needling

i'm going to get a hepatitis shot in an hour and i'm about one hundred percent sure i'm going to cry like a baby.  a) i have a pretty intense hatred of needles and b) hepatitis shots are given in your non-dominant arm for a reason (namely, that they hurt like a biatch and prevent you from doing any real work with your arm for a few days).  side note: i love that i'm discussing these vaccinations as if i'm the only person in the universe who has ever had to suffer through one and as though not every college student in the country has had to get the shots.

anyway, i'm not pleased.  however, doing the work that i'm doing (which may or may not include handling many strange dead things from unknown locations) has prompted me to try to overcome my fear of long, sharp metal objects entering my skin and just get the damn vaccination already (well, if we're being honest, i should say "again," as i had to have it to start my undergrad career seven years ago).  also, i scratched myself through a glove yesterday (meaning the glove did not tear, but i still got a small, hopefully protected, poke) and now i'm freaking out.  regardless of whether or not the glove broke (and it didn't, which to my mind bears repeating) and regardless of whether or not i bled (i didn't, as the scratch was perhaps as superficial as one can be while still be considering a scratch), the fact that i was messy with foulness and got a small scrape is really upsetting.  sometimes, as i macerate things and get disgusting and smelly, i take a step back and think to myself, "how did the vegetarian child of an enormous hypochondriac find herself working elbow-deep in forensics?"  it is an interesting life path for anyone, but for me, as i still carry around my mom's extreme health mania and tendency for exaggeration and hysteria, it's even more surprising.  i love it in practice for all the reasons i always thought i'd love it in theory, because we really are helping to build back identities and i think that's fascinating and noble.  however, i can love it and appreciate my opportunities and still not jump for joy about exposing myself to disease by slicing myself.

thus, doctor's office, here i come!  yay.