My cat broke my lymph node. He jumped on it with such force, 14.6 pounds of impressive Maine Coon weight, not counting the three pounds of fur he has surrounding him because I didn’t brush him yesterday, and he landed, dead perfectly, on my left groin lymph node (positioned just above the left groin). Goddamn and Holy Hell! I did not know until this morning that a. such a thing was possible and b. how much I must really love my cat because my lymph node is now broken and my cat is still alive. I haven’t known this much pain since I fractured my foot, stepping awkwardly off of a curb and twisting it at the same time.
My husband murmured pretend-consolingly in his sleep that it was “too bad, honey” and added a gentle “aw” in his attempt to be on my side. I asked him if he knew what lymph nodes are and he said, “Not really.” I felt briefly superior because when I was a kid, my Mom used to ask us all sorts of medical questions, like, “Are your lymph nodes swollen?” to which we would say yes or no (depending on the correct answer) because we had been taught what and where they were. Sort of. She had one of those giant Medical Books, you see. I told my Husband, continuing with my air of superiority, that I would tell him all about lymph nodes when he woke up later. Then he rolled back to sleep and I got out of bed, in pure broken lymph node agony, to realize that I probably needed to look it up and learn more about lymph nodes myself. All I know is: there are several of them throughout your body in various critical places. I know that if they are swollen on the sides of your neck you are definitely “fighting something,” that if you have breast cancer you don’t want it to spread to the lymph nodes, and finally that if your 14.6 pound Maine Coon jumps on yours and hits it in just the right spot, you will not die, but you will wish you did. After not killing my cat after this horrific jump accident, I realized I must really, really love him. (I knew that already, but the pain to love ratio was extraordinary, really).
This tragic accident led me here, out of bed, at the ungodly hour of 8:00 am, writing and trying to learn about lymph nodes so that I can nod knowingly once my husband awakens and gets up in another hour. (He sleeps later than I do, usually by an hour or two. He stays up later, too). I can then speak condescendingly to him and say wise things such as, “I can’t believe you didn’t know about lymph nodes,” and then tell him all about what I have just learned (in the time he kept sleeping) as if I have always known about it. Ah, Wikipedia, great to see you again. Until then, I am going to research the very, very important–but seldom asked–question, “What do you do when your cat breaks your lymph node?”