Return

I saw Hepworth. Anxiety leading up to the appointment was crazy. I really didn’t know what he was going to say or do.

He warmly greeted me with a handshake as he always does. However, he was polite and straightforward. I’ve come to respect this doctor in varying degrees. I told him about the drill bit. He stopped and stared. “No fucking way”. I felt better. This was the compassion I was looking for. I told him what’s been going on since. He remarked about my rhuem. Told me I should stop seeing her. Sjogrens. He explained the labs prior. He was pretty adamant that it is what it is. So there’s that. Secondly, my face. He noticed immediately something was wrong. My face as this point is full on wild fire. As he went to scope me, he didn’t even get 4cm in, and said that I have a bad infection in my nose. Nasal vestibulitis. He looked at both sinus (while I gagged) and said it was pretty bad. I asked for rocephin and he immediately agreed. And with that it was over. A 3 month wait.  Hopefully this is the last time I need his help. I’m pretty sure he’s got better things to do, but was relieving to have a doctor on my side. He even commented that he trusts what I say. I don’t have to convince him. 

Nurse walked in with 1g of burning joy and I was out. I get the second dose Friday morning. At the same time he put me on clairthromycin. I haven’t been on this stuff in a very long time. But the twist is that it’s going to be a long course. 6 weeks. Here’s hoping I get some sort of relief from all this. The next morning as per usual I get better after the shot. Hopefully the second one will punt this away for awhile. Or just lessen the pain. Trust me. You do not want facial pain. It’s the fucking worst. 

The second half of this is my return to the office. It’s been since February of 2020. Yes. This is all too soon. It’s stupid. I can do my job from home. But whatever. After getting my badge working, I was allowed to use one of the empty offices. So that’s a huge plus. At least I can be out of the way from people and hopefully dodge COVID. Everyone seemed to love that I’m back. Providing some much needed relief to them that I am still there. I am still alive and apart of the team. 

Just because I’m not physically there, doesn’t mean I’m not there. It was nice to be back, but my body quickly reminded me that the infection in my face was still there. I went the entire day without morphine. Probably a record. As the day got older, so did I. I started to really slow down. The pain in my face was worsening. The skin crawling cat trapped in my sinuses. My body has been too used to allowing myself to rest when I need it. Do my sinus rinses. Tell myself it’s ok to be done for the day. I remember back to how I handled this job before. I had a ton of energy. I was able to take everything on plus more. I was just alive. None of this was even a thought nor a possibility. 

I got tired fast. But I was missing something. My fan. Oh my god they are nice to have. Just keeps me cool. So mike and I stopped to target for fan, and some food. 

My return however has brought me more worry and unknowns. Firstly. I am burned out. The proverbial candle from both ends. Nothing left as I explained it to one of the Directors. To Whig she immediately precluded to tell me that there’s a forger change coming. On other manager is gone out on FLMA (all too familiar) and now the other half of the week is missing their manager. At this point I kinda shut off my brain.  As the discussion took place the more and more I wanted to leave. It was pretty awkward when someone goes on and on about how awesome you are and this and that blah blah blah.  Buttering me up for what I knew was coming. 

Yes. Our team is down a pretty significant amount of engineers and wouldn’t you’ve guessed it. Managers. 

I know why. But again not putting it In writing. 

So the expectation is to have me cover yet more shift work. As it was explained to me. That both her and Jim talked about it. I simply replied back that I hope that it’s clearly understood  how burned out I am. From both medical and work. If I do have to return back to shift work that once I leave, I’m gone. When I’m out. I’m gone. When I’m there? 100% able to do whatever needs to get done. But I was hesitant to agree since him isn’t there. I’m sorry but word of mouth does t work. I need a clear cut picture of what the expectations are. That’s what would be met. And that’s it. 

I explained that I am absolutely never going back to 80 hour workweeks. Boundaries need to be respected, and you gotta understand that my body is still fighting things.  I still need my time too. 

After that I spent the rest of the day showing and doing question / answer. It’s something fun I put together where it’s 100% unscripted and our convversations to cover a wide variety of question and answers. I can tell that the team is eager to learn something. So hopefully I can just do this till I can’t anymore. 

Yes. That’s pretty dark, but I know that something bad is coming. Just haven’t seen what it is yet.