Thorns In The Head

This story does not have me saving my head similar to a superhero zombie like the previous post. Instead, I am more of an oaf left standing dumbfounded with thorns in my head.

 

This past Fall, I had enthusiastically accepted a long term sub job in 6th grade at Moe and Franki's school. It was extremely refreshing to be back in the classroom creating lesson plans and making what we called " big girl checks." Being out-of-practice to the whole full-time working mom gig (props to those full-time working moms who balance everything), the house resembled a battle zone with dishes unwashed, toys strung about, and landscaping unkempt. We had leaves in flower beds, crispy dead perennials that needed to be dead headed and a few ugly, scary rose bushes that had grown out of control. One rose bush in particular had thorns on the base that were the size of a guitar pic. Spoiler alert: I would end up fighting this exact rose bush.

 

Thinking I needed to get as much Fall clean up as possible done in a quick Sunday afternoon, I got my nippers, rakes, and yard waste bags. The weather was nice; however, the wind was gusting at 30 mph. I had this one afternoon and wind was not going to slow me down so I started digging those crispy dead annuals out of their pots. Next I put on heavy duty gardening gloves and got my large nipper to tackle our rebellious and unruly rose bushes. I went head first (this will be even funnier in a second) into the base of the biggest rose bush, the one with the guitar pic sized thorns, and started grooming. The wind made it hard to keep my balance, but damn it I was going to at least get the outside of the house looking neat again (even though the inside was a disheveled disaster). Well the wind won, and dropped me head first into the rose bush.







 

Once again I was laying on the ground wondering what had I done to myself. With gardening nippers in one hand and thorny rush bush vines in the other, I didn't have a chance to protect my head this time. After all, nippers to the head is generally frowned upon whether you've had brain surgery or not. After pulling myself out of the bush, I felt a warm trickle  of blood running down my face.
 

Leaving my pile of weeds on the ground I race inside to survey the damage. I am bleeding from my head, and the punctures are around the shunt site. I also see that there are some thorns embedded in my scalp. I yell some obscenities and throw the bloody wash cloth on the ground because I am embarrassed to show Kyle I am also having flashbacks of how a small cut turned into bacterial meningitis and two more surgeries last fall. I need him to pull the thorns out, so with sheepish eyes I approach him and explain what happened. The look on his face said, "How in the hell did a rose bush kick your ass?"
 

Tweezers in sanitized hand, Kyle pulls out at least 3 thorns from my scalp. Then I apply an antibacterial cream every hour completely paranoid of infection. I walked around for two weeks with a permanent greasy spot from my compulsive application of Neosporin. However, after pulling 3 thorns, I still felt like there was still something in my scalp. Sure enough the next morning a 4th thorn came to the surface. It was completely submerged; Kyle couldn't even see it.

The first three thorns Kyle pulled out of my head.



Paranoia also made me call the neurosurgeon-on-call at Research Medical Center on a Sunday afternoon with my issue. He was polite enough, but I am sure that surgeon was thinking "What a quack!" We also called my neurosurgeon on Monday wanting an emergency appointment. All I could think of was last December, and I wanted to do EVERYTHING possible to prevent an infection, hence my perpetual greasy Neosporin spot and the rubbing alcohol on my vanity. Well, my neurosurgeon did not see my situational urgency and refused an appointment.  Its not like he wasn't busy ;) Everything turned out fine and everything healed, but it did start the thought process of if I was the best candidate for a shunt with all my klutzy tendencies. It also made Kyle seriously consider buying me a helmet. But a helmet with a wig so I could still look awesome, of course.