Independance Day and The Big D

““We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed, by their Creator, with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness.” This philosophy has held true for 231 strong years due to the sacrifices of our forefathers and those of us honored to wear the uniform of our nation today. While we reflect upon the importance of our Independence Day, it is important to remember that what we have asked the Iraqis to do is no easy task. It wasn’t easy 231 years ago as our democracy came to life. The same holds true today in Iraq.” – W.E. Gaskin, Commanding General, Multi-National Forces, July 3rd, 2007

For anyone that has ever visited Bethlehem, PA, you’ll know that there are two times of the year when the fireworks launched over the Lehigh River are spectacular. The first is in August during Music Fest, and the second is on the 4th of July. I guess there’s just something amazing about fireworks that never gets old, no matter how quickly we grow up. Perhaps Roger Godseken put it best “It must be the male thing about watching stuff blow up!” Anyway, Al Asad is a far cry from Bethlehem, and the most fireworks I saw was during our July 4th picnic when I set a Strawberry Marshmallow on fire with a toothpick and a lighter (incidentally, toasted Strawberry Marshmallows aren’t as good as the plain kind). But I can still remember some of the best July 4ths of my life...

Last year in Hawai’i I watched the fireworks over Kaneohe Bay as some of my friends like Billy, Jacintha, Josh and I sat on the shores of Oahu. The summer prior to that my friend Victor and I drove cross country from Washington State to Pensacola, FL as I was about to start Flight Surgery School. In Nevada, we watched the fireworks from one of the top floors in a suite of the Belagio Hotel in Las Vegas! (Remember the food I ordered that night, V?) The summer before that, my good friend Anthony flew out to Washington State to visit me, as I just began my Internship at Naval Hospital Bremerton. I remember that weekend well because I was on call for my first Ob-Gyn shift, working the night shift in Labor & Delivery and there was a freakish amount of pregnant mothers that came to the hospital in labor. I delivered a record 7 babies in one shift! (Talk about trial by fire!) Anyway, I came home dirty, smelly and covered in amniotic fluid and we opened up a bottle of Veuve Clicquot champagne (my favorite) and watched as the neighborhood kids set off fireworks that would just cast a shadow over the majestic Cascade Mountains.

Perhaps the fondest memories of the 4th involve the times that my best friend Jan, my sister Kelly and I would sit in front of the Bethlehem library and watch the July 4th show in Bethlehem, PA. Although the fireworks were spectacular, I remember sitting on a blanket next to Jan and Kelly and thinking about how happy I was. I felt so fortunate and thankful to be among such good company. I felt love. I also felt proud to be an American, without fully knowing what that pride meant yet. I remember becoming overwhelmed with emotion and trying my hardest not to start crying (I sometimes shed tears when I get overcome with emotion – yeah, I watched ‘Beaches’ and ‘Titanic’ and cried at the end of both, I’m man enough to admit it, you want a piece of me? Let’s go…!).

So all this pride and nationalism makes me wonder, at what age do we forget? At what age are men no longer created equal? When does prejudice take root and all of a sudden a man no longer has the liberty to pursue happiness, but instead is forced to succumb to restrictions of their ‘unalienable rights’ based on their gender, color, race or sexual orientation? At what point are an individual’s rights bestowed upon them not by the Creator but by Society? Part of Independence Day is to serve as a reminder of the way our country is supposed to be. It is a day to celebrate the ideal that our Forefathers fought to strive for. The United States we live in however is wrought with prejudice, discrimination, acts of hate and violence because of our own differences. I hope those 7 babies I delivered, now at the age of 3, can learn to overcome the challenges of our socio-politico-infrastructure and act in accordance with the idyllic principles that cause us to celebrate this day with fireworks and champagne.

As for the Ugly Angels and I, we had a July 4th picnic that consisted of hot dogs and hamburgers, and we all ate in the chow hall that my corpsman and I decorated with decorations sent to us by the SA organization. It was really nice, until 1800. I decided to go down to the main chow hall on base to see what they were offering. It was spectacular! They featured traditional BBQ fare – steaks, burgers, baked beans, corn on the cob, potato salad, fruit salad and celebratory cakes that said “Proud To Be American” (but unlike JFK, who admitted to all of Germany that he was a jelly donut when he added the “Ein” before Berliner in his faithful speech in ‘63, the Middle Eastern bakers here left out the “An” before American).

Anyway, I got my food and sat down and I suddenly lost my appetite. (Which for me is very peculiar since I’m always hungry) Within minutes I felt a tightening sensation in the left upper quadrant of my abdomen and despite the noise level of the bustling chow hall, I heard a loud rumble in my stomach. Being great at foreign languages (I have a double minor in Spanish and German from college), I quite easily deciphered the foreign tongue. It said “RJ - You have exactly 5 minutes to get to the head before the fireworks are going to launch!”. So I picked up my tray and headed for the exit with haste! I speed-walked back to the barracks while clenching my Gluteal muscles tight! Then I ran to the can and with not a second to spare, met Von Klepner himself!

This trip was definitely not about maintaining social graces. It was beyond my control. After a few seconds I thought, “well that wasn’t so bad”, but much in the way that a few seconds before a great fireworks show is about to begin they launch a test firework (you know, the one that makes a loud noise, then you can’t see it, then it flashes white for a split second high in the sky with a loud bang, letting everyone know the “Big Show” is about to begin), well my big show, “The Big D”, had only just begun!

That initial trip to the bathroom my anus got confused and thought it was my urethra and I lost about a gallon of fluid. As I made a bi-hourly trip to the head for the next 6 hours, I lost another gallon at least! I had cyclic cramps every few minutes that had me bent over in pain. It was awful. (Women I have a new appreciation for the cramps associated with your "Curse") Of course, being a Doctor, I was fortunate in that I could quickly diagnose myself with what MUST HAVE BEEN Pancreatitis, Liver Failure and a bleeding Gastric Ulcer. I gave myself about a few hours to live, in addition to an anxiety attack. All night I tossed and turned, sweating, then freezing, then sweating again. By morning I was so weak and dehydrated I could barely move. I asked my roommate who was leaving for work to send one of my corpsmen down to help me. He got to work and forgot – yes, forgot as I was lying desperately back at the barracks! So by 11:00 I forced myself to get up and take the bus to Medical. My corpsmen saw me and immediately wanted to start an IV to give me some fluids. I said let’s hold off while I try to drink a few bottles of Gatorade. You know me and needles – for those of you reading, RJ was bit by a Groundhog in 5th grade in PA and had 6 months of Rabies shots which gave him a wicked fear of needles, you should have seen me in Medical School giving my first IV to my scared classmate John McGee, but I digress. So I took some medicine and made my way to the chow hall to try to force some food.

Of course, life has a way of especially screwing with you when you’re sick, and I knew it wasn’t going to be a pleasant trip to the chow hall looking and feeling as bad as I did. I entered and within seconds I saw what seemed like hundreds of people I knew that I hadn’t seen for ages. (Kind of like making that trip to the pharmacy in pajamas when you’re at home and you run into your long lost enemy that you haven’t seen in 10 years.)
“RJ, how ya doin’ man? Come sit with all of us!”, or “RJ, you gunna just walk by without sayin’ hello? What’s up man? Where u sitting?”, or “Hey Doc, I’ve been meaning to ask you...”, or “Hey Sir, when you have a minute, I wanted to talk to you about…” Now normally, healthy pleasant RJ would have enjoyed, even invited this kind of discourse, but at that moment, I have to say that having Von Klepner himself rip my fingernails out one by one while simultaneously being bit by a 1000 giant scorpions and camel spiders would have been more enjoyable.

Not by choice, I sat at a table with a group of Doctors to my left and a group of my Marines to my right. I wanted to cry, lol, as I really wanted to just sit alone in a corner facing the wall as I nibbled on my grilled cheese and chicken soup. Instead I had to endure sitting across from one of my Marines who was stuffing his face with baked beans, scoffing down his runny smelly potato salad and shooting corn juice in my face as he violently bit his corn on the cob kernel by kernel. The other Marines around me were just as bad (has anyone ever seen a hungry Marine eat?) I momentarily turned to the left to escape and got drawn into the Doctor’s conversation, “Yeah, RJ, you should have been there when we took the Esophago-gastric-duodenoscope to visualize his peptic ulcer, as we traversed the lower esophageal sphincter, we noted…” Again, I wanted to cry, but I was too occupied with trying not to puke that I couldn’t. I was in hell.

Suffice to say my cramps eventually subsided, the Big D (diarrhea) eased up and after a full night of rest, I woke up as if waking from a coma. I feel 90% better today and I’m back at work. My best guess as to the cause? One of 3 things, either my body wasn’t used to the BBQed food (the burger was pretty much charred), or I washed out my protein shaker with the sink’s water instead of a bottle of water (we’re instructed to use only bottled water since the tap water is visually brown and often contaminated) and I caught a bug there or maybe I didn’t hand sanitize enough after taking care of one of my sick Marines. Maybe I’ve been talking about Von Klepner so much that he got his revenge, who knows? In any event, I think the worst of it is gone and I’ve gained my ‘Independence’ from the hourly bathroom trips, at least for a while.

Much like the last 3 years, it was a July 4th that I won’t soon forget…