May 24, 2005

I can hardly believe myself just how jam-packed with activity the past few days have been.  On Saturday, the gym was nearly dead.  Only Deveney and a new friend, Michael, were there.  It was the last day of my first week back working out, and after some dead lifts and biking for twenty minutes (not to mention the other hundred exercised I did), I went and jumped in the shower.  Right before I got in, I ate a protein bar like always.  I didn't think much of it.  Well, about five minutes into the shower, my shoulders and chest started to feel weak and a little sore.  I thought it was odd because I hadn't worked those parts of my body in about four days, so I just brushed it off.  Then I started feeling really sick and like I had to go to the bathroom really bad.  I didn't know what was going on, but all of a sudden I fell to the left and landed on the floor.  I was really getting scared at this point.  I sat up and leaned against the wall, the water still pouring down on me, and I felt my pulse.  It was really faint, and I didn't seem to have any other pain, so I didn't think it was a heart attack.  But I was really beginning to get scared by this point.  I started thinking how I needed to fall on the floor so that, hopefully, someone would see where I fell and come to help me, but then I thought about how empty the building was.  Michael was still working out, and Deveney wouldn't be going into the men's locker room, so I just sat there stunned.  Finally I thought, I either have to pass out here or try to get some help.  I kept thinking, I can't just let myself die here!  I turned off the water, somehow forced myself back into the chair, and headed for the lockers.  I was soaking wet, but with a towel, and I thought, even if this is an emergency, I can't just go out to the front desk in a towel.  I went to my locker and started putting on my clothes.  I only got one sock on when I heard somebody come in to use the bathroom.  I hollered to see if it was Michael, and if he could help me.  He said it wasn't, but that he would be there in just a second.  Well, Michael walked around the corner and said he was just kidding with me.  (I had only met him that day, though we've worked out together a few times since.)  I told him how I was feeling, and he just shrugged and asked if I had the water on pretty hot.  I didn't think it was all that hot, but he said that he used to work on the ambulance squad at his school, and his ex-girlfriend had done the same thing before.  Apparently if you take a hot shower after an intense workout, your body will overheat and pass out.  I had to admit that, even though it had only been about a minute since I had gotten out, I felt better.  I then felt like a big dumbass.  He didn't think much of it and said to just be more careful and told colder showers.  Then he packed up and left, and I wasn't done showering, so I went and got back in... with much cooler water.  The worst of the whole ordeal is that I really thought I was dying, and nobody even seemed to care.  I was really traumatized by the whole thing, but even when I got home, my family didn't seem to care all that much.  Oh well, guess I made a mountain out of a mole hill.  Then on Sunday, I went back for the finals.  In the first round of the finals, all the contestants had to sing a song, and then the five highest scores from that round went on to a sing off round.  Well, two songs later and I had three hundred bucks in my hand and a handshake or pat on the back from every person in the room.  People kept coming up saying they couldn't believe such a beautiful voice came out of me when I got up there.  I was just happy to have the dough!  Ha ha, and then after the contest was over, most of the people left, but I stuck around and sang for about another hour or so.  It was a lot of fun.  Then today I had my pre-op meeting with the plastic surgeon.  He said that he only expects to take off eight pounds, but he didn't even look at my body.  Either way, if the stomach is not flabby and saggy, I'm happy.  And I stopped in to see Michelle from the gastric bypass department.  She's the one that was so nice to me when I was going through it all, when nobody else there seemed to have much of a soul.  She seemed delighted to see me and insisted I was "so thin" and "so handsome", and even said that, because of my hair, I look like Rob Thomas.  (No, it's not long, but it does look similar to his debut album hair-do.)  That's actually the third or fourth time I've heard that I look like him, but the first since surgery, the first person not online, and the first time I sort of believed it.  Ha ha, it's good to not be humongous anymore.  God, I can't be thankful enough.  Everyday is a blessing that I'm not over four hundred pounds anymore.  It's probably the endorphins from all the exercise I've been doing lately, but I've been a lot happier this last week, even though it doesn't seem like all that much has changed.  The weather certainly hasn't gotten better!  But I'm still more happy today than I've been in quite some time.  Well, guess I should go share the wealth, woo hoo!

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