Chapter 11
“Mrs. ET? Do you remember me? I am Dr. Kang, the hospital psychiatrist.”
Oh great. Dr. King Kong’s back. But I’m polite. “Yes, I remember you, Dr. Kong. You told me the hallucinations I'm having are caused by the illness. Well, I’m not so sure about that anymore. I talked it over with Dr. Verylongname, and she thinks there’s more to it than that. Especially when she found out I tried to jump out of the car on my way back to the hospital.”
“Mrs. ET," he begins with a frown. "I will take the time to explain to you what is happening. Then I will send a prescription home with you for an anti-anxiety drug which will help you recover nicely.”
For the next five minutes, he expounds on his theory of why I’m as mentally healthy as Mr. and Ms. Normal Person living down Ordinary Lane. As he talks, I’m easily convinced that shigellosis is one helluva mean sombitch monster, and I’m lucky to be alive with any brain function at all. By the time Dr. King Kong’s soliloquy for the ages finally reaches its conclusion, I'm loving his theory. The man does have a way with words. He smiles and admonishes me to call an ambulance if I ever get that sick again. He pats my arm and bids me farewell, immensely satisfied I’m hanging on to his every word. Which I am.
As I watch him pirouette out the door on the tippytoes of his massive ego, (a one thousand dollar bill from the hospital for ten minutes of work is quite convincing), it's a relief to know I'm as sane as he is, even though I fully realize I haven’t been exactly forthright about my very brief psychiatric history as maybe I should’ve been. But then again, it's likely Dr. King Kong would’ve ignored it in favor of his own diagnosis.
At any rate, the rest of the hospital stay goes very well. I don’t switch off, I don’t see Dr. King Kong, and the shigellosis has verily been defeated. I’m discharged the next day. Now I can resume my very ordinary, and very normal life. And I’ll never ever complain about being bored again, I swear to God.
“And she lived happily ever after. The end!”
“Oops!”
