another I-sort-of-poisoned-myself anecdote.
Today I made a glorious lunch. It contained a bit of broccoli, yellow bell pepper, carrot, and potato stir-fried with some vegetable oil, Kikkoman soy sauce, and black pepper. Because I have spicy things, I feel compelled to put them in my cooked food. So, I put some wasabi powder in. It's only the second time I've used it, so I'm still working on the "how much to use" quantity I keep in my mind. And then I cut a habanero pepper in half and threw it in as well. I remember biting into one a few weeks ago, noticing that it was quite hot, and so this seemed like a perfectly good idea for my lunch. Lately I've been in the habit of not making any rice or grain when I stir fry. Why dilute a perfectly good and tasty blend of seasoned vegetables? I'm sure I get plenty of carbs anyway.
So everything worked out, the timing of putting in the vegetables, everything was cooked just so. The wasabi was hot, to be expected, sinuses were cleared, but I felt that it was all perfectly under control and well within the standards that I set myself for being able to enjoy a meal. Two thirds of the way through I tentatively popped one of the halves of the habanero in my mouth. I was hanging out with my roommate and her bf, and suddenly everything got worse. What you'd expect: breaking out in a sweat, increased respiration to the point of panting, drinking all water in the vicinity while spilling it all over myself, holding your breath through the pain, etc. It was HOT. But after like 15 minutes I recovered and finished the meal, my plate clean all but the other half of the habanero. I wasn't stupid, after all.
Except that I was and am incredibly stupid. Like 15 minutes later I popped the remaining half habanero into my mouth. The same suffering deal again, it seemed slightly less bad this time since perhaps I was used to it?
This is where I became instructed on some interesting anatomy stuff that I hadn't known beforehand. Food generally stays in the stomach for an hour or two, depending on the type of food involved. No news there. What I hadn't realized was the lining of the stomach MUST BE thicker than, say, the lining of the intestines. About an hour and a half after I finished my meal, I was biking to a local coffeeshop to enjoy a cold drink while reading Anna Karenina. As soon as I got there I knew this was going to be a tricky visit, if I could pull it off.
First off, I was sweating, and not from the bike ride. Secondly, I could feel my guts churning and burning. You're not supposed to feel your guts, but I felt 'em all right. Before I settled into my routine, I felt it necessary to just go find anywhere to just sit for a few minutes, try to get my guts under control through sheer force of will. After five or ten minutes of just sitting and staring at the table, I realized force of will is shit and I needed a drink to dilute the little droplets of spiciness currently causing me the worst agony I can remember. So I got a bottle of Vitamin water, and it was tasty. I sipped it and several glasses of water, and the pain came and went in quite insistent waves. Like labor pains, yes, these were my contractions. Except I was giving birth to nothing. Imagine such a mother, after all that pregnancy and birthing ordeal, and then just nothing coming out? I'd be pissed. Anyway, I wondered about my delicate innards and if they were being scarred, blistered, or worse, burnt through entirely so that my undigested food would spill into my abdomen, causing toxic shock and soon death. I didn't think this last to be very likely.
After I'd finished my drinks in fifteen minutes, I realized I'd only been able to read for a bit, on and off for what I could concentrate and focus through the pain.
I just need to pause and reflect on how stupid I am, the things I do to myself. I am stupid. I admit this freely.
It was clear I had ruined this coffeeshop visit. I couldn't read. I sat on the toilet but nothing of interest happened, except that I had a private place to reflect on my pain and didn't have to hide it from anyone. My guts were still burning. I didn't feel like buying a drink every 15 minutes to only slightly help diminish the pain. I knew it generally takes two days for food to make its way through the intestines, and two days of burning churning intestinal pain seemed to me like the longest way to die. I'd rather just die in some quicker more painless way, you know?
So I had to leave, I was bummed. There's a small grocery store where I locked my bike. I thought I should buy some junk food. Eating mass quantities of voluminous food might dilute the spicy batch in my belly more than the water had. And the tastiness of junk food would be a slight offset from the churning pain, maybe a good send off if I were to meet my digestive demise.
I biked home. Put on a movie, munched on gross amounts of salty snacks (wheat thins and cream cheese, the food of chubby champions), and then fell asleep for six hours.
I'm fine now, just...sore? that, or the soreness I feel is actually a duller burn further down in my small intestine. I think this is more likely now that I concentrate on what I'm feeling inside. It may be that I diluted it. Or, it may be that the spicy molecules (capsaicin?) reacted sufficiently with enough of my body so as to be mostly used up.
Problem solved. I only lost a half a day this time. Fortunately my time isn't worth anything these days.
Aren't you glad you weren't me today? Thank God!
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