Needled

After much deliberation I’ve decided to talk about something that has made me fearful for years. It’s been the cause of many uneasy feelings and faintings. Alright, one fainting, but it was still traumatic for various reasons. Some of you may think this makes me a pussy, but I am here to tell you that that’s simply not true. I’m actually going to go out on a limb and say if you aren’t deathly afraid of needles there is something morbidly wrong with you. I think my uncompromising stance on this only adds to my ever increasing awesomeness.

I was more affected by this needle fear when I was younger, though it still causes some panic in the irrational part of my brain, which is pretty much all of it. The reason I believe that I’m not a pussy for this phobia is because I’m not afraid of the pain. It obviously doesn’t hurt that much at all and I am better than most at dealing with pain. It’s just the idea of a stranger sticking something inside me that causes some concern. I’m not gay, or a woman so I’m not used to it. Plus, I like to think of my skin as an impenetrable shield that nothing can break so I can live forever and needles completely fuck up that perception.

Like most of my weird, yet awesome, problems it has to stem from my childhood. Perhaps it was the time when I was at my babysitter’s and there was a rumor of a guy who drove around taking pictures of children. They also mentioned that he offered them candy and would then stick them with needles, probably injecting them with date rape drugs, or Ebola. I don’t know why that story would affect me that much. You’d think if it would make me fear anything it would be creepy old men with cameras and candy, but no, I still liked those.

There was even a time where this needle fear made me look like a complete fool in front of my entire 5th grade class. We were taking a field trip to the local hospital to learn about stuff that nobody cared about and to also take a ride in an ambulance, which everyone cared about. Well the trip was going well until they took us into this little classroom area. The started showing us young kids how to put in an IV. It wouldn’t have been so bad had they just told us about it, or drew us a diagram. Instead, they decided to break out this fake arm with veins and hair aplenty. It looked sort of like this, but with Robin Williams type arm hair:

Yeah, well my person didn’t take that very professionally as I went from sitting on my knees to falling over like a tree that had just been axed down. Again, my fainting shouldn’t have been that bad because I was in the back of the room and nobody noticed, except one parent who said “Umm, we have a problem back here”. It really blew a hole in my “get up immediately and act like nothing happened” plan.

Before I know it I was laying on a stretcher in front of my entire class. While the instructor rattled on for a half hour about why people faint and that’s not the worst part. Since I had just toppled over and was still as white as a very white thing they decided that I should not be allowed on the ambulance ride and instead had to have my mom come pick me up.

When I finally got home my mom made me lay on the couch all afternoon and do nothing except watch television. Then of course ever single program on television had to do with needles and surgeries, which I did not take kindly to. I swear, even Who’s The Boss was showing open heart surgery in gory detail. Not even The Danza could salvage my most embarrassing day ever, and he’s basically a superhero. The superhero of constant giggles, fluttering hearts and groundbreaking television.

Tags: faint, needles, Tony Danza

Category: General Posts