"What's the grossest thing you've ever seen?"

Emergency Department, five years ago.

Curious Me: Dr. J, what's the grossest thing you've ever seen?

Dr. J: Easy. Maggots. My intern year and I will never forget it. Homeless woman comes into the ED holding her side. She has a huge abscess. I need to drain it. Cut it open, and out spills hundreds of maggots. I want to gag just thinking about it.

Shocked Me: No way. Really? That happens? Maggots?

This morning.

At 2 am I get an email from my mentor saying, "Hey! Why don't you come in tomorrow? 8 am?"

A serious Night Owl, I am wide awake at this hour and think, "CRAP! I can only get 5 hours of sleep!? What is this?! It's summer! I haven't functioned on less than ten hours of sleep in two weeks!"

I wake up at 7am, jump in the shower, and turn around to see a seriously large and thick massive black spider flying through the air to attack me. I scream and attack back. I win. At this point, I can't decide if this is a really good start to a day (up early, going to be productive, kill a spider) or a really bad start to a day (dang, I'm up early, a massive spider just attacked me). I get my answer when I pull my white coat out of the dryer and spill orange pop on it less than ten minutes later. Then, I realize I've lost my ID. Twenty minutes later, I find it, and I realize it's too late to walk to the hospital, so I jump in my car. I figure I will drive as far as I can and park on the curb where I do not have to pay millions to park. I notice all these signs on the sides of the street, forbidding me to park there. I turn around and drive until the signs stop. I park. I realize I am only five blocks from my house. I get out, walk to hospital, trip on curb, hurt my toe. I start to get nervous about what this day has in store for me.

I walk into the team room and read the board. "Maggs."

Mentor: Want to see something gross?

Me: Ummm... Sure?

Mentor: Ever see maggots?

Me (actually getting excited): OMG! No! But, I want to! I have probably asked 5-6 doctors what the grossest thing they've ever seen is, and the answer is always maggots!

Mentor: Oh crap, patient's already in surgery. (Gives me brief patient history) But, I can show you the pictures.

Me: Yeah!!!!!!! Awesome.

Me (looking at image one): WHAT? Oh my God, that is the grossest thing I have ever seen.

Me (looking at image two): OMG, I think I might throw up just looking at these. I can feel them crawling on me! There are thousands! How does this happen!?!?!?!?!?!???!!?!?

Even though I did not see these in real life, I saw enough to deter me from ever being excited about maggots again. I did not describe what it was like in good detail, because truthfully, it was the grossest thing I've ever seen and I want to save you from having any type of mental image. All I'm saying, is when I snuck into the staff meeting to steal some free Chinese food, I looked down at my fried rice and saw maggots. Appetite killed.

Good luck to everybody in healthcare. May none of us ever have to deal with maggots, and if we do, may we have the strongest of stomachs and a really bad cold at the time so we can't smell.