LOM Chapter 6: Culture
A couple days into my sick leave, Bonnie the nurse called. I was in the bathroom, so I let the machine catch the call. She left a message: “Hi, this is Bonnie from Dr. Kudafer’s office, calling for Wesley. Your stool culture came back negative, so the doctor wants you to try eating a bland diet – bananas, rice, applesauce, toast, roast chicken. No dairy, and nothing too rich or too spicy. If you’re still having problems, the doctor can see you next week.” I called Joey to ask whether I could come back to work, given that I was no longer contagious, but he didn’t like the fact that I was still sick. He told me to come back when I was cured. I made another appointment with Dr. Kudaver, and meanwhile lazed about doing nothing.
By the time I saw Dr. Kudafer again, the illness was kicking my butt. I was tired, not eating well, and definitely sick. I was making all sorts of poops. On a good day, the morning was best – only slightly urgent, sometimes soft but almost formed, usually brownish and only slightly green. Things got worse from there, getting wetter and faster as the day progressed. In the afternoon it squirted out of me in heavy blasts, then settled in the bottom of the bowl like flakes in a snow globe. This was usually accompanied by slight cramping, especially at the beginning, which eased as I finished my evacuation. By sunset watery poop gushed out of me, blossoming and clouding the basin. If things were particularly bad I saw a pink tinge in the bowl, or a red streak on the toilet paper. By bedtime my anus was raw and itchy; I took to dabbing it with calamine lotion when I could. I even tried the lidocaine spray I used for sunburns, but that stung too much and then made my anus numb.
Mom went with me again to see Dr. Kudafer. We checked in and waited a few minutes for the nurse to call my name. This time it was a different nurse—not Bonnie. She brought me back and pointed to a scale. “The doctor would like to get a weight,” she said.
The scale had metal balances that slid on rails back and forth. She set the bottom balance for 130 pounds and slid the smaller balance down to 1 pound.
“One thirty one,” she announced.
“I’ve lost like seven pounds,” I said.
“I wish I could lose seven pounds,” said the nurse. She winked at my mom, and wrote down my weight.
The nurse showed us into an examination room and took my blood pressure and temperature, then left us to wait for Dr. Kudaver. He arrived a few minutes later.
“How are you today, Wesley?” he asked.
“I seem to be getting worse,” I said. “I’ve tried all the diet changes and it doesn’t seem to help at all.”
“Let’s talk about stress,” he said. “How are your stress levels?”
My mom laughed. “Stress? Him?”
“Sometimes stress can be latent in a person’s life, especially if they’re anticipating big changes – like graduating from high school and getting ready for college. Do you worry about any of that?”
“Not really,” I said.
“Is work stressful?”
“I work at a pool.”
“Sometimes work relationships can be stressful. Any problems with your coworkers, with your boss, customers?”
“I’ve been on unpaid sick leave for a week. I told my boss what you said about waterborne illnesses and he told me not to come back to work until you cured me.”
“Oh. What about your romantic life? Is that stressful?”
“I’m not dating anyone,” I said. I thought about Kelly at the pool. I wondered whether she missed me. In fact, I had spent a significant portion of seven days straight wondering whether she missed me.
“If I told you you had to reduce stress in your life, what would you do?”
“Stop pooping so much,” I said.
“Wesley,” said mom, sharply.
“What? He’s my doctor, and that’s the most stressful thing going on in my life. Do you really think this has anything to do with stress?”
Dr. Kudafer made some notes in his file. “Well, it doesn’t sound like stress is a factor. For now, let’s have you keep up with the modified diet and try to rest as much as possible. I’ll give you some antibiotics, but I’ll have you do another stool culture first. Sometimes they give false negatives.”
He left us in the room, and the nurse came in a few minutes later. Instead of a stool cup she gave me a plastic bag with three vials, two of which were half-full of liquid.
“So this is a little bit different from your last culture,” she said. She took out the vial with no
liquid in it, and unscrewed the cap. One the end of the cap was a tiny serrated plastic spoon. “When you collect your sample, use this to scoop the material into the tube. The tubes have a line on the side-” she brought it close to my face to show me- “that tells you how much you need to put into each. For the ones with liquid, shake them up afterwards. Try to scoop from the messiest part of the sample, if it looks like there’s blood or mucus or anything else gross.”
It was poop. It was all messy. “When I left here last time, I, uh- well, it wasn’t very obvious how I was supposed to collect the sample. So I’m wondering if you have any suggestions, especially since I have to scoop it into those little vials.” I did not see any point in explaining in detail my previous debacle.
“You can use plastic wrap or newspapers. Just wrap the plastic so that it hangs into the bowl, and catches your feces. Remember not to let any wee-wee get into the sample.”
“No, no,” I assured her. “Of course not. No wee-wee.”
I woke the next morning and went to the restroom for more morning void, but realized that I needed plastic wrap to collect the sample. I had no clue how the newspapers would work; was I supposed to squat over it like a puppy? My need was urgent, but I had to produce before I could start taking the pills. I scurried to the kitchen, where my parents were already eating breakfast.
“Where are you taking the plastic wrap?” asked my mother.
“Bathroom,” I said, and scurried away. I had to move fast because my bowels were already on the move and it would be just minutes before they emptied into something—be it toilet, plastic wrap, or underpants. The plastic wrap proved a formidable challenge, however, especially against the urgency and grogginess of my mornings. I couldn’t find the tag end, then found it but couldn’t get it to unroll without tearing lengthwise. I finally got an unmarred stretch of plastic, but it folded on itself and stuck fast, impossible for me to separate. I gave up. My need had become so ferocious that I was shaking when I sat down on the pot, and my relief was immediate.
Still sitting on the toilet, I tore off the now-crumpled stretch of plastic and tried my best to unroll a fresh piece. After getting an arm-length’s worth without tearing it or letting it adhere to itself, I carefully tore it off and stuck it flat to the wallpaper next to the toilet so it would be there when I came back.
I finished and took the plastic back to the kitchen.
“If you need that, Wesley, why don’t you hang on to it?” my mom asked.
“I have what I need,” I replied, putting the roll back in the drawer.
“What were you doing with it?” my father asked.
“I had to collect a stool sample. The nurse told me to stretch this over the bowl to catch the stool, so I don’t have to aim for the cup.”
“Well, then, why don’t you keep it?”
“No, I just needed the one piece.”
“You can keep the roll,” she said. “You might need it again.”
“I have enough,” I said.
My mom grimaced. “Wesley, I don’t think it’s a good idea to use that wrap on food now that it’s been in the bathroom with you.”
“I think your mom may be right,” said dad.
“Where am I going to put it?” I said.
“Your room,” mom offered. “Your bathroom.”
I took the plastic wrap back out of the drawer and set on the far edge of the kitchen counter, away from any food, where it would not cause any distress. After breakfast I carried it with me to the bathroom, but I didn’t need any more of the plastic to collect my sample. I got all the tubes filled, shaking the ones with liquid until it mixed with the poop in a brown slurry. I took the tubes in a paper sack back to the doctor’s office.
League of Mortals by Duncan Cross is licensed under a
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