"Well, that was gross"

Chris and I have been under a lot of stress lately. Me with my surgery, and Chris with a herniated disk; so our planned, 1st year wedding anniversary vacation came at the excellent time. We took a trip to Stratford, Ontario (a beautiful place and if you get the chance to go, do so and catch a couple of Shakespearean plays while you are there). We stayed at a fabulous Bead & Breakfast called Duggan Place Bed & Breakfast. If you like B & B's and are in Stratford, stay here. The house is beautiful, the rooms comfortable and immaculate, the food out of this world and the company entertaining. Though I could go on and on extolling the virtues of our vacation, that is not what I really wanted to write about today.

I wanted to talk about french fries. "French fries", you ask? Yes, french fries and the fact that I will not be eating these again any time soon. As you may well know, I am at the point in my recovery that I can eat "soft solid foods"; basically everything I want except for bread, pasta, and rice as long as I chew everything at least 25 times before swallowing.

While on our vacation I decided to try french fries. We went to a little place that specialized in them and, once served, I doled out a few for myself adding some vinegar and ketchup. I ate about 6 fries, chewing well, and sipping tiny amounts of water. Now let me clarify that these were skinny chips, not long, or noticeably greasy, and when I felt my chest muscles tighten ever so slightly, I did stop eating. In all honesty, I thought that I had done well.

Chris and I left the restaurant and decided to go for a walk. "This is great", I thought. "No difficulties so far". Boy was I wrong. About 1/2 hour into our walk I began to feel like I had swallowed a lot of air and began burping. About 10 minutes later my chest began to constrict. I told Chris that I needed to sit down and we found a little bench. Things only began to feel worse and after another 10 minutes I told Chris I definitely felt like I needed to vomit and wanted to be by myself. I left him on the bench and walked to the back of a parking lot where the garbage bins were and waited. Nothing happened and after a while, and several more burps, I felt fine. I went back to find Chris and told him that maybe I had just swallowed too much air while eating, That I felt OK and wanted to resume our walk. I pondered, as we walked, what could be the cause of this discomfort? I had not overeaten, potatoes were on my list of things I could eat, and I had chewed well. The only thing I could think of was that the potatoes had been deep fried, and possible I had consumed more oil than my stomach could break down.

Not more than a minute later an overwhelming weight began to close in on my chest. Pressure from my diaphragm pressed up toward my stomach, the tightness around my chest pushed my ribs in, and I experienced a gag reflex that seemed ready to remove my own throat. I could barely stand from the pain, and immediately sat at the nearest park bench. This bench was facing a road (that, thankfully, was not well traveled), and was situated amongst nearby bushes obscuring us from view.

Chris asked if there was anything he could do and I merely shook my head and indicated how much pain I was in. Moments later I felt my stomach turning inside out and all I could do was turn away from the road, hang over the back of the bench, and watch french fries leave me. All I could think of was "Well, that was gross", and Since there was not much food to begin with, the whole process took no more than 30 or 40 seconds. Once the deed was done, I felt wonderful. Like nothing had happened. In fact, I was amazed at how good I felt. I mean, usually when one vomits there is an overwhelming body soreness and exhaustion, But not this time. All I wanted to do was clean up, and continue with our walk.

So, why am I sharing this with you? Well, I wanted you to know that this is not an easy process. That along with my many successes (as indicated by the little train at the top of my blog), I do have some setbacks. But that is all they are - setbacks and I can wipe myself off (pun intended) and get back up again. I will not eat french fries again; at least for a month or two, but eventually I will try them. Who knows what the future holds. I may never be able to eat fries again but maybe I will. That is just part of the adventure.