Reminded of fear

I was talking about my reluctance to go into the hospital last week with a friend of mine and my daughter, Madeleina, said: "Dad, I think you always forget that when you were five and in kindergarden you had rheumatoid arthritis and spent between a month and several months (depending on which sister is doing the talking) in the hospital. I think you got hurt by that a lot, so every time you have to go into the hospital you secretly remember being that little helpless, lonely kid in the hospital."
She was right and the tears streamed like a tsunami for an hour. I shut that all out, but when I remember it, I remember that almost every few days they wheeled one of us out with the sheet over their faces cause we were in an experimental ward and kids died. I just buried that, but know that I hate going to the hospital because it feels like prison where I can't get out. Thanks, Madeleina. I will start to incorporate that old pain and try to get rid of it since carrying it around buried so deeply doesn't help at all.
Today I had the first of my follow up appointments to the recent 8 day stay in the hospital and I was sort of throwing up going into it because I was sure the doc was going to keep me there. Wow. I am going back 63 years to those pains. And I am sorry I am being so selfish when there are people with no food, people with no friends, people suffering from wars they have nothing to do with. I would be happy if the universe would fix them all and then, if it has a little more oomph!, could fix me too.