10 pounds of peanut butter.

This post was originally published on my old personal blog and reportedly delivered much comedic relief at my expense. I survived the incident so I’m happy for posterity to continue to enjoy it.

The price difference between these two containers of peanut butter is the equivalent of $4. FOUR DOLLARS! So obviously it’s more cost-effective to purchase the bigger one and spoon feed myself directly from it all day long.

My eating habits since moving to Japan have been really bizarre. Generally speaking I eat a shit ton of rice and pasta every week and on top of that, peanut butter in my face all the time. I mean, I go out and eat the delicious cuisine of Japan, OBVIOUSLY, but when I get home I’m generally too tired to put any real effort into my meals so I fold to frozen gyoza (pot stickers).

The peanut butter is mostly because it’s a familiar taste among all the not-so-sugary confectionary here because Asian palettes are less accustomed to the obesity inducing candy that is consumed in the states.

So yeah, sometimes my consumption of the stuff reaches really unhealthy levels. Like when I ate 10 POUNDS OF PEANUT BUTTER IN THE FOUR MONTHS I’VE BEEN HERE. I mean really, that’s ridiculous. Even for me. Which is probably why I got what I initially thought was kidney stones and then later turned out to be a full blown kidney infection.

When I came back from the dead the first thing a co-worker asked me was, “Isn’t that what old men get?”.

NO, girls in their early twenties that consume mass quantities of peanut butter get it too!! Okay?!

So it all started with some dull lower back pain. I didn’t think anything of it because lower back pain has been something I’ve always had but this felt more harbored in the deep tissue of my back, you know? So anyways I let it go for a couple of days but then I spent the whole weekend in bed because it felt like little gnomes had just punched my lower back all night with their little gnome hands. (pew, pew, pew, pew! That’s the sound I imagine them making while doing so.)

I called my dad because he knows everything. Who then talked to my stepmom who is a nurse. They regrettably informed me that I probably had kidney stones because of all the water that I don’t drink. (and the peanut butter.)

So I spend the whole weekend chug-a-lugging all the water and peeing every fifteen minutes. I somehow make it through work on Monday but my kidney region was tender to the touch, and walking was really difficult. And then Tuesday, I spike a fever. I’m incredibly stubborn so I was determined to stick out the whole day before going to the ER and then my boss was like, “Hey, you look like shit. You should go to the hospital.” So…he convinced me.

I really don’t mind hospitals. I think I was avoiding this though because can you imagine what going to a hospital in a foreign country would be like?

Well let me tell you.

First I researched a clinic that had an English speaking doctor. Then I went home and grabbed a giant folder with every document pertaining to my citizenship, work status, etc. I filled out paperwork and after that I felt like I was SO drunk.

Like, I am sweating through my clothes and thinking, “Okay, just be cool. Don’t act drunk, don’t act drunk.” Because I could feel my eyes glazing over and my body swaying from side to side.

(later discovered intel would reveal this was actually my kidneys slowing killing me.)

So about 45 minutes after signing in they move me from reception to the other ‘next in line’ waiting room. And then a half hour after that I was taken into a smaller room (a real Russian-nesting-doll of a clinic) with a nurse who took my temperature – which was 102, nbd.

And then she was like holy shit! And at THAT point made me put on the “disease mask”.

the “disease mask” in all its glory.

And THEN they were like, yeah your shit is messed up, let’s get the doc to see you NOW.

Then after that I was back in the ‘next in line’ room and I’m not entirely sure how long they made me wait in there, but it doesn’t matter because this is where I effectively passed out.

I was tired of the swaying and so I just sort of laid down…but then somehow I ended up on the floor. I’m guessing this was on purpose by my subconscious because I ended up on the tile and it felt ssooooo goooood.

This is how incoherent I was; I do not totally recall whether they took blood or pee or asked me questions to determine why/how I was so sick. But I do remember an IV being injected in me and the doctor speaking in half English and Japanese and me just grunting to show I’m not dead. But basically this is where I found out that I don’t have kidney stones, but a full blown infection and it’s because I don’t drink enough damn water.

Well shit doc. I drank the whole ocean last weekend! So he scolded me a lot and then told me I had to be hospitalized.

And that’s when I started to have a drunk panic attack.

I started having flashbacks of The Ring and The Grudge and all the dead Asian children. (remember I’m still kidney-infection-drunk) I think I freaked the doctor out because I’m trying to pull the IV out as if I don’t get out now, they’re going to hold me hostage. So he tells me that I can go home IF I stay for an hour hooked up to the IV and come back in tomorrow to do the same thing. So we struck a deal.

It took me four days of bed rest and drinking all the water that was ever bottled to get me back to not feeling like total shit. I’m still not 100% but the punching gnomes have disappeared so that’s a good sign. But now that everyone knows why I was sick it turned from “oh you poor thing” to “why are you getting what only middle aged men get?”.

Better question: WHY ARE YOU BADGERING THE SICK AND ELDERLY.