two years ago

Two years ago tonight, my friend Phil and I were sitting on my second-floor, back porch having a few beers and talking about work and music when two young men walked off the alley to rob my neighbor. One of them pointed a large chrome-plated revolver at her. When I yelled at them to leave her alone, he turned and fired two shots. One bullet lodged in the kitchen wall, and one bullet went through a two-by-four before hitting me in the shoulder. I blacked out when it happened and didn't know I'd been hit when I got up from the porch floor. My shoulder hurt, but I thought it was from the fall. It wasn't until I felt the blood coming out of the hole in my shoulder that I realized I'd been hit.

The next events follow a blurry trajectory of firemen from the station behind my house, police officers and detectives, and paramedics. There were neighbors and Phil. There was the ambulance and the oxygen and the heart monitors and the IV lines. Banana was upstairs asleep while all of this was going on and didn't wake up until much later. By then, my father had arrived to spend the night and get her to school in the morning. She still remembers being scared when she woke up and I wasn't there. And given my father's occasional mentions of that night and how much worse it could have been, I can only imagine what he must have been feeling.



The bullet lodged in the muscles between my shoulder blade and spine. It damaged muscles and nerves, but narrowly missed doing far greater — and possibly mortal — harm. It caused a hairline fracture in one vertebrae and set me on a course of physical and mental recovery that continues today.

As time goes by, I expected the impact to lessen, but it hasn't. This is in part because I can never forget that someone tried to kill me. That I am known as the neighbor/friend/guy who got shot keeps it alive in other people's minds as well. I've begun to accept that this certain grace or fortune that kept me lucky enough to be here is also something that will always be with me.

And while I can't wish the event away, I do wish for one thing: an arrest, a conviction, closure.

382

That's how many days I've been in one sort of pain or another. Not that anybody's counting. And not that it's getting old or anything...

Don't get shot, okay?

Pharma notes

My recent forays into prescription drugs for treatment of pain have included, most notably, a neuroblocker named Lyrica. It is a formulation of pregabalin, and related to neurontin (gabapentin). At first blush, beginning in early September, 75mg twice a day of the stuff seemed great; my pain went away, and in general I felt better. My sleep cycles settled, and the only side effect I noticed was a greater sensitivity to alcohol.

After a while, though, the pain began to return. The pain specialist kicked me up to 100mg twice a day, and that's when the fun really began. The side effects began to include:

• greatly heightened effects of alcohol
  
• confusion
  
• loss of memory
  
• inability to find words
  
• thinning hair
  
• dry skin
  
• loss of balance and coordination
  
• blurry vision

Strangely, it was the blurred vision I noticed first and most acutely. The rest of the symptoms I began to put together as I looked back at the intervening month. After a bit of research, I also discovered that these are common side effects. In response to my concern, the pain specialist decided to move me to Gabatril. After discovering that Gabatril has many of the same (potential) side effects, not to mention a host of others, I decided to pull myself off everything but Ibuprofen.

I have no regrets. The pain is within manageable limits. The experience has made me question the pharma industry even further, however, since so many patients are put in the position of responding to one foreign substance with another. In spite of everything, I'm lucky. I feel bad for the people who need stuff like this to function day-to-day.

My shoulder hurts

This isn't too surprising, I know. There's a bullet in there, and a hole that's still healing up. Even so, it's rainy here this morning and I feel like I should be saying something like, "Eh, there's rain in the air. I can feel it in me bullet." Ah well... The pain and discomfort change as time goes by. The medication the doctor gave me--Neurontin--has helped with some of the worst discomfort. That doesn't change the fact that it's downright weird to feel that the lump on my back has gotten more pronounced as the bullet works its way out.

All together now: "Ewwwwwww."

pain

One week after I tried to go off the Ibuprofen, I need it more than ever. The vicodin even seems tempting at moments.