Or so I thought.
Around 4:40am I was awoken by the very worst sensation in the world: My back was spasming, my lower abdominals were attempting to turn me completely inside out, and it felt like someone was desperately trying to claw their way out from under my skin. That's right - my special gift of pain that comes to visit once month had arrived in my sleep. Rolling out of bed still in a fog, I got up to go to the bathroom.( I should probably mention that I hate going to the bathroom in the middle of the night. I have a terrible, completely illogical fear of mirrors in the dark.) Keeping my eyes down and blindly feeling around for my box of tampons/torpedoes/pixie sticks, I suddenly remember: I don't have to suffer! I remember that I had read online that microwaving dry, uncooked rice can help alleviate cramping - I had even set aside a bag of rice for this purpose.
I go into the kitchen (past another mirror), grab my bag of rice, wrap it in a towel and set the microwave for 30 seconds. Wasn't long enough. I'm tried. I'm now cold, I've been wandering around blinded by both pain and darkness for much longer than I would like. If 30 seconds isn't going to heat up my dry uncooked rice, 60 seconds had better do the trick. Punch in 60 seconds. Wait. After what seemed like 240 seconds, I open the microwave to grab my towel wrapped bag of rice.
Oh the searing, burning, screaming pain!!! Covering my mouth in order not to scream, I lean my head up against the refrigerator: I've burned my thumb with the steam from the air that was between the rice and the towel. The pain is so bad I half expect skin to have somehow detached itself from my finger. I should go run it under cool water: Except, there's a mirror in front of that sink, and I really don't want to go there. Of course I could turn on the light...But wait! Frozen veggies are in the freezer, and if I just wait a minute or two I could still use the rice bag on my stomach, and the frozen veggies on my now throbbing thumb.
The pain of my finger so bad that I can longer feel my cramps which woke me up in the first place. I reach into the freezer and grab the first bag that I can. Whatever misshapen object I grabbed was not doing the trick - tossed that aside. I reached in and grabbed another: much better. Wrapping my finger with the frozen veggies, and laying my rather evil bag of rice across my stomach, I feel as though I am completely wrapped in pain. I try to fall asleep.
Woken by pain. This time the sky has started to brighten. My head is in fog - pain and the lack of sleep have completely disoriented me. By some sort of miracle my rice bag is still piping hot. My frozen veggie hag is still freezing cold - but has fallen off my thumb. So, I wrap it tighter and weigh it down with a pillow. Go back to sleep.
Woken up by pain, again. Only this time it is searing hot, and it is everywhere - my legs, my stomach, my back... sitting up, this time I do scream. Waken the boyfriend. Turns out, the ever miraculously hot bag of rice melted its plastic and was now making its way into every crevice in the bed. I was covered in hot, uncooked rice. It was even in my hair.
My boyfriend thought this was pretty amusing.
Cleaned up rice. One nice bonus - my thumb was completely numb. The pain was gone! I removed the bag from my thumb and closed my eyes. Peace. Finally.
Woken up by pain. My thumb is throbbing once again, but in a strange, ever growing sensation of pain. My room is now completely filled with light and I can see that the vein in my thumb is a dark purple - maybe even brown! I realize that perhaps I had that frozen bag of veggies on a little too long...Did I freeze my thumb? I don't know. I don't care. Back to sleep.
Woken up by alarm. I have work in one hour. Day passes by in a fog, come home with a headache. I start dinner, and stand around waiting for water to boil. Boyfriend has done laundry, and it's waiting on the bed for me to fold. While folding I discover that my brand new Jason Wu for Target kitty-cat tee has somehow developed strange purple stains...I ask if my boyfriend put this mysteriously stained 100% cotton shirt in the dryer. Yes, yes he has.
FML.
