Side effects may include...

I avoid medicine. Medical procedures. Medical establishments, workers, topics, all of it. I run. I don't have a doctor. Unless you count the stat care doctor. I don't imagine that counts but I convince myself it does.
So when all my hobbies involve rusty metal and dirt and my tetnus shot was 11 years old when a vineyard razor blade went into my hand, I started thinking about getting a tetnus shot.

"Started thinking" is not an understament. It took 6 months for the process to sink in.  The wound healed. My jaw didn't lock up and progress into a terrible back breaking convulsion so I figured I was fine.
Until bro-captain-medschool came home and told me I could die every time I picked up a rusty something or other or put my  hands to the dirt. Believe me, three loads of scrap metal and there are a ton of rusty spring thingies around that made cat scratches all up and down my arms.

So ok. Predicament. I have an involuntary, irrational aversion to all things medical. No idea why or where and if I could talk myself out of it of course I would. Like I enjoy collapsing or crying hysterically while some poor nurse takes my blood pressure. Stitches required straight jackets for young jane and as I got older I got more talkative in convincing my way out of med procedures.

Novicane does not work on my clan. Always a fun time in the dentist chair when they think you're full of shit, screaming because the horses dose they injected you with isn't doing anything. Trust gets shot pretty quick.
But I know I need this shot, no insurance means I'm going to the clinic and that means I avoids having homeless people look down on me as I shake and sob over a needle.

There was a pregnant woman in the card aisle. I thought damn, if only I could be they brave as having an impending surgical medicinal date growing inside me.

I told myself it was just a beer run. With an extra stop.

I did the best I ever had. No fainting. No crying. Just a little meditation and imagining my emotions as a garden hose that I could shut off.

Worked for me

Got the shot. No crying. Promptly wen home and started going through wicked side effects. Nausea and headaches and my left arm going numb and feeling terrible.

It's been a couple days. My arm still feels like I sat on it and the prickly numbness  is there. I remember my last tetnus shot hurting worse than the sawblade to the thumb injury that merited it. The doctor told me she wouldn't remove the sawblade until after I got the shot and still I sat there and thought about it for awhile. I eventually got it in the opposite arm and saw splinter pulled out of the other thumb. Then I got on my bike and while riding home, ended up curling the tetnus shot up and having to ride with one bandaged hand and a throbbing, punching pain.

So I'm wondering what comes first, the fear or the side effects. And if these drugs really are being rejected by my body or my mind.
And I hope I can feel my left hand again soon. Maybe it's time to get a real doctor instead of these bandaid treatments in emergency mode.