Rebel with a Cause
The glistening sound of metal swooshing through the air. Swords clinking and clunking against the other. The Colonist and the Red Coat face to face, so close they can feel each other’s stubble. Their breath chuffing hot and damp against the other’s skin. One fighting for freedom of choice, the other fighting for ultimate control. Back and forth, indignant fire pulling to overcome acrimonious spite.
My eyes open. The peripheral vision is mostly dark and cloudy. I can make out curtains. Curtains everywhere, with a terrible pastel brushstroke pattern. Holy, yuck! What is this place?! The searing in my belly becomes more clear. “My baby! Where’s my baby?” A hushed, consoling voice quickly moves closer and gently tells me there is no baby. There was that feeling of indignant fire rearing its head again. “No! My husband. Where is my husband?” How could they not know who I was referring to? Obviously I knew I wasn’t having a baby. The word “duh” sprang to mind. Hours passed as I writhed in pain, spitting out endless demands to see the man I loved. Finally, four brutal hours later, I was wheeled in to see him. The sourest look on my face as I fought against the pain in my body. Not exactly how I would have liked to have greeted him. He covered my face in kisses. Kisses I have no memory of.
“Here, eat this cracker so you can take your medicine.” The saltine cracker stuck to my lips. The shards scraped my already raw throat, the throat I was slowly becoming aware of. “We’re going to need to get you up to pee.” There was that feeling again. Pee? I’m not getting up. How am I going to do that? I didn’t. For two more hours until the pain in my gut became a gentle rolling storm, I didn’t get up to pee.
The uterus inside my belly was filled with a fibroid controlling every aspect of my life. If I could leave the house, when I could leave the house, how long I could leave the house, the way I spent my money on 150 tampons a month. It never ended. My period never ended. From the first of one month, to the first of the next month, my period went on eternally. There it was, fighting for ultimate control. I presented my ever present ordeal to the best of the best. With scalpel in hand the doctor finally cut away and cauterized where my womb once rested her head. The webs of endometriosis screeched out like a banshee, hanging on voraciously with her terrifying tentacles. I lay there unconscious, unaware of everything. The doctor chuffed her hot, damp breath into her mask. With precision, she cut away the monarchy that lived inside of me. There I was, a Daughter of Liberty, dumping the bloody tea into the harbor, declaring liberties not previously afforded me.
Now I sit here on my own bed, the incisions healing, but tender. The frustration of being nearly helpless as a babe. Everyday slightly better than the last and a few worse than the beginning. My freedom slowly returning. I’m waiting to heal, I’m waiting to be filled with indignant fire again. Never to be passive, always to be bold. Liberty or death.
