It happened on a Tuesday. A Tuesday that haunts my memories and still invades my dreams. A Tuesday that forever changed my faith in the safety of food prepared by others. What, do you ask, caused me such distress and pain? The answer, my friend, is simple: the worst case of food poisoning I have ever experienced.
One summer during my twenties, I worked as a camp counselor. My days were spent watching over kids as they enjoyed all the usual camp activities. It was not a bad gig, and I rather liked most of the staff I worked with. Housing and meals were provided, served at the camp dining hall, which was a rather large facility with a cafeteria-style serving line. I ate there regularly and never heard of nor experienced any problems -- until that fateful Tuesday.
I still cannot remember what was on the menu for dinner that night -- perhaps I blocked it out -- but whatever it was, it caused my guts to mutiny in a fashion that has left me a changed person.
The after-dinner evening activities began normally. I sat and watched a movie in the staff living area while having a beer. I soon went off to bed, without a care in the world. Around two AM, I awoke with a slight pain in my stomach. I tried to get back to sleep, but within an hour the pain had doubled and then tripled. I felt as if someone was literally reaching into my guts, grabbing a handful, and squeezing the life out of me. I lay doubled up in pain, clutching my belly as sweat drenched my pillow.
Around four AM, I decided to try the bathroom. I stumbled out into the hallway. Breathing hard and taking small steps, I managed to reach the toilet. I so hoped that I could take a dump of horrific proportions that would relieve my pain, but this was not to be: this first trip was unproductive. After some time, I slowly returned to my bed, where I would again writhe in agony.
After another hour passed, I finally felt the urge. I made the torturous trek back to the throne, where I proceeded to foul it with a rank mixture of solid shit followed by diarrhea. This did nothing to alleviate my abdominal pain. The splatter was everywhere, but I could care less -- at this point, I could not physically do anything about it. And besides, there were other bathrooms available for my coworkers.
Around seven AM, as I was making another attempt to reach the bathroom, I passed one of the other counselors. He was heading to the showers. One look at me stopped him dead in his tracks. "You look like hammered dog shit," he said. I replied that I felt that way as well, and proceeded to warn him about using the bathroom of death. He was nice enough to get me some fluids and promised to let our boss know that I was out for the day.
The rest of that Tuesday was spent rotating from my bed to the bathroom and back again. I had made so many trips to the toilet that I was only expelling what looked like cloudy water. My ass was so raw that I could only dab it with a rag that I kept in cold water. During the whole ordeal, I found it strange that I never threw up or even felt nauseous at all. Around eight PM that evening, the pain had started to subside, and I actually went to sleep.
I woke up the next morning and took stock of my situation. The pain was now gone, but I was dehydrated, had a raw ass, and was lying in a bed fouled by my own sweat. I also smelled absolutely awful. I took a long shower and then went in search of something to drink.
My coworkers avoided me at first because they feared catching some type of stomach bug. After hearing my story, however, they agreed that it must have been food poisoning.
I didn't eat anything resembling solid food for at least two more days. I believe it took a whole week before I felt back to normal.
For the rest of my employment there, I avoided the dining hall like the plague. To my knowledge, no one else got sick on the day I did. I must just have been the unlucky one -- the one who, on that Tuesday, had bull's eye painted on his stomach.
