my 10 inch scar.

visiting my friend sara in the hospital and spending time with her while she's laid up at home has really brought back the memories of this particular month of my life. it doesn't upset me to talk or write about it-- after all it has been 10 years.

all my life, i'd had little moments when it hurt to breathe. kind of like when you're working out, and you get the really sharp pains in your lungs. only more. one night, it got really bad.

anna and i were home alone. cristina had gone away to college, dad was on a business trip and mom was at some meeting at church or school. anna got really scared, but i wouldn't let her take me to the hospital. i made her call taneka to ask her was an asthma attack was like. like your throat is shrinking. no, that wasn't it.

i know now, of course, it was a thymic cyst the size of a grapefruit residing inside my ribcage. it occasionally made its presence known by nudging my right lung. that sucked, to say the least. very rare. the doctor asked me if he could write me up in a medical journal. the thymus is a gland present in your body at birth. after aiding in the development of your immune system, it's supposed to disappear. mine didn't.

it was kind of an a-ha moment-- that's why, while i was by no means a sickly kid, i was much more prone to colds, strep throat and mononucleosis in the 4th grade than my sister. yes, who gets mono in the 4th grade? me. atleast that explanation made sense to me. (i did make that up.)

i spent 5 days in the hospital. 2 weeks at home. i recovered quickly for the major surgery i had, thanks in part to the fact i had just finished my first tennis season and i was young (14). lost all that tennis muscle though.

before i went to the hospital for the ct scan and ultrasound which ultimately revealed the thing, i had only ever been once- to visit my friend sarah who fell and had a concussion. if your name is sara(h), please don't be my friend.

the next time i was in the hospital it was for 5 days of morphine drips, crappy food, dad sleeping on the cot next to me, wondering where my mother was, realizing who truly care about me (tan, nora, hotcop, my tennis coach, my french teacher, and other random people who came to visit), plus the nicest nurse ever. i remember the name of my favorite: carolyn. she was there the first night and came back 4 days later.

[let's be clear-- my mother passes out in hospitals. that's why she wasn't there as much as i would've liked her to be. i've never told her that. when i wrote my thank-you note to her best friend she told me to write thanks for taking care of my mom.].

all this was in the midst of the first semester of my freshman year of high school.