Got me trippin, stumblin

When I was at the doctor a few years ago, I put "cats, horses, seasonal" as my answer to the question: "Allergies to medication?" The nurse laughed at me as she pointed it out, and I was all, "Whatever, if you didn't give me six pages of stuff to fill out before each appointment, maybe I'd actually read the questions better. Bitch."

I had completely forgotten about this until I went to the doctor on Wednesday and found myself facing the same endless questions. Family histories, medication histories, hospitalization periods. It makes me wonder how exhausting this paperwork must be if you actually HAVE a history of anything other than crappy lungs and 3x yearly strep throat attacks.

I'm whizzing through my 'NO' boxes when I come to the question "Do you bruise/bleed easily?" Dead stop in the waiting room. I have bruises everywhere. In the summertime, I'm the girl rocking sundresses with busted up knees, tank tops with purple swelling on my upper arms. It's even hotter than it sounds.

So where do they come from? In college, my black and blues were my blackout badges of honor. "Tal I owe you new leggings... if you want an idea of what I did to yours come check out my KNEES!" I told her one harsh morning.

As you may remember from my previous post, I am a grandma now so my days of waking up with strange contusions are over. Why then do I still have bruises/scrapes/cuts/gashes everywhere? Pretty simple. I run into shit all the time. Specifically corners of walls, desks, and doors. I think this is just another extension of my complete lack of spactial awareness. I have no sense of direction, and even if I manage to get myself somewhere on the first try, I will absolutely slam into some sort of hard surface once I walk in.

The second reason is that I am currently living with two teenage idiots, ages 16 and 13. Their idea of fun is to fake punch me in the face, then give me two hard thwacks on my arm/stomach/back for responding to their fake hit (a game known to everyone with brothers as "TWO FOR FLINCHING"). The real problem with this is that they are baseball pitchers. They have semi-legit pipes, though I would never stroke their egos by telling them that. When they punch me, even in play, it hurts. A lot. If I tell them this, they laugh at me and begin "BENCHWARMERRRRR" chants, so generally I shake my arm out and walk away making a mental note to mess with them someday when they're old, fat, and balding.

Back to the waiting room. I begin thinking... I do have more bruises than most people. Is it possible I have anemia? Poorly clotting blood? Or am I a spaz with semi-abusive siblings? I eventually circle "YES". I think I was feeling like a bit of a bragger, not having any heart disease/diabetes/skin cancer to fess up to.

Fast forward 20 minutes later when the nurse asks me to tell her "more about the bruising and bleeding" I experience. Crap, this is the allergies moment all over again isn't it?

I explain, leaving out the part about my brothers so they don't call in the shrinks to size me up. Blah blah, I run into all hard surfaces at my waist level, blah blah, I always have huge bruises. Yes, they go away at a normal rate. Yes, they generally occur after I smash into something more intensely than usual.

"I think that sounds pretty normal," she said soothingly. "Nothing to worry about unless they aren't going away or are coming from very light pressure on the skin. The doctor will be right in."

I observe her reach for a pen from her scrubs pocket, as she X's out my circle and writes something next to it. I squint closely at my chart as she walks out.

"N/A- Clumsy"