The Nose Bleed

Last night I was leaning over and I felt something that felt like nasal drainage in my nose. Bizarre. I thought to myself because I hadn’t been crying. I hadn’t just finished watching Sixteen Candles or Steel Magnolias and so there was really no reason for any type of sinus problem.

Grabbing some toilet paper from the bathroom I blew my nose and was surprised to see that I was BLEEDING! Ugh. I haven’t had a nose bleed since I was like 8. That is 22 years without a nosebleed. I suddenly started thinking all these crazy thoughts. What if I have Ebola? What if my insides are turning to muck and I am found days later, not in a pool of my own blood, but actually a pool of crusty biological mass that is akin to Nuclear waste.

I stuffed tissues in my nose and consulted the internet for guidance. Oh Great Google, knowing of everything good and evil, what do you do with a nose bleed? Answers materialized before me and immediately I was relieved.

What Causes Nosebleeds?

The most common causes are dryness (often caused by indoor heat in the winter) and nose picking. These two things work together–nose picking occurs more often when mucus in the nose is dry and crusty.

Other, less common, causes include injuries, colds, allergies or cocaine use.

After reviewing this information I was only slightly relieved because the inside of my nose wasn’t dry and crusty, and I have no allergies, nor a cold, and I only pick my nose and use cocaine in moderation.

My nose continued to bleed and I thought if I just laid down it would get better. I could feel the blood running down the back of my throat. Ugh. It’s metallic taste was making me sick. Do I have a tumor? Is my head going to explode? I can’t sleep with all these horrible thoughts going through my head and this blood running down my throat.

I get up and take some Tylenol PM and change the toilet paper stuck in my right nostril. It is much bloodier than I thought it would be and this only causes me to worry more.

I sleep fitfully all night and I dream of aneurisms and epileptic seizures induced by bursting blood vessels in my head.

When I woke up at 10 this morning my nose had stopped bleeding and I hadn’t decomposed in the middle of the night. Thank God. I have a bachelor party to go to later today and showing up in a mummy wrap of gause would have been so “look at me! look at me!” and at 30 I have outgrown that for the most part.

Almost 12 hours later that bloody nose is a thing of the past, but the residual trauma caused by the bleeding hasn’t subsided completely. I don’t want to inhale to hard for fear that it will break a blood vessel in my head and I will die from blood loss. I also don’t want to bend over to tie my shoes for for the same reason.

I hope to get some good pics from the bachelor party tonight. I think we are going to use Alan, the groom-to-be as a pinata and then we will probably go to a strip club and do lines of coke off of strippers bellies – but I will pass on that because I don’t want my nose to start bleeding again.

Later taters.