Pre-Surgery Concerns

Do people fart when they’re on the operating table? During surgery I mean, once that anesthesia hits, you take a deep breath, you go to sleep, your muscles relax—all of them. I need someone to confirm that I won’t just let loose as soon as I knock out. Luckily the doctors and nurses will be wearing medical masks over their mouths and noses; who knows, they might even be all plugged up under there, secretly so as not to embarrass their customer. 

This is my main fear about my surgery, truly; the thought of me, lying naked with a paper bag over my body, mouth gaping open, farting up a storm while my surgeon tries to focus through watering eyes. I voiced this complaint to a few friends, all of whom laughed at me and said that was the least of my worries. “These people are professionals they don’t care about that stuff, besides maybe it’ll lighten the mood in there,” a close friend giggles, gingerly slapping my arm. Oh, it’ll be lit up, that’s for sure. 

I offer these concerns to my parents as well. I tell them I’d literally rather die during surgery before my placid body betrays me through flatulence. “Oh honey why do you have to be so dark all the time!” My mother shrieks over my dad’s joining in of, “I know you’re a snorer too, hopefully the nose plugs double as ear ones.” 

My mom rolls her eyes and gets up to refill our coffee mugs. I watch her walk away, out of the corner of my eye I see my dad blink away a tear, he blushes and shyly smiles when he sees that I’ve noticed. He tells me that he hopes for all of our sakes, I’ll be snoring the whole surgery through. I roll my eyes, secretly relieved at the thought. 

I catch a lot of those secret tears, those eyes staring at the floor when reality sets in for a moment. I feel the somber glances, cold at my bare neck, I can hear the pitying and sympathetic sighs all at my expense. I hate it. I hate this attention. I hated it more at first, the limp pats on my back, the sad, “poor you” droopy eyes looking at me when they hear or see my condition. It made me so angry; all of these healthy people staring at me, feeling sorry for me like it couldn't just as easily be them in my chemo chair. People using me as an example to realize how truly lucky they are; that they might not have money or beauty but at least they have their health. Well I’m bald, sick, and deep in it with the hospital bills so what do I have? What do I get out of this deal? 

I like that my mom still scolds me when I say inappropriate things. She knows I’m sick but I’m not special. The sick girl does not get to cuss at the dinner table. Except for that one time when I broke down in a “why me?!” tantrum in front of my family. It felt good though, to let it out like that. Before this massive breakdown I had convinced myself that stoicism was the way to go. Take it like a champ: no tears, the sadder you look, the sadder your family will be. But that's not actually true. 

Nobody likes to see a sad person, but it’s torture to watch a person that is physically there but mentally miles below, in a grim and dark place. I saw my mom do it once, at dinner after finding out the cancer had spread. She just left. She was there, sitting there with a fork in her hand staring into her glass of wine like it was whispering something terribly tragic to her. I don’t think anyone else noticed but I watched for about a minute before she snapped out of it and gathered herself. I looked away before she caught me staring to give her some privacy. That’s when I realized that I probably had that same stare constantly plastered on my face. I was always zoning out, thinking about myself, deciding that whoever speaking wasn’t worth pulling me away from my tragedy. How hard it must be, for my family to see me like that. To see me like this, bald and frail, must be hard enough but the burden of watching your child’s spirit deplete as her hair falls out has to be unbearable. 

When I had my tantrum, my family listened. My parents livened up at my anger, they saw me feeling something and I saw them will it out of me. They listened and they joined in on my rage, bashing the universe for doing this to all of us. My siblings began making jokes about all of the minute rules I must have broken to be given this curse: what was it, the time I stole my sister’s dress and somebody puked on it at a party? The time my brother and I were in line at the grocery store an I stepped backwards, accidentally knocking over a toddler that I didn’t see standing there. That was it, we all decided; the time I kicked a baby. We laughed, I cried while laughing. To secretly emote joy and sadness at the same time is a beautiful experience, so much more enjoyable than pure sorrow. 

After that night I decided my attitude was as important to recovery as the hospital visits, the medication, the chemo, it all goes hand in hand. Now that being said, I’m still bitter as hell, I hate this sickness and I hate all the pity. So I respond with sarcasm, it’s my only redemption from absorbing it all and mentally leaving this place. My dad gets it and he plays along. My mom does too, but they both still have that look of concern in their eyes; they don’t want to lose me. So why not annoy them a bit to make the loss a bit easier right? Throw a couple fart jokes in the mix, just enough to make my mom roll her eyes and leave the room in hopes that the subject has changed by the time she’s back with the pot of coffee; it hasn’t. 

A fart during surgery here or there wouldn’t be the worst thing to happen to a person. I think cancer would be worse, definitely. A fart from a cancer patient during surgery?! I mean come on give a girl a break.