Post-Traumatic Stress, Take Two

16Dec09

I was pick-pocketed on a busy bus and discovered it only a couple of hours later, when I opened my purse. I couldn’t find my wallet despite effectively burrowing to the bottom of my bag, where everything ends up. I didn’t get that sickening pit in my stomach. I accepted that, yes, wallet number three was gone.

I knew exactly what to do. Seven years before I had lost my wallet in Costa Rica; my wallet had also been stolen about four years ago. Now I keep only the bare minimum in my wallet. I went home to my handy-dandy folder of ID numbers and crucial phone numbers. I cancelled cards and applied for new ones.

Even though I did everything I could, that night I had weird dreams about my wallet being gone. In one dream, someone stole my identity. I also kept waking up intermittently, feeling paranoid and wondering if the door was locked. I even got up to check it.

The next morning, when I was thinking a little more clearly, I was fascinated about how bizarrely we’re wired. Sometimes logic doesn’t prevail. In daylight, I could see that my mind was linking this theft with the previous one.

That whole incident was very upsetting. Deb and I had left our purses just inside the foyer of my house. Apparently when we were downstairs watching movies, someone tried the unlocked front door, walked in, and helped themselves to our bags. It’s only when she was getting ready to leave that we realized what had happened.

I felt so violated. I also was angry because the one time I had forgotten to lock the door – look what happened! The cops came but it was painfully obvious they had better stuff to do. Their questions and report were just a formality. I felt more safe once the locksmith came in the wee hours and replaced all of the locks.

Things, however, got worse. A cop called early Monday morning, waking me with questions that he needed answered in order to finish his report. When I was in the shower, it struck me that a lot of the questions were redundant with the ones asked by the cops on Saturday night. Since I had to fly to NYC for work, I got Colin to check with the station. He called me later to confirm my suspicion and share the creepiness: the cops hadn’t called. Great, our house was being cased! Until we got an alarm system, he wouldn’t leave me at home alone. I dreaded going into the kitchen because I felt on display, given the large, glass doors leading out to our backyard.

It took an alarm system (albeit kind of gross) and a couple of months before I felt safe in my house. But ever since, whenever I’m stressed, I wake up in the middle of the night, either to wonder about the front door being locked or inevitably to go and check it.

The mind does play tricks, but sometimes for good reason.


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Lump

02Dec09

This post is an important reminder for all of the wonderful women in my life.

A couple of days before leaving for Hawaii, I had my yearly physical. I never thought much of having one. I rarely get sick and I always feel really healthy. So I had time stand still when the doctor was examining my right breast and said that she felt something. Just like that, my heart and the suspect breast dropped through the examination table and the cold floor below, into a gaping hole.

I tried to focus on the doctor’s questions. No, there was no history of breast cancer in my family, but my sister had had a scare with a cyst about a year ago. The doctor then said something about the lump in my breast not being hard, but kind of squishy, which is characteristic of a cyst. She wanted me to make an appointment before my vacation, so I could have an ultrasound as soon as I returned.

She also asked if I do monthly breast exams. I had to sheepishly answer, no. I felt really ridiculous. Here I exercise regularly, eat healthy, and proactively deal with physical hiccups as soon as they surface, yet I don’t do breast self-exams. Crazy. How long had the lump been there? I had no clue. Foolish.

I chose denial (or maybe it chose me) for the next two weeks and I had a fantastic vacation. I lost only a few hours sleep when I woke up one night and I thought of all of the horrible things breast cancer would mean. During those tedious hours, I played out lots of awful scenarios. However, I also got re-acquainted with the well of determination in me. I would fight! And I even tried to think of a perk: a wig could be cool. But overall, I was really sad to think one of my girls may be sick and may have to be lopped off.

One day, Paul and I were driving around Kauai listening to crazy funny surfer radio when next thing we knew, these dudes were talking to a doctor who had called in about (duhn duhn duhn) – BREAST CANCER. Talk about a crazy coincidence. What the doctor said was really interesting. In the U.S., from the age of 40 upwards, women are encouraged to get yearly mammograms. However, each mammogram increases their risk of cancer by 1% because it exposes their delicate tissue to radiation. I panicked upon hearing that because when I had called for my ultrasound appointment, the receptionist informed me that she was going to automatically schedule me for a diagnostic mammogram, which my doctor hadn’t even mentioned.

I returned from vacation and had a few days before my appointment. I got in touch with Michelle whom I can always count on for sound medical advice. She concurred that the radiation from yearly mammograms isn’t good, and encouraged me to clarify that I wanted an ultrasound first and then a mammogram only if necessary. She also told me about breast MRIs, which give no radiation. I called the breast health centre and explained my concern about radiation. I said I was interested in progressive diagnosis – ultrasound, breast MRI, and then mammogram. The receptionist noted all of that but suggested I speak with the technician during my appointment.

The fateful day arrived. I felt emotionally—and physically—weak. As luck would have it, I had had food poisoning just the day before. I was grateful for calm Paul who stayed with me through the hospital check-in and all of that. Since I was going to be tested for upwards of two hours, I sent him back to work. Little did I know they were going to tell me the results immediately after!

Well, they did. My story ends happily this time. I only had to have an ultrasound. I had a few cysts. Relief. I truly felt the weight of my good luck when I was leaving and saw a woman crying in the waiting room. My heart got all twisted up.

All you lovely ladies out there, please learn from my scare. Do your breast self-exams monthly. And be sure to understand the procedures and tests you’re sent for.


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Duality Snippet

12Oct09

late-night spadina station. i hurry from the subway to the streetcar. near the column a homeless guy urinates with (ahem) abandon. everyone picks up their pace, regretting the reason.

fast-forward 12 or so hours later. it’s mid-day and the same spot. this time i’m retracing my steps to the subway. a fragile fluttering catches the corner of my eye. almost warily, i turn towards the column. a pretty black and yellow butterfly dances about, seemingly confused by the walls and roof. suddenly there’s collective acuity. the crowd shares a just perceptible pause to admire the pretty, little prisoner.


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Stupid Tourist

20Sep09

from my travel journal: 19 july 09
kathmandu, nepal

I felt like a stupid tourist at Pashupatinath. Zsoka had said, “Go see the burning bodies.” But it didn’t register until I was there that I was trespassing (or so it felt to me) upon families’ funerals.

As soon as we paid our admittance fee, a man who wanted to be our guide hurried us up some stairs and proudly presented the platform we stood on. He gestured to the river and then ushered us to the platform’s walled edge. I tried to distance myself from him because I didn’t want a guide. I was wondering how we were going to lose him. Those thoughts were hastily swept away when I peered over and saw we were right above a couple of funeral ghats. A foot was just being licked by orange flames. My stomach jumped into my mouth. I felt sick – a human body was burning less than 10 feet from me. I also felt liking becoming invisible. I felt I had mis-stepped boundaries and cultures. I wouldn’t want groups of foreigners watching my loved ones’ funerals. Some things are meant to be private or, in this case, shared only within a known community.

Things got worse, in my opinion. (I’m very aware that I may have projected my personal discomfort, but I don’t think so given the glares we got from families.) We left the platform—and the guide—and crossed a bridge, which took us over the sacred river. Facing us were stone steps, like prehistoric bleechers. On them were at least 30 or so other foreigners all wearing—groan—matching red t-shirts. They magnified my tourist humiliation. The steps. The shirts. A disrespectful sporting motif tinged it all for me. What must these locals think of us? (And yes, I may as well have been wearing a red t-shirt.)

Sure, you can argue that the temple is a UNESCO world heritage zone for which tickets are sold. Sure, tourist revenue helps with the up-keep of the reverent area. But, I highly doubt the locals who are there, trying to say good-bye to their loved ones, were ever asked if they minded the foreign attendees. From the cold looks they gave us, I’m guessing an overwhelming “no.”

I took one surreptitious photo of the funeral ghats. There was an eerie beauty to the smoke and fire above the river, reaching up the late-day sky. When I focused on that view, I felt the reverence I wanted to communicate to the mourners. Stowing my camera away, casting my eyes down, and getting out of there as quickly as I could were the ways I knew to show some respect for the sadness that permeated the place.

The whole experience reminded me that I always have to put thought into where I go as a tourist. I feel I usually do. I can’t recall another place that overwhelmed me with regret. (You could even argue that that’s good.) The experience underscored to me that forethought is always so important. I hate feeling like a stupid tourist.


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Fifteen Minutes

08Sep09

from my travel journal: 19 july 09
kathmandu, nepal

All Kathandu’s traffic—foot, bicycle, auto—travelled and converged together in a water-like swirl down the main streets. The amount of hassling was high, but maybe that was requisite because the energy was also high. Walking was a challenge. But I sometimes like when things that should be easy, are hard. Puts things in perspective. And, believe me, my perspective got battered.

Aside from the traffic’s black spit-up, the city is vivid. Saturated saris. Overflowing stores. Painted pilgrims. Stone idols with pigments pressed on. Decorated rickshaws. And all moving, or being moved, at a frantic pace, often like a photograph’s blur. In hindsight, Kathmandu made a good impression on me because I loved its craziness. However, I didn’t like a lot of things that happened to me there. Especially….

Stephanie and I were walking down a street in search of a cab to get to the “monkey temple” (Swayambhunath).  Two boys walked on the other side of her. The older (12-years-old?) held the hand of the younger (eight-years-old?). The little one kept pace with her, trying to catch her eye and fiddling with a foil-wrapped candy. He offered a hundred rupees intermittently and something else that I couldn’t catch. Naïvely I thought maybe he was offering the candy. But once they passed us, Stephanie, looking somewhat horrified, said she thought it was for sex. And with my stomach lurching, I came to the same conclusion.

On our circle back, a ten-year-old boy flanked me. He flung out, “15 minutes, 500 rupees.” I felt sick because, yeah, he had to be offering sex. I had been offered everything else, from drugs to trinkets. His proposition only mentioned time and money, leaving an implicit and, therefore, explicit blank. He was clandestine, furtive. Even when I had been offered drugs, the tactic, though similar, stated what was being sold.

Street kids are rampant in Nepal. Of course I know about child prostitution. But having it right in my face was shocking, even if it sounds cliché. Knowing something and being faced with it are very different things. I felt the harsh, palpable difference.


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Otter Snippet

07Sep09

from my travel journal: 18 july 09
driving to kathmandu

waterfalls streamed across the road, making our bus slow and letting us see how the locals were enjoying the surplus water. my glance up caught a jubilant boy on a green terrace. he was all shiny and sleek from the water being splashed on him by other kids. his face was open and his body was closed, hunched over. he was expectant for the next dousing, loving and hating it at the same time.


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Permit

06Sep09

from my travel journal: 16 july 09
some tibetan road

Can’t forget our other driving adventure. We finally hit a relatively flat, paved patch of road. The bus pulled over. Our guide explained we all had to get out because the driver needed to go and get gas. Huh? Yes, we were to wait for him to return in 15 minutes.

Our options were to start hiking the road in the direction we’d inevitably go via bus, or to sit and wait. We all chose the latter since a couple of people were suffering still from altitude sickness.

On a sandy, windy, sunny corner in the middle of nowhere yet at some apparent junction, we sat. A Tibetan farmer and his son were already there. They stayed to stare at us for at least five minutes, bemused and curious as to what this whacky group of foreigners was doing. Unable to figure out our plight, the two of them turned and wandered away.

I found myself as perplexed as them. I was grumpy given the arid, evening sun still burning down and dirt blowing into my eyes and my mouth. Why couldn’t we stay on the bus and go with the driver to get gas?

The answer crystalized why foreigners can have a hard time travelling in Tibet. No permit. The closest gas station was in an area for which the guide hadn’t gotten us a permit. The government didn’t know we’d be going there and, therefore, we couldn’t go. (You also can’t go anywhere in Tibet without a guide.) Our Tibetan driver would make it through the obligatory police checkpoint without question.

Of course the driver didn’t return for at least 45 minutes. That gave a shepherdress ample time to come over while her sheep jogged across the highway. She came amongst us and stood and stared. I liked her blatant curiosity. Her little boy who just reached her hand also stared. Thankfully Zsoka speaks Tibetan. She explained our herd. The shepherdress got a wry smile on her face before pushing on with her sheep. Their bells and her prematurely aged, yet smiling face added decoration to the odd predicament.


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Yak Snippet

05Sep09

from my travel journal: 13 july 09
some himalayan highway

one time i looked out the bus window to see silvery, green, slim trees framing silhouettes of yak. the shimmering foliage acted like a theatre curtain that had just begun to rise and reveal the ancient-looking, hairy cast. such wonderful, effective back-lighting.


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Quirky

05Sep09

from my travel journal: 10 & 11 july 09
lhasa, tibet

I like when people jump out of stereotypes, especially when the leap reveals humour and charm. Then I’m reminded of how much I usually judge, making quick assumptions. I shouldn’t.

On my way into Jokhang Temple I was stopped dead in my tracks by a lithe monk who pulled a leprechaun move and cut in front. Suddenly there he was before me, spinning the gold wheel, flinging his friendly, yet devilish giggle over his robed shoulder. All I could do was smirk.

At Potala Palace, when I was losing enthusiasm for taking it all in because there just was so much, I happened to catch the eye of a monk in a gloomy, dusty chapel. He quickly stopped his incantations and proceeded to dramatically slouch over, as if he had fallen asleep. A few moments later, his bright eyes peeked over his shoulder to see if I was still watching. Of course I was. We shared a smile.


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Devotion Snippet

04Sep09

from my travel journal: 10 july 09
lhasa, tibet

pilgrims flung themselves into plank poses, thlapping onto their wood-shoed hands over jokhang’s sacred stones.


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