So where did we leave off? I was with friends and loved ones at the Friendly Toast in Cambridge’s Kendall Square. Jake and I split a bottle of Dogfish Head’s Fort (an excellent, excellent beer that I’ll have to devote another post too sometime). We moseyed over to Cambridge Brewing Co. and drank a tower of their beer (which was meh). Things did not get too crazy.
At around five the next morning, however, I awoke with the feeling that my chest and throat were onefire. I felt as if someone had poured kerosene down my gullet it and set it alight. I felt like I had been disemboweled and my throat replaced with a steam pipe. I also felt the need to vomit.
I did so. And the result was…not ideal (‘ideal’ and ‘vomiting’ are two concepts who are not well-acquainted). It was a torrent of blood. All right, it wasn’t a torrent – more like a mouth-full. But that’s enough to freak you out. Esp. if you’re me, who does not suffer jarring physical ailments well.
The internet said to go to the hospital, as hematemesis is considered a medical emergency. I wasn’t too keen on that, being away on a small vacation of sorts. What I did do, though, was not eat for the entire rest of the day (this was extra disappointing given that our trip to Boston had been a sort of tour of our old culinary stomping grounds).
My doctor advised me immediately that the intake of certain foods was verboten. Fried food, citrus…and alcohol. I was devastated, as you can well imagine. She (my doctor) also passed me off onto a gastroenterologist, who gave me an endoscopy. This whole thing took about a week. I was beerless…but not tearless.*
The endoscopy reported that I had (have, really), a hiatal hernia. What this means is that my stomach has slipped the surly bounds of my lower abdomen and is pushing its way into my chest cavity. This sounded pretty serious to me, but the doctor only shrugged. I guess it’s not a big deal if your organs aren’t where they’re supposed to be? I don’t know.
Anyway, the hernia caused the vomiting, which in turn was violent enough to cause a Mallory-Weiss tear in my esophagus. It looks like this:
It had healed by the time they did the endoscopy, so that’s cool.
A week after the initial incident I had my first beer. It was an Allagash Black, consumed with Erich at the Brooklyn Public House. It was fucking delicious. I might be biased – I can’t even really remember that much about it – but damn. It was so good to be back.
*That was terrible. I can’t believe I’m leaving it in.
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