It’s 3 a.m. in the 5th floor of the hospital I’ve called home for the last three days.  It’s dark, it’s quiet andI have to make a run to the bathroom. But I can’t. My medication leaves me in an altered state of mind, it leaves me dizzy. If I fall I could bleed, my body doesn’t have much blood to spare. I press the button beside my bed, one minute, two, three, four. I’m 23-years-old and I can’t even walk myself to a bathroom. Finally, my escort arrives, she’s blonde, tall, and holds my arm as we walk all of eight feet from my bed to the bathroom. I go in. She follows. She turns her back, a professional move.  There I stand, in a  5×5 foot bathroom, trying to think of something funny to say, anything to say. My escort, dressed in her maroon scrubs, remains silent.
I’m done in a minute, ready to go; ready to avoid eye contact at any cost. The journey is made back from the bathroom to my bed– it”s probably more like seven feet, maybe six and a half. I’m helped back onto my mattress, tucked in by the blonde in maroon scrubs, reminded if I need anything–anything at all–to press the call button.

Just last night, right before bed my mother filed my toe nails. Nurses my age walk by, I just smile and nod as mother rounds off the edges.
“Much better,” she adds, gently wipings my feet down with alcohol,  we have to be cautious, I can’t afford any infections.

“Thanks mom,” I return in a tone she hardly deserves.

I’m a 23-year-old, who was working full-time less than three weeks ago, living in my own apartment, filing my own nails.

I know I’m being obtuse. I should be happy to accept the care I’m fortunate enough to have, grateful for parents willing to do anything and everything to keep me healthy. And yes, my bone marrow has failed, but my mind hasn’t. It  feels as it did last month, craves the same freedom it grew  to love over the last year. It doesn’t want to admit that I’m anchored to my sickess for now, and likes to forget I’m attached to a rolling IV unit—–a leash—–24 hours a day. All it seems to remember is that I’m an independent, 23 year-old.

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