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Reflections on a Munchausen’s Syndrome by Proxy Childhood, Part 2
Hospitalization — Bishop, California
It’s weird. When I fill out medical intake forms that ask if I’ve ever been hospitalized and which seem to mean ever, I never, ever think to mention being hospitalized for pneumonia at age three.
I tell them about having my tonsils out at age eight.
Maybe because the tonsils marked a huge step in the Munchausen’s Syndrome by Proxy (MSP) story of my life, though I didn’t always recognize that fact.
At age three, I got pneumonia. I don’t remember that, particularly. What I do remember is being put in an oxygen tent in the hospital in Bishop, California, where the parents took me. The thing was like mosquito netting over a bed and made probably out of vinyl. It hung off some frame and came down over my head and shoulders, ending mid-chest. I’m not sure why I wouldn’t have been able to sleep in any position under it, but I recall being stuck on my back (which could be misremembering since it’s really hard to breathe that way when congested). I hated the thing and plotted my escape, and one night I got free and danced briefly on the bed, waiting to be told how clever I was. I seemed to be under the misapprehension that the parent or parents beside the bed were on my side, just waiting for me to free myself.
