From Intern to Admitting

November 6, 2018, I was seriously injured at work. While furiously preparing our high-end grocery store cheese department for the Thanksgiving rush, I stepped on a haphazardly placed piece of metal shelving and slashed my left achilles tendon.

The next day, all of Southern California set on fire, including the communities directly neighboring our little house in Woodland Hills, CA.

My injury was severe enough to require surgery, and because of the time of year, getting a date for that procedure proved a real challenge, so I spent many days in bed, waiting to hear what the next step would be.

Admittedly, as a mother to six, with two jobs, the opportunity to sit all day and cuddle my kiddos while watching TV and having my meals brought to me, was quite welcome at first. If not for the pain, lack of ability to do most everything, and the absence of basic hygiene, I could almost say I was enjoying it.

Because I knew that the road to recovery would be long, and without a set surgery date, I needed a show to binge that had some serious seasons behind it. Having never seen "Grey's Anatomy," added to the fact it had 14 complete seasons available on Netflix, and the subject matter somewhat parallel to my situation, I dove in head first. The fact I managed to avoid seeing a single episode of this wildly popular program in nearly 13 years, is almost a more incredible feat than the fact that I completely finished watching them in less than 3 months.

Because it took me this long to actually watch the show, does not mean that I spent those years living under a rock. I knew about McSteamy and McDreamy and the various plot peaks and pitfalls that had the rest of the world riveted. The triumphant wins, the gutting tragedies, the gorgeous actors... I was especially entertained at this display of early-aught, typically rainy Seattle. The endless cameos of personalities (Christina Ricci!) who were now more widely known was also really fun to observe.

The kids all loved to climb into bed with me, each day after school, to watch "Grey's." This undoubtedly led to some real grown-up conversations surrounding the endless coupling and uncoupling of characters, untimely tragedies, and seemingly endless tumors.

So many tumors.

My own surgery did eventually happen. I received a date in early February where my dear old achilles would be cut again, sewn back together, and healing would commence. We devoured season 14 clear up to the day I was going on the table. At that time, that was all Netflix had to offer.

It's been nearly two years since that final viewing. Currently there are two more seasons of "Grey's" available, and for whatever reason, I have not watched them. I like to think it is because those days of being injured and helpless have passed, and that the good doctors of Seattle Grace (or Seattle Grace Mercy West, or even Grey Sloan Memorial) all helped me through it, day by day, episode by episode.

They really did do everything they could.