Life on the Other Side
By fearing death, I fear life itself.
One month before I moved to New York, I had a routine physical exam in my hometown, doing my due diligence as a newly college educated adult and checking up on my health. I was hoping — expecting, really — for everything to be fine, and make my way to my new home in Brooklyn with a clean bill of health. The physician seemed concerned when she told me my thyroid felt “full” and I should have an ultrasound to check it out. Naturally, this made me nervous, as someone who has never once had to think about their thyroid before, much less worry something might be wrong with it.
This isn’t exactly where my anxiety began, but it’s certainly where it started getting worse. I’ve always been one of those people who are deathly afraid of everything. Literally. There is no time in my memory of being alive where I don’t recall constantly fearing for my life, for some reason or another. Terrible things happen to people all the time, so what’s stopping something awful from happening to me? Not much, I’d say. Someone could break into my home and stab me in the chest, I could suffer a gunshot wound from a stray bullet, the building I’m in could collapse at any moment. All of these things happen to people just like me. So really, what are the odds? These are thoughts I have regularly. So when it comes to my physical health, things are no different. If it’s possible for a young person in good health to suffer a stroke or a heart attack or what have you, then dammit, I could be the next one out.
I went back to the doctor a couple days later for the ultrasound, something I’d never had to do before, and stared at the cloud patterns on the ceiling tiles for 45 minutes while the technician pressed the transducer into my neck, rubbing the cold gel into the collar of my shirt. I thought about these clouds briefly, wondering if they were supposed to be calming or distracting. I didn’t feel like I was lying comfortably outside staring at the sky in the slightest, though I wish it somehow helped. I was told nothing about what was on the ultrasound, and left with no more information than I came in with. I had a follow up with the physician a few days later to go over my results, and I was not met with pleasant news. She told me I had a multi-nodular goiter, that my thyroid was enlarged and had dozens of nodules on it, some larger than others.
These nodes can be cancerous, she said. You’ll most likely need your thyroid removed, at least partially.
This didn’t sound right to me, so I just sat there waiting for her to say something else. Something like, well that’s actually a worst case scenario, and there’s no need to panic. Or maybe, here’s some facts about thyroid cancer, and why your symptoms probably don’t point to it. Anything, really. I’d soon learn, no thanks to her, that my condition wasn’t a gateway to thyroid cancer. Even if it was, if I was going to have any type of cancer, thyroid cancer is one of the easiest ones to treat.
But all she said after my moment of silence was that I was taking the news much better than most patients would. She then had me immediately go in for a CT scan to double check the fine work done with the ultrasound, something else I’d never done before. I cried the entire time worried that maybe I did have cancer, and wondering how I would move to New York to live on my own if I needed surgery. The CT scan results came back showing the nodes were even larger than what was originally measured, according to the physician, and a biopsy needed to be performed as soon as possible to rule out cancer, though she heavily suggested that’s exactly what it was.
All of this was horrible news, as I had only undergone surgery for the first time earlier that month when I had my wisdom teeth extracted, something I barely did willingly as it was. I had all but convinced myself the anesthesia would do me in. I was worried I wouldn’t make it out on the other side. I did, obviously, coming out fine, just shaken. Despite having lived to tell the tale, the idea of having a much, much more delicate operation for something much, much more serious was not of any interest to me. I didn’t know what to do but consider every terrifying possibility imaginable and crying myself to sleep at night worrying about all of it. Obviously this was the only option.
A few weeks later, I moved to Brooklyn anyway, and my dad helped get me there and moved in to my new apartment. I almost opted to turn back, as I didn’t know how I could possibly navigate living somewhere unfamiliar and attending a master’s program while trying to beat cancer. Cancer. It seemed like one of those things that only happens to other people. Like dying in a building collapse, or randomly getting shot.
I decided to stick it out, though I felt lonelier than ever before sitting in my basement bedroom in the company of only my material things, hanging up photos of me with people I wasn’t sure I’d ever see again. I didn’t know my roommates, I didn’t know the city, I didn’t know if the debt I was incurring to go grad school was going to be worth it, I didn’t know anything, besides the fact that I was scared.
On day two, I scheduled an appointment with an endocrinologist. The first doctor of the many I’d see didn’t seem so worried based on my scans, but referred me for a biopsy at the end of the month anyway. I went in for the biopsy, another thing I’ve never done before, just to get all set up and have the radiologist tell me there was nothing on the ultrasound that indicated I needed this procedure done. Interesting. So I left, and tried not to think about my thyroid again.
Even though I was seemingly in the clear, I spent the first semester of school wondering about my health. While this is something I’d always generally done, this time I got so close to having a real problem. It made me think even more, elevating my anxiety to new heights.
I tried to find joy in my new life despite everything, taking advantage of the fact that I now lived in the greatest city in the world. There was an endless supply of things to do, though I did many things on my own that would have been far more enjoyable with a friend. I went kayaking on the Hudson, I rode a bike along the beach, I used my student discount at the movie theater. The feeling of solitude was relatively new, and while I wasn’t completely isolated, being new to the city came with many days that felt like I was. Surely I’m not special for feeling this way, as for a place that never sleeps, I sure was tired of being alone.
Whenever I’d talk to old acquaintances, they’d tell me how cool it was that I was living the dream in New York City, that I was so brave and strong to be doing that on my own. Well, I didn’t feel brave or strong. There were good times, of course, but the thoughts lingering in the back of my mind tended to overshadow them.
In undergrad, I struggled briefly with insomnia. But that first year in New York, there would be many nights I couldn’t sleep at all, save an hour or two after lying there for what seemed like forever with no luck, worried that I might die in my sleep for some unknown reason. This happens to people, I swear. To healthy people with no known pre-existing conditions, even. This is what always got me. You can just, not know something is wrong. I remember hearing about a girl from my high school whose dad died that way, and I’ll see stories about similar tragedies on occasion. But I suppose you can find anything if you look for it.
Could that happen to me? I seriously started to wonder. Being alive is a fickle thing.
Months continue to pass, and I began to worry if I should have asked to have the biopsy done anyway. What if she was wrong? What if it’s really, really bad? I decided to get another opinion from an ENT who scheduled me a biopsy for peace of mind, if nothing else. I wasn’t so apprehensive that time, for some reason, perhaps because I’d gotten that far before. The needle felt strange in my neck, not painful necessarily, just odd. I was told to lie still, don’t move, don’t breathe until it’s over. So I did that, nervous that I might need to sneeze at the wrong time. I didn’t, and turns out, I didn’t have cancer, either. I just have an abnormal thyroid, like a lot of other people.
So I went on, still distressed but slightly less so, waiting for the next thing.
Two years later and one year into the pandemic, after moving into a new apartment and thankful to finally have received my security deposit back from my old place, I woke up at two in the morning in excruciating pain. It came on suddenly and exponentially worsened, even after puking. My chest was on fire, my abdomen felt like it had been run over by a bus, and then backed over again, over and over and over. I’d never felt a pain this intense in my life, so I made a choice one can only make in absolute desperation and went to the hospital. Walking through the automatic doors in the middle of the night, hunched over, holding myself as though my insides would spill out onto the floor if I didn’t. I cried my way into the emergency room holding a bag of my own vomit. Still I had to sign a bunch of forms before I could be given a bed, and once I was, everyone referred to me as “Bed 17” and spoke to me as if I’d done something wrong.
Maybe I made a mistake coming here, I thought. The pain will probably go away. It’s probably nothing, anyway. Right? It was, however, too late to change my mind.
I spent half a day in bed 17, waiting desperately for something new to happen so I could hopefully go home, as the pain had thankfully subsided seven hours later. I don’t know if it was any of the many things they put into my IV or simply the passage of time, but I was grateful to no longer be in pain.
At first, it was written off as acid reflux, as if I’d come to the ER for something silly. But after mentioning my family’s history of gallbladder disease, I was sent for an abdominal ultrasound. Still a hard sell, considering I didn’t otherwise fall into the high risk category for gallbladder problems. The ultrasound would surely be the determiner of truths, once the imaging department opened.
Most of my time waiting was spent in absolute boredom, as my phone’s battery life was quickly dwindling and I wanted to keep my partner and parents updated on what was happening. There for a while it was just me, my throw up bag, and a vial of my urine sample hanging out on a sheet, listening to the grunts of the poor man in bed 18 discuss his impending blood transfusion with a doctor. I deeply regretted not thinking to grab my charger on the way out the door.
About half an hour after I was told my ultrasound would take place, I was rolled up to another floor. On the bright side, at least I had first-class transportation with no need to move a muscle. In the waiting room I tried napping to pass the time until I was eventually helped out of bed. I rolled my IV pole with me into the imaging room, uncomfortably got onto a table and rolled to my side. The gel was warm this time, unlike my previous ultrasound experiences, and the pressing of the transducer into my abdomen actually hurt quite a bit. The sonographer was not gentle. I did what I could to lean over and see the screen, though to me it looked like a ton of black splotches and nothing more. Like some sort of inkblot test for my midriff. There wasn’t even a single cloud on the ceiling to make me feel better. Again, she told me nothing, and bed 17 and I ended up right back where we started. Finally, a doctor came through my curtain to confirm that they indeed found “a lot” (I quote, as this is how it was phrased to me) of tiny stones in my gallbladder, and I’d need to come back and consult a surgeon for next steps. What I had was known as a gallbladder attack, and I’d need my gallbladder removed before my condition worsened. Well, great. I thought this would be the end of it, and I could go home and think everything over after finally getting some sleep. A few hours and a round of antibiotics later, I took my long dead phone home to charge and took a nap, hoping surgery wasn’t really the only solution.
The next two months consisted of panicking, more attacks, changing my diet, losing 20 pounds, several 20 minute walks to the hospital, and a daily bouts of alarming uneasiness.
The surgery was scheduled, and I could think of absolutely nothing else leading up to it. The fear was nonstop. This time, I really was going to have an organ removed.
I join a subreddit dedicated to others who suffer the same fate as I, looking for reasons not to be scared. Of course, this search for reassurance was unsuccessful. It may not have mattered much, though, as I would have been terrified either way. I ignored the statistics and focused only on the worst circumstances imaginable. What if removal only makes things worse? What if I have a bad reaction to the anesthesia? What if something else is wrong entirely?
Luckily, aside from an unpleasant experience at the hospital, I was just fine, as expected. It sucked, I could barely walk or even move without being in pain, but I was fine. Again. Some people don’t have the luxury to say that. Every concern and panic I’d ever endured turned out to be nothing, or at least, nothing that was going to kill me. Years of my life given to the horrors of my own imagination. Even knowing this, it seemed as though something else was triggered after my surgery and emphasized all of my fears tenfold. I’ve always been afraid. So why did it start to feel so much worse?
Often times, I will dread going to bed because that’s when the fear is at its most severe. The sensation of falling asleep somehow feels like perhaps I am not falling asleep but actually I am passing away, like maybe this will be the last time I lay down to rest, and in the morning I’ll be long gone. I jolt awake and my entire body feels off, my heart races, and my brain tells me I’m dying. What seems like something that’s basically impossible for someone young and healthy feels, to me, like a reasonable concern. What if I have a strange condition I don’t know about? I didn’t know there was anything wrong with my gallbladder, and now I have one less organ inside me. Something else could be wrong, too. I have nodules on my enlarged thyroid, which I would never have know even to this day if a physician did not send me for an ultrasound and wrongly tell me I’d need it removed. But what if I do? Maybe it was fine two years ago, but what if something is worse now? Something could be wrong, and that’s all I can focus on. Something could be wrong.
Thinking this way is disruptive, and I try hard not to act on these thoughts, but even when I touch a countertop and touch my face after without realizing, it bothers me. Maybe I won’t run to the shower after, but I wonder if I should. I’ll regret not doing so, if I get sick. And if I get sick, what if something is so wrong with my body I don’t make it?
All of these nonsensical ideas and intense fears keep me inside a particular place I don’t feel comfortable leaving. I hate feeling like this. So why can’t I change? I frequently wonder what it might be like to be normal and not worry about such asinine things. I suppose everyone has their own problems, of course.
I’m not a religious person, so there is no comfort in the afterlife. I wish there was, and for years I tried so hard to have faith, but it’s never something I’ve been able to do, and I was lying to myself by thinking otherwise. Many of my friends think of heaven when they think of death, and that’s enough for them. When I think of dying, I think of the way I feel going under anesthesia. Everything just stops in an instant, like hitting pause. But with death, it’s a full stop. The only reason I feel the unpause when coming out of anesthesia is because someone wakes me up. I only have time to be scared because I come out on the other side, perfectly alive, wondering what it might feel like if my consciousness never returned. When there’s no other side, is there a place to carry my fears? I don’t have all the answers, of course. If I did, I’d like to think I’d have a nice, cushy solution to my problems. Maybe everyone else’s, too. The reality is, it doesn’t much matter. When I die (hopefully many, many years from now), there will be nothing left to hold me down in my worldly concerns. Not the good, nor the bad. I just wish that was enough for me. This is life on the other side. For now, I can only spend time on the frequencies I’ve been given, and believe that each tomorrow will be different.
Two and a half months post removal, I’ve started to develop new hopes. I’d really like to shake it all off, shed the layers of terror that make my body feel sticky with discontent. Easier said than done, as they say. Maybe something isn’t wrong with my body, and maybe the chances of someone climbing through my window while I’m sleeping to stab me are lower than they seem. Maybe my thyroid nodules will never become cancerous, and maybe I don’t need to be afraid of every stranger. Maybe I can’t control my own thoughts, but maybe it’s possible.
I still live in Brooklyn, though I’ve upgraded from the basement and don’t have to spend all my leisure time alone anymore. This is a good thing. With all that’s happened since that hard to forget moment in a Florida clinic, the weeks spent obsessing over my thyroid seem so small now. This is another good thing.
Recently, I’ve been trying to eat better, drink more water, and exercise. Something I’ve never done before. I’ve even tried journaling and reading self help books. You know, stuff that’s easily accessible for someone with student debt and struggles keeping a steady income. I realized that I’ve been so terrified of something going wrong, and yet I’ve never made a real attempt to keep myself as healthy as I can be. Now that I’m doing so, I honestly can’t say I’ve started to feel better at all. I wish everything else would begin to feel small too. I’m still filled to the brim with anxieties. But at least I’m trying.
