When I finally got to begin the long awaited process of Getting my Hormones, it was not the thrilling rush that I had come to expect it to be. Hospital Day, as I would come to think of it, was really a bust, a long maddening endless span of waiting around in a too cold examination room in a cotton gown feeling sprung and anxious and bored, like being on a long plane ride at the point where the movie had ended and the in flight meal was long ago reduced to a messy, discarded tray and there was nothing left to do but stare out the window aimlessly. I always brought along a backpack of books. School books, comic books, reading books, but I could never bring myself to actually open any of them and relax. I was too hyped up, worried that I would never grow past four foot ten, or I would end up sadly out of proportion like this one kid I once saw in the waiting room, with legs too short and arms too long and a thick torso that seemed too slight to support his limbs. I was getting very worried about my body, and had begun the habit of confronting my figure as of late, and finding it full of faults. I was entirely too round, I would think, as I stood and examined my torso in the bathroom mirror. Too round and sadly undeveloped. I watched with envy as my friends changed during sleepovers, seemingly unaware of their suddenly slimming waists and breast buds.
“But you have incredible hair.” my best friend Caroline would say, as a way to comfort me as she pulled off her bathing suit and slid a long flannel shirt over her head, her sudden swell of an actual breast giving a slight sway. I ran a hand along my hair that hung to my waist. Yes, I did have incredible hair. At least on my head.
Yes, Hospital Day was a disappointment. I had expected so much more, so much more than sticky scooped back avocado colored seats that were cold in the winter and sticky in the summer. I had expected much more than a windowless room where the nurse announced my weight in a stage voice that they could probably hear all the way to phlebotomy.
“One hundred and thirteen.” The nurse announced, and then looked at me from only the corners of her eyes, “that’s a little high for your height.” I immediacy felt the sort of shame that should only be reserved for someone that has been driving drunk, run a stop sign and taken out an old lady in the crosswalk. I wanted to apologize to the nurse and tell her that I would try to grow faster and eat less. I slumped back to my mother and slid down low in the plastic scooped seat.
“Be good.” She said, sensing my mood.
Being Good at Hospital Day was hard, because it was not the normal sort of Being Good that was expected of a twelve year old. Being Good at Hospital Day meant not giving the doctors attitude when they wanted to draw blood or count my sparse display of pubic hairs. How, I wondered, sliding lower on the plastic seat, can one Be Good in a situation like that, when pubic hairs owned by a twelve year old, by all rights, were to be looked at privately, like when Caroline and I skinny dipped, and we sat out on the lawn afterwards wrapped in thick towels, and I had furtively glanced down at myself to compare with what Caroline already had and I was surprised to see seven hairs sprouting there. I had absolutely glowed, staring down at that sudden crop. Later, at bedtime I had shyly shown my mother. And that, I thought, sticking to the seat, was what pubic hairs should be all about when you are twelve. It was against nature and nurture to have these sacred hair constantly probed at and counted by some nameless interns and then noted on my chart.
Yes, from the beginning Hospital Day had been a bust. It was a disruption to my school routine, to miss an entire day, and I still hadn’t figured out how to explain my absence to my friends. “I was in the hospital” always had quite a ring to it, but I didn’t want to get into the nuts and bolts of why. It was depressing, because I had expected so much more from Hospital Day. I could still dimly recall the spark and special flare of the hospitals of my childhood, the special feeling of being the sick girl, the emotional pampering, and the presents. But no one was lining up to give me a bouquet of flowers and an Easy Bake Oven now.
And the day began insanely early. My Mother would rouse me before my usual wake up time because there would be traffic to contend with. When we arrived at New York Hospital and handed the car to the valet, there was a long walk along the manicured gardens, and then the whoosh as we passed through the sweeping glass doors into the huge airy atrium, and the echo of my slapping sneakers as my feet dragged down the endless corridors that led to the Pediatric Endocrinology Unit. My Mother’s walk was brisk, efficient, as she carried a tote bag with magazines and books and lists to tend to. Even though we arrived before eight, even though we were among a handful of early patients, when we settled into the scooped plastic seats it was always at least an hour before Hospital Day really got going. I could help but begin to immediately fidget.
“Read a book,” My Mother would say, relaxed and flipping through her magazine.
“I don’t wanna.” I would say, swinging my legs and kicking at the floor.
“Can I take a walk?”
“Don’t go far. They’ll call our names soon.”
I would nod, even though I knew it wasn’t true. I could wander the entire length of the Pediatric Endocrinology Unit, five times over, all the way to the double doors that led to the cafeteria, where, my mother always promised, I could have Chef’s Boy-R-Dee ravioli if I would just Be Good all day.
“Be good,” my Mother reminded me in the exam room while we waited for the doctor. I was sitting on the heater by the window and swinging my legs again, making rhythmic thumping thwacks.
“I am.” I said, annoyed, but I stilled my legs and then hopped to the floor, letting my gown flap open in the back. I glanced around the room, at the two bland leather chairs, the exam table covered with tissue paper with the drawers underneath. I put on hand tentatively on the handle and tugged. Inside were supplies. Rubber gloves, butterfly needles for blood draws and alcohol scrubs.
“What are you doing?” Asked my mother, glancing up from her magazine.
“Exploring.” I said, “Look at what I found.”
I held up a rubber glove.
My mother grinned and motioned for me to toss it over. She blew it up like a balloon and we had a spirited game of Glove Toss. She could do this for me on Hospital Day, she could make it fun. She would let me case the entire room, pull out all the drawers, mess around with the blood pressure cuff, or put on a funny voices to make each other laugh. It stopped the insanity for a moment. Even though too soon my spirits would sag and I’d lie down on the exam table under a thin blanket and hover into twilight sleep until light tapping at the door would rouse me and I would sit up, blinking and disoriented at some resident, fresh faced and eager to exam the pre-puberty surgical menopause case in room five. It was always someone different, as it was a teaching hospital, but the routine was the same. Lungs, heartbeat, blood pressure, and then they would say in the same detached professional doctor tone,
“Okay, why don’t you go ahead and lie back now?”
I hated this part, where they would untie my gown and peer intently at my flat nipples, and then prod gently at the flesh around them. It wasn’t so much that there was nothing there to make note of, it was the strangers touching me, even in this medical fashion, that made my body seem less mine somehow, at this crucial time where I wanted it all to myself. I wanted to be like every other twelve year old girl I knew, alone in my bathroom in front of my mirror caught up in a secret flush as I took stock of the subtle changes that belonged solely to me, and were for me alone to observe, not lying on a paper covered table with a hospital gown lifted up as the Resident spread my vulva apart with gloved fingers and peered at the interior of my vagina and said,
“Okay! The Doctor will be right in.”
As the resident left I would hastily retie my gown feeling violated, a victim of medically sanctioned sexual molestation. My Mother would catch my eye, her entire face telling me, I’m sorry. I would show her my brave face, that plucky look I had mastered, perhaps more to lesson her pain than mine, for I had learned to completely disassociate the second my gown had been opened and the chilly air hit my skin.
Dr. Bei made me feel different, soothed even, as she examined me more intently, commenting softly and asking questions. She was Chinese and had a very thick accent that I could hardly decipher. My Mother would step in and translate on an as needed basis.
“Wu have pain lon scar?” She asked, pressing her deftly below my navel in swift little circles, almost like my Mother’s touch.
“Does your scar hurt honey?” My Mother stood at the foot of the exam table and rested a hand gently on my ankle.
“No,” I said, “but it kinda hurts a little higher.”
Dr. Bei would move her hands and prod my stomach above the double scar that sliced between my hips like a lopsided smile.
“Hurt here?”
“Yes.” I made a face. “Always.”
Dr. Bei would then go off on a long tangent that I only caught every forth or fifth word of, but my Mother seemed to follow, because she kept nodding and making interested little grunts of “Uh huh.” Or “Mmmm.” It took several visits but I began to decipher some of Dr. Bei’s spiel. “Vu-Ginal Beeding” meant your period, something I definitely wanted. “Odd-heeson” was adhesions along my scars, something I did not want at all. “Esstageen” was Estrogen, or Getting My Hormones, but this would not happen for some time yet as my Han Axreey (Hand X-Ray) and not yet shown Popper Foosen (Proper Fusion) of the bones. No Vu-Ginal Beeding or Bess Tisoo for me yet.
“We take bud today,” Dr. Bei concluded and plucked a butterfly needle from the drawer. I held my arm out like a seasoned pro, making a fist and not even flinching as the needle dipped neatly into the crook of my elbow. I moved my arm gingerly as I dressed, being careful not to dislodge the wad of cotton taped down, and then we were free, and I was cranky with hunger, and my footsteps fell fast as we headed to the hospital cafeteria where my Mother always tried to entice me over to the hot section first.
“Oh honey look,” she would say, motioning to the steaming trays, “they have lamb!”
I would stand firm with my backpack slung over one shoulder.
“Ravioli.”
I loved the cold section of the cafeteria. It was filled with all sorts of crap that I wasn’t allowed to eat at home. I adored feeding quarters and dimes into the vending machines and making selections from the large Varity of pastas and pastries. It was strangely satisfying to end Hospital Day eating something sweet and mushy.
And then, bellies full, we would walk back out into the bustle of mid-afternoon Manhattan, me scrapping one sneaker along the sidewalk as my Mother called my Father from the payphone on the corner to give a full report before we retrieved our car and headed home. Once in the shotgun seat, my eyes would grow heavy, and I would give into the emotional fatigue and fall under, listening to the drone of WOR on the radio, fully asleep even before we reached the West Side Highway.