Why Am I The Latest Restoration Project?

I went to the doctor today, which is always a mistake.

You can walk in feeling reasonably functional and walk out carrying several referrals, a list of vitamin deficiencies and the unsettling suspicion that your entire body has quietly resigned without bothering to tell you.

Apparently, I now need liver scans.

Nothing makes you feel quite as cheerful as hearing the words “liver scans.” I don’t know exactly what they’re looking for yet, but I assume my liver has finally lodged a formal complaint about the conditions under which it has been expected to operate.

Sheez! I only drink when someone comes to dinner these days. Probably stuffed it years ago when I used to guzzle...

Then there are the B12 injections.

I’m not entirely sure why I need those either, but evidently swallowing an ordinary vitamin is no longer sufficient. My body has reached the stage where nutrients must be injected directly into it because asking it to absorb them normally is apparently expecting too much.

Vitamin D also needs to be added to the list.

This seems particularly insulting. I live in Australia. We have so much sunlight that half the country spends its life trying not to get any on them. Yet somehow, despite living beneath a giant flaming ball in the sky, I have failed to collect enough Vitamin D.

And then there is the mucus.

I have become a mucus generator.

I don’t know where it is all coming from. There cannot possibly be this much spare space inside one human being. Yet my body continues producing great quantities of green sludge as though it has secured a government contract and must meet a monthly quota.

It is revolting.

I cough, blow my nose, clear my throat and briefly believe the supply must finally be exhausted. But no. Somewhere deep inside me, another shift starts work.

At this point, I don’t feel like a person. I feel like an ageing house discovered during a renovation. You pull up one floorboard and suddenly somebody is talking about damp, structural movement and whether the wiring is still legal.

Why is everything falling apart at once?

My brain has already required more repairs than most major highways. My legs have their own ideas about how walking should work. Now my liver wants professional photography, my vitamins have disappeared and my respiratory system is manufacturing industrial waste.

I went to the doctor with green mucus.

I came home as a restoration project.