The Struggle is Imaginary.

I was given a flu shot over Thanksgiving weekend, and while I am super thankful to have it be so convenient (woot woot, middle class American-- or at least family member of the middle class) I hate them. I hate them so so much.

Here is Shot Manifesto: I do not mind the needle (unless it's anywhere near my stomach. I will probably never be pregnant or have a pet raccoon because of my fear of amniotic fluid tests and rabies shots). I DO mind whatever weird invader is being put into my system. It's an unreasonable double-standard because I will happily take any pill a doctor prescribes me, but it creeps me out to think of dead germs swishing around in my muscle. It isn't the shot that bothers me, it's the next few days when your body keeps reminding you with sore muscles that something is stuck in there that doesn't belong.

Flu shots freak me out the most because every year I have to wait around for 10 minutes after I get the shot to make sure I don't have a "reaction." What is the reaction we're waiting for? What is supposed to happen?? If I'm not about to become an X-man, I probably don't want to know. Then, they tell you that you might have flu-symptoms in the next 12 hours so I spend the whole day worrying myself into a fever. I didn't even really know what flu-symptoms were, so the first few years I imagined myself into a stomach-bug until I found out they weren't the same thing.

The past few years I've gotten the nasal mist, which is simpler because instead of having a sore arm you just get a snuffly nose, which is much easier to pretend is normal. This year, I got the shot with a "short needle." Instead of going into your muscle, it puts the vaccine under your skin in a smaller volume. It also hurts less, but clicks like a piercing gun which is its own kind of startling.

This long boring post all comes down to this one small inconvenience: My arm has an awful swollen red bump (like a hive, or a bug bite) where I got the shot, and it's super itchy but if I itch it it hurts and then I get nauseated. It's like a little flu-germ pool stuck in my arm and it won't go away. Picture whatever it is that makes you feel sick-- gory horror movies, seeing other people get sick, dead puppies-- then imagine that thing attached to your arm, and you can FEEL it wanting you to pay attention to it but you can't look.

Like I said, the struggle isn't real, it's imaginary.