Shock treatment

After months of research and weeks of waiting, it’s time to go to an appointment to find out about an alternative type of electrolysis. One available only in Sydney. I am staying with my parents, who are in their eighties and living in an upmarket retirement living complex. It felt decidedly odd when I realised I was actually old enough to meet the organisation’s age requirement to live there.

This morning, my mother is feeling unwell and tired. We had been supposed to go out to the shops together. But it is ten am and she is sitting at the dining table, bent over the crossword still in her nightie, her food left almost untouched.

We defer the outing, which is sad because it might be months before I am visiting next.

“Just get dressed”, I say encouragingly, “and see how your day goes”.

I drive to the appointment. My work calls, and I try to navigate the complicated conversation as trucks rumble deafeningly on the Victoria Road upgrade. I am standing outside an unprepossessing shopfront, hands over my ears, endeavouring to understand the voice at the other end. A woman steps out the door of the shop, sees me there, nods and goes back in.

I shout into the receiver “Sorry, I have to go”. I scurry inside. The space is crowded with little rooms, amateurishly constructed. White partitions that do not reach the ceiling make me think of an experimental maze for rats. Or a chicken farm.

I am ushered through to a cubicle. It is a cross between a dentist’s surgery and a wardrobe.

The consultant pulls on gloves and mask and looks at my face. She seems slightly crestfallen – there is more hair than she expected after two years of laser.

I’m not thinking about that. I cannot take my eyes off the menacing contraptions hovering above the bed.

Dozens of wires ending in microscopically sharp needles. Wires, tangled in some electrician’s nightmare, for carrying electrical current. Current that is going to be intentionally passed through my skin and into my body. A pad that is applied to the arm to carry the current through the body. No wonder they asked about pacemakers. I am not calm. At all. But we are just here to talk.

After discussing what would be required, I am shattered. There will be 100 hours of motionlessness, able only to listen to music or podcasts, but not to get up, move my head or read. All the while being, gently, electrocuted. She recommends three- or four-hour blocks, “or you just will take forever to make progress”. We do a thirty-minute trial. Even though I have anaesthetised my face with a powerful analgesic cream issued under prescription, my fist squeezes a hard foam ball as I feel the intangible yet visceral burn of the electric charge.

I go home and my mother asks about the session. “I feel like a fool”, are the words that burst out, then I find myself crying. Why did I find myself like this? Why did this have to happen to me? Why do I care so much about just some hair? Why can’t I just get on with life?

And my mother says, “well, each step at a time. You made it to the appointment.” She smiles encouragingly. “Like you say, just get dressed”.