having surgery on my ears, and the pain of not having eardrums, and then the pain of having them implanted, and then the pain of … whatever… that I guess I’m just kind of clueless when it comes to my ear health. Because even if it hurts, to me, it seems normal.

Anyway. I hope you weren’t reading this before lunch. I’m still gonna see my doctor when I can but at least between now and then I can hear.