My Virgo Hell

Recently in conversation with a fellow Virgo birthday twin (in day but not year), we slid into talking about the inner monologues that run through our heads… At last! Someone who shared my hell! I made a joke about writing these angst ridden tales down… Then dismissed the idea with an ad nauseum list of reasons why it would be a bad idea…

I often laugh when I encourage people to try new things and they dig their heels into refusal and tell me – That’s easy for you to say, you don’t worry about things going wrong!

Ha! Little do they know! I worry less these days because through pushing past worries, I know evidentially that I’m not going to die! You’d be amazed at how many of my inner thoughts are scenarios that spiral out of control until it reaches the only and inevitable conclusion that I’m going to have to be rescued by air ambulance! Followed by worrying about where the air ambulance is going to land…

A couple of months back, I was driving and I got a pain under my ribs… Oh wow! It was intense! The previous week, I’d been doing first aid training and so my mind went straight to ‘I’m having a heart attack! This is it!’ Now a normal person would probably have pulled the car over… As an inhabitant of Virgo Hell, I ran my mind through ever increasing levels of crazy thoughts…

Heart attack… I need to sit against a wall in a W shape… Fuck there’s no wall in my car… OK… Seat… Ah.. No.. Can’t W in the seat… Steering wheel is in the way plus need to keep my foot on the pedal or I’ll be late… OH SHUT UP KAREN! IT’S PROBABLY JUST INDIGESTION!… No… Can’t be indigestion… I never get that… Why don’t I get that? I’m a Virgo. You’d think I’d be a marytr to that… No… I’m almost definitely having a massive heart attack… Really? But your pulse is OK? I’m checking your pulses, they’re fine… perfectly in rhythm… Oh… But the pain! I’ve got beads of sweat… Breathe… Breathe… Breathe… OK.. Only need to get through the next couple of hours and then I can go find somewhere quiet to go and die… I can’t die until after my shift ends. How are people going to get home? Oh.. Should I be driving? I don’t know… I’m driving OK… Yes but.. I burp so loud I shock myself! What the fuck was that? Another lengthy burp reels out… I don’t know whether to be ashamed or proud by the sheer length of it… As I wait for it to end, I decide I’m not embarrassed as there’s no witnesses… Wtf? Where did that come from? Oh… Wait… The pain is gone! Jesus! So that’s what trapped wind feels like! No wonder babies cry so much… I laugh all the rest of the way… OK! So this is why I’ve not been worrying about lockdown other than to worry now and then about why I’m not worried about it… It’s kind of little league in the grand scheme of my lifetime’s catalogue of crazy ways I’m going to die.

Over the last week, I’ve managed to convince myself that I’ve got a brain tumour… I’ve not Googled… Oh no no no… We don’t visit Dr Google and risk self diagnosing renal failure, extremely rare forms of cancer… Hmmm… What else have I imagined I’ve had? You name it, in my imagination, I’ve had it.

So back to my achy head… Now on a logical level, I know it’s a tension headache from not enough sleep and dodging the idiots who’ve forgotten how to drive, who reappeared back on the roads this week… It’s been a week of free reflex tests, hazard awareness exercises and a certain person walking me up at odd hours because he can’t sleep… Of course I’ve got a headache! But it’s extremely rare that I get headaches, so Virgo Hell ignites… You’ve definitely got a tumour… It’s pressing on your brain… All this writing…that’s not creativity… That’s some kind of abnormal pressure building and pressing neurons… You’d best write quick before your brain is nuked…

How can I stop these ridiculous thoughts? I ask Mr S – have we got any paracetamol in the house?

He’s puzzled – Why are you asking for tablets? You never take tablets. No we don’t. I took the last two trying to shift a migraine.

I call him a selfish bastard! And then disclose to him that I have something the size of a melon growing inside my head.

Oh ffs Karen! Look at me! No, you don’t have a melon!

How do YOU know?

Because your eyes would be bulging out of your head and your face looks perfectly fine. Anyway you idiot, paracetamol wouldn’t cure that. Honestly, if you’re that worried then go to hospital!

Yes I am that worried. I wanted paracetamol so I wouldn’t have to go to hospital.

What? That makes no sense! If you’d got a tumour then you’d need radical treatment!

No! You make no sense! If I take paracetamol and it goes away, then I’m OK. Fuck! I’m glad you’re not a G.P. I’ve got a headache, oh ok let’s go straight to chemo and treat worst case scenario first… Were you even going to shove me in a MRI scanner first or just straight to opening my skull and carving out contents with a melon baller… Ffs man! I wanted paracetamol to save me the embarrassment of going to hospital and getting turned away as a time wasting hypochondriac and massive drain on the NHS!

Do you want me to go shop and buy you some tablets?

No! I don’t take tablets!

So what the fuck do you want?

I want to go bloody swimming! But that’s not an option… OK… I want the house to go quiet, I want to sit with my pencils and I want you to promise not to wake me up before I need to get up tomorrow…

He says OK, I’m going to bed, you have some alone time with your pencils…

I sit and doodle until I feel sleepy and I head to bed… He’s still awake… How’s your headache?

What headache? Oh… That headache… Yeah… Gone… Nothing fatal after all…

And this is why I laugh to myself every time I get posted the meme – We can’t all be neurotypical Karen.

I laugh to myself and wonder if there even is such a thing…Maybe neurotypical only exists because you’ve avoided Drs and diagnosis… Maybe being neurotypical is just short hand for people who are better at masking their madnesses… I don’t know… But I’m not going to worry about it… I’m well over my quota for the month…

Ah… My Virgo Hell…