Diary of a CyberChondriac

I had already booked these two weeks off when I thought I was going to Benidorm with Anita so I have managed to cancel second week as there is no point in wasting holidays. I need a week to recover from drinking that mini bar anyway. Doesn’t feel strange being single again as was only with Mark a short time.

My stomach is in terrible state though. I am fairly sure it is the after effects of drinking mini bar (two miniature Jack Daniels and coke, two miniature vodka absolut neat, a mini malibu, a mini southern comfort and lemonade, three miniature bottles of Napoleon Brandy for shock.

I can’t stop feeling sick and I have butterflies in my tummy. I went onto google to look up symptoms and it said I was suffering from acute anxiety and stress. Yes, it makes perfect sense. Although just to be sure I have made a telephone appointment for tomorrow with Doctor Bloomfield. He may be able to prescribe something to calm my nerves.

Managed a tin of soup but couldn’t face venturing out. Mrs Skelley knocked and delivered a hand written letter. She explained that she came past my door as she was sweeping lobby and noticed letter.

It is from Mark.

He said he broke up with Jennifer nearly a year ago and she could not accept it. He explained that she has been using stalker like tactics since the breakup. Apparently she has stayed good friends with Mercedes and that is how she knew about the barbecue. He asked me to give him a ring and he would explain everything.

I just can’t bring myself to read his texts, listen to his messages or ring him. I feel so foolish. Like I was the only one who didn’t know about his other secret life. Not only does he have webbed feet, he has spun me a web of lies. I shall not call him The sexy builder anymore, i shall refer to him as Spiderman (although he is taller and much better looking than Tobey Maguire.)

I am back home licking my wounds. Mark has sent me sixty three texts and left various voicemails but I won’t reply. The woman I met was his fiancee Jennifer. I was so gob smacked I didn’t let on who I was and just said I was a friend of the family.

Jennifer said she was thrilled to see Mark as he was working in Manchester at the moment for a building company. She told me she was going to press him to
set a date for the wedding.

I am just realising that Mark didn’t introduce me as his girlfriend to his family, just Carla who he met through his job.

The two timing bastard. Anyway, I digress. I finished my cigarette and tried to sneak away from the barbecue without being seen. My plan was to return to the hotel, pack my stuff and catch a train. However I changed my mind for the following reasons:

1. There were no trains to Manchester until the next morning.
2. It should be him who leaves not me as he is in the wrong.
3. There were molton brown toiletries in the en suite and I wanted to enjoy using them.
4. Maybe I should confront him? (this goes against every fibre of my being as I am not usually a confrontational person.)

Anyhow, as I was proceeding toward the vast entrance in order to make a clean getaway I bumped into a man and he said “wo where’s the fire?”. It must have been a build up of things, I am not sure but I burst into tears. The man introduced himself as Rex, the family’s private hairdresser.

To cut a long story short we ended up in a pub six miles away and the whole story came pouring out. He said he of Mark but had not met him and so didn’t know anything about Jennifer. He said he was sure it could all be explained.

I could not help telling him how my hair had sapped my confidence and that I felt ugly compared to the rest of the female guests. Rex reassured me that I was very attractive and that if I followed him to his salon he could fix my hair and restore my self esteem.

Rex a bloody miracle worker. He gave me a gorgeous honey blonde colour with caramel slices and a temporary straightening treatment which should last six
weeks. He told me he was gay but I informed him I had already guessed. I also figured out that he has a thing for Mungo and he confirmed my suspicions.
Although he said no good could ever come of it as Mungo still has female genitals and he is with Babs who Rex adores.

We parted as good friends and we have swapped numbers. Rex gave me a lift back to the hotel in his sports car and I came up to the room to google my stomach, write my diary and read tragic love poems on the internet.

I telephoned Mark at this time after consuming the mini bar. I told him it was over and not to come to the hotel. I advised him I would make my own way home. He seemed very puzzled as to why I had left barbecue and why I was ending things with him. I told him to ask Jennifer and then I hung up and switched my phone off. I put the ‘do not disturb’ on door and passed out.

A knock on the hotel room door awoke me at ten o clock. It was the cleaner needing to get the room ready for the next occupants. I packed hurriedly and took all molton brown stuff and shower cap (good to use when applying hair mask.) I then rang Julian and he came and collected me (I knew he was in the area on business.)

Well, it’s all been a nightmare. I am writing this in the hotel room alone.

The whole thing started off okayish. Mark’s parents Dolores and Alfredo (AKA Dolly and Alfie) were ok and fairly friendly. He introduced me to his sister Mercedes who is married to Hugo. What a complete bitch!!

Well I have missed a vital part of the story. Somehow, my hair went wrong on the journey. It was a drizzly morning when we set off but my stylist had assured me that this industrial strength serum would not fail. Well he was wrong. I only stood in rain for about thirty seconds whilst putting my bag in Mark’s car and we stopped at a service station for a coffee and a fag break (nearly fainted as two cups coffee eleven pounds).

Anyway , Mercedes looked at me like I was something she had trodden in and said I was welcome to use the family gym in the house but all her stuff was size zero so I would have to get Mark to take me for gym clothes. I was so annoyed I told her I didn’t go near the gym as it put too much strain on my joints and didn’t want to end up with osteoporosis. I calmly explained that I was more a fan of Ashtanga yoga and pilates, (I read about these two things in an article about Madonna in Company magazine in the doctor’s waiting room.)

I then met Mark’s ‘brother’ Mungo and his ‘wife’ Babs. Mark filled me in on the history. Mungo used to be Mary but always felt trapped in the wrong body and dressed in men’s clothing from the age of fifteen. After years of psychology sessions along with horrendous bullying from school then work colleagues (he went to an all girls school and worked in stocks and shares) he underwent a full sex change and had his breasts, ovaries and womb removed. He was put on a course 0f male hormones to deepen his voice and give him facial hair.

I can accept all this but why choose Mungo as his new name? That I can’t get my head around. His wife Babs was lovely to me and I was very surprised at how glamorous she is. Mind, Mungo is extremely wealthy. The house is enormous with a gym, swimming pool, four reception rooms, six en suite bathrooms and a landscaped kept garden. They have housekeeper, a cleaner and a nanny for the two dogs Bafta and Oscar.

I am in the wrong job. The dogs’ nanny gets eighteen grand a year just for walking, grooming, dressing and accessorising , training and picking up poo poo.

My stomach was playing up so I stuck to cold salads and white wine spritzers. Mercedes asked me if I was watching my weight when she clocked my plate but I told her I don’t do carbs ever. (Good job she didn’t see the two crumpets I had for breakfast with utterly butterly and jam).

At about nine pm, Mark was mingling and I was left alone. I crept around the back of a tree for a sly cigarette and that’s when I met her.

Managed to swap my days with Bernice at work so that I could get hair done and pack. Of course I also needed to go through flat like a tornado. My mum always told us when we were growing up that if you were going away you should leave your home immaculate in case anything happens to you and you don’t return. That way, whoever comes to sort out your affairs cannot call you behind your back for being a dirty bugger. Although when I think about it rationally I realise that if you were dead you wouldn’t really give a flying fuck whether your bench tops had been bleached and your chrome was sparkling.

I told my mum years ago that her headstone would read ’she may have had her faults, but her skirting boards were immaculate’.

Since I am only away the one night I am simply taking a holdall (the truth is I only have one case and it’s ancient), I could be like that trampy chav family from that television documentary and carry my belongings in netto bags!

Anyway, hair looks totally defrizzed for once and have applied masses of super strength serum so it would take an act of God to move it. Roots are a nice hue of strawberry blonde and is looking poker straight. I think with hours spent applying expensive clinique make-up I should look passable for barbecue tomorrow.

My tummy still a bit gyppy so have googled at last minute for advice.

Got bit of shock. Turns out that the spasms, constipation and the runs may not be irritable bowel syndrome but may be crohns disease. Very concerned now.
The website says it can only be confirmed with an endoscopy or a colonoscopy (other end, think hoover nozzle inserted up rectum without lube.)

I have therefore decided to take my trusty laptop on my overnight stay. I need to keep a close eye on symptoms but earliest doctors appointment would be Tuesday as Dr Bloomfield doesn’t work Mondays and he knows my stomach history, i.e. irritable bowel syndrome, sliding hiatus hernia, painful period cramps and excessive flatulence.

Mum rang to say goodbye as she off to Benidorm with Anita, Ivan and kids. I decided not to mention the barbecue as didn’t want the third degree when I return, i.e. what do Mark’s parents do? where do they live? are they god botherers? Do they have their own teeth? Does his mum dye her hair and are there any signs of varicose veins or bunions?

I told her to have a great time. She asked me if I wanted any ciggies bringing back and I gasped as I am a secret smoker. Mum said she has always known that I smoke even though she chain smokes herself, she can smell it on my coat.(that febreze is rubbish!)
She is bringing me two hundred fags back and is smuggling tobacco in bulk for dad as he rolls his own and extra for her to sell at the local working mens social club.

Mark came around this evening and we watched a repeat of ‘Extras’ then we ate a Chinese takeaway. Big mistake on several counts. Firstly, got spare rib meat stuck in tooth and I picked at it all night and ended up with swollen gum. I have also had violent pains in stomach so have taken some buscopan as I think pork must aggravate my irritable bowel syndrome.

Mark became amorous but I said I had my monthly visitor and he asked if my mother was staying at my flat.  I explained I was on my period and he laughed and said of course he knew that and was teasing me. I wonder!

Forced myself back into work as mum rang four times altogether yesterday and I couldn’t face any more of her interrogation.

I went for an eyebrow and bikini wax in my lunch hour and have made an appointment to get my roots touched up on Friday. I want to make a good impression at the barbecue.  Am not sure why. I reckon they might be posh as they live in an affluent area.

I also called in to Debenhams and bought a nice outfit (trousers and summery top).I decided to wear shoes instead of sandals and hopefully Mark will follow suit and conceal his webbed feet.  I expect his family are aware of them. God, maybe they are hereditary. I will have to keep my eyes peeled.

My mother rang to ask if I was over my illness. I am sure she didn’t say swine flu in case just uttering it would make her catch it.

She said she was preparing for her trip abroad and had called next door to remind Doreen (morbidly obese loner with halitosis and facial hair) to check on house while she was away in Benidorm. Doreen asked her to bring back four hundred ciggies and a bottle of cheap vodka.  No wonder she is a loner!  Anyway mum informed me that Doreen is on the waiting list for a gastric sleeve operation.  The term gastric sleeve conjures up an image in my mind of the thing Christopher Timothy wore when he was delivering calves on ‘All Creatures Great and Small’.  It sounds well, frankly barbaric. Doreen must be desperate. Mum said she had joined Match.com and described herself as single, GSOH and cuddly. She had gone on seventeen dates. She had been stood up sixteen times and the suitor who did show up wanted her to squash him. I told mum that this was sick and perverted but she said au contraire, Doreen went back to his old people’s sheltered housing and did the deed but they didn’t see one another again as she said he had awful BO.

Anyhow, Julian has gone and told the family about Sexy builder and mum asked when they could expect to meet him.  I told her not to hold her breath as was early days and I didn’t hold out much hope.