Seated on a warm, cotton white bed and tapping my fingers nervously, I anxiously awaited the arrival of the nurse to sweep me away to have my adenoids taken out. It was one of the worst feelings in my life.

The clock ticked slowly and steadily only with a slight tremor as it hit the ‘2’. I knew my time was almost up and I would have to face my surgery soon enough.

I turned toward my stepfather, Andy and gave him a nervous glance. At his place beside my bed, slouched in a wooden, maroon colored chair he tapped my leg softly.

He told me, “Our worst fears are seldom realized.”

“What does that mean?” I inquired, peering over at my mom who just shook her head as if to say ‘Don’t even ask.’

“Great question!” he exclaimed, leaning forward on his knees. “It means that most of the time we don’t realize how ridiculous and minute our fears are until we have to face them. So even though you are worried and fearful of the surgery, it won’t be as bad as you’re planning it to be.”

I stared at my dad in amazement as all of my fears drained from my body.

“Are you Jill?” a tall, dreadlocked man wondered, entering my room.

I nodded my head apprehensively as the man ambled over to my bed and shook my hand.

“You look a little nervous. Do you have any questions about the surgery? I’d be glad to answer them.” He looked at my parents as they shook their heads, no. Then he looked at me.

“I do actually. How long will the surgery be and how long will I be...asleep?”

“Well the surgery shouldn’t take very long. But it could take anywhere between ten minutes and an hour. Now for the anesthesia, you’ll have to talk to the anesthesiologist about that. Lucky for you, that’s where we’re headed right now!”

The man, who’d later introduced himself as Joe, rolled my fluffy bed down to a room packed with many similar looking beds, all occupied by anxious patients like me. Loud noises vibrated throughout the small room, making me extremely nervous. What if those sounds were the sounds of panic? What if those sounds were the sounds of trauma and heartache?

“Our worst fears are seldom realized,” Andy reassured me again when he saw my terror-stricken expression. My body relaxed as this phrase sunk in again. Then a tall, lady with a long, black ponytail shuffled over to my bed with a bright smile on her face.

“I’m the anesthesiologist that will be working with you today. So...” the lady began explaining to me the anesthesia process. After she was done she offered me a warm blanket.

“Yes, please,” I replied. They pulled out a warm, soothing blanket and wrapped it around my shaking body. I then layed on the bed for another ten minutes, resting pleasantly underneath the soft blanket before being poked and prodded and examined on the surgical table like an Egyptian artifact.

“Are you ready Jill?” someone asked me suddenly.

I opened my eyes only to find the lady with the ponytail standing over me and holding my hand as my bed was being dragged into yet another room.

I heard a scared yelp from the other end of the room I was exiting from and my anxiety rose again. But before I was wheeled away for the doctors to begin my surgery, my parents strode up to the side of my bed and my dad told me again, “Our worst fears are seldom realized.”

He smiled down at me right before the giant doors closed me into a small room filled with people in scrubs scurrying around. But instead of shaking crazily on the surgical table as the fruity gas filled my lungs and made my head spin around and around, I just breathed in deeper and told myself, “Our worst fears are seldom realized.” And before I knew it I was back in the recovery room resting in my bed under another heated blanket.