I know better than to compare my insides with someone else’s outsides. But Susan, a woman who lives five blocks over, was the first person I saw after my three-hour appointment with the endocrinologist., and I couldn’t help myself. ??
“Your problem [an elevated level of the hormone Prolactin] could be caused by one of three things,” the doctor had informed me. ??
“One, you could have a hormonal imbalance (permanent PMS on top of manic depression . . . wonderful). Two, you could have a tumor in the pituitary gland in your brain (even better! God must have listened to me four months ago when I begged him to die). Or three, it could be a result of your medication (after trying 23 drug combinations, I’ve found a winner that, unfortunately, makes me lactate like a cow).” ?? 

Susan waved an energetic hand as she passed me in her just-detailed Land Rover, a Starbucks coffee cup in her left hand. This perky chick is only two years younger than me but could be mistaken for my teenage daughter, runs on a surplus of serotonin, and probably doesn’t know what cortisol (the stress hormone) is. Her mother and mother-in-law take turns watching their grandson, Christopher, a Gerber babe who sleeps 12 hours a night, takes two three-hour naps, and craps once a month. ?? 

Fearing that my days on this earth might be limited, I stopped by Starbucks myself to drink away my sorrows. As I parked my Honda that stinks of spoiled milk, I was trying to figure out when, exactly, I was going to fit in an MRI and additional blood work. My sitter time was already used up for therapy and psych visits. So I’m in the coffee line, having words with God about this new development, when I notice the wide grin on the guy in back of me. He is a midget in a wheelchair. ?? 

“Hey, Andy! What’s new?” the barista yells to him. ?? 

“Look at this!” Andy says, as he raises his seat and reclines it like a dentist chair. “This baby is snazzy!” ?? 

He is excited about his new wheelchair. ?? 

Humbled, I remember a quote from Helen Keller, who was not without her own challenges: “Instead of comparing our lot with that of those who are more fortunate than we are, we should compare it with the lot of the great majority of our fellow men. It then appears that we are among the privileged.”