The time a spray tan almost killed me

I've been on a health kick lately. I've been eating healthier. I went to the gym 7 out of the past 9 days. And I even started organizing my room (one of my New Year's resolutions) which is more for my mental health than anything else, but it still counts!

So anyway, my gym was offering free tanning, and even though I know that it's the opposite of healthy, I can't turn down anything free. My fondness for free shit is actually a problem. I'd probably say yes to a free pair of Crocs even though I think they're the ugliest shoes in the world and would never wear them. But hey, if they're free, I'll take them and FIND a use for them dammit!

Back to tanning. Included in the free week of tanning was a free spray tan. I was intrigued. I've never had a spray tan before and they're much less detrimental to your health than frying in a tanning bed. Or at least, I thought they were.

At my gym, spray tan doesn't actually mean a person is spraying you. Their spray tans are automatic, and supposedly pretty flawless. All you have to do to not screw up your tan is put lotion on your hands and feet so they don't turn orange, and make sure you turn around after the first 30 seconds. When they explained all of this, it sounded easy enough, so I went for it.

It wasn't until I was enclosed in a cold little black box (about 4 feet by 10 feet), with three spouts facing me about to spray God knows what all over my body, that my claustrophobia started to set in. I stupidly ignored my gut feeling, put on my shower cap, pushed the green button, and braced myself for the spraying to start.

As soon as the spray hit my body, I think I went into shock. It was freezing and I'm not going to lie...I peed a little. I couldn't stop it from happening. I felt like those pregnant ladies who pee every time they sneeze because a baby is sitting on their bladder, only my baby on the bladder was an ice cold spray tan. NOT COOL. (Don't worry though, the bottom of the floor is one big drain, which makes me think others have done the same thing...or worse!) After I got over the initial shock of the cold spray, I moved on to trying as hard as I could not to panic as the box started filling up with chemicals and vapor from the spray, sort of like a steam room fills up, only this "steam" tasted like hairspray and was impossible to breathe in. I kept telling myself, "Just 30 more seconds. You can't get out now otherwise only half of your body will be tan!" So I turned around and let it spray my back, even though I was near tears and gasping for air like a fish out of water.

The spray tan ended after what felt like an hour but was really only 1 minute and I almost cried from relief, until I realized that the vapor not only tasted bad, but it stung my eyes, too! I couldn't keep them open to find the door so I started spinning in circles with my hands on the walls groping until I found the handle. I think I might have uttered a "help me" during all of this, but if I did, the front desk girl didn't hear me and she certainly didn't come to my rescue.

I have this fear of dying while doing something really vain, like getting plastic surgery, or having a chemical peel, or getting Lasik surgery, or even having my teeth whitened; all things that are potentially dangerous and definitely unnecessary. Then, at my funeral, instead of people celebrating all the great things I've done in my life, or um, that I WILL do eventually, they'd only be able to talk about how I died and say things like, "Poor girl. If only she wasn't so insecure. Lots of people are A cups but at least they're STILL ALIVE."

Before I got out of the box, all I could think about was how EMBARRASSING it would be to die in a spray tan booth, or to even have to go to the hospital because I had a panic attack in the spray tan booth.

I finally found the handle and barreled out of the spray tan box of death only to look down at my legs and see that the tan had streaked from my "accident." So I did what any sane person would do, and started rubbing my streaked legs with my hands until they were as even as I could get them, which meant that they were now lighter than the rest of my body and my hands had turned bright orange.

After that, I patted myself dry with a towel, per the desk girl's instructions, and just sat on a chair in the tanning booth and had a moment of silence for my skin and my dignity.

Once I finally calmed down and put my clothes on, I texted my friend Dianna and she met me at Subway so I could tell her all about my near death experience and drown my sorrows in a diet coke, even though I don't drink pop, and a 6-inch veggie patty sub on wheat with extra black olives.

I can honestly say that was one of the worst experiences of my life. From now on I'm either white, or I'm baking my epidermis in real sunlight.