TheBanyanTree: Notes from the Hospital (Underworld)

[Monique Colver]

            I spent the first few hours shivering on my gurney. The nurse
had said he'd see about getting the heat turned up, then returned later to
say it was out of his control; a robot was in charge of heat and the robot
apparently didn't think I warranted any. 

            All I really wanted was something to make the pain go away, so
of course they could not do that for me. They did, however, insist on giving
me IV fluids, and whoever put the IV line in did so without apparently
considering how I was to move my arm for the next two days, for every time
I'd bend my elbow my IV would beep and I'd have to unbend it. When I was not
moving this was not a problem, but sometimes moving was necessary, just like
in real life.

            I had three blankets, and still I shivered. I just wanted to be
warm and pain free. They just wanted my fever to go down and to find out if
there was something they could possibly send me to surgery for. 

            I was taken to x-ray, me and my gurney, and the view
horizontally is quite different from the vertical. Have you ever noticed
that? I felt awkward, as if I should be walking to x-ray. Certainly I wasn't
so sick I couldn't walk there. I had managed to ambulate myself into the ER
in the first place, hadn't I?

            Later I was taken for a CAT scan by an orderly who perceived the
hallways as a racetrack, and who sped me down them accordingly. It was
amusing, and since it didn't increase my pain I was happy to find someone
who moved with speed, if not always precision, in this place. 

            By afternoon they had determined there was no pressing need for
surgery, though random people kept mentioning the possibility of removing my
hot appendix. I kept repeating the same mantra when this cropped up: "I
don't have one. That came out years ago." So into my IV line went a little
something extra, and there I was, the pain subsiding a bit, and I even
started to warm up. Not to my environs, but physically anyway, which was
quite a relief at the time.

            I always have trouble with the pain scale. "On a scale of 1 to
10, what's your pain like?" How do I know? How do I know my scale of 1 to 10
means anything? At times I felt like a raging 10, but how was I to know if
the pain could get worse, thereby rendering me off the scale? I have the
same problems with favorites: favorite books, favorite movies, favorite
foods. I can possibly rate in order so many enjoyable things? How can I
possibly assign a number to my pain? It hurts, dammit, fix it! I failed to
see the relevance in assigning random numbers to my pain, but I went along
with it in the hopes they would see my cooperation as further evidence of my
extreme pain. When I am not in pain I am not at all cooperative.

            In the afternoon I was gurneyed off for an ultrasound, a rather
innocuous event, in most cases, and in this case also. The ultrasound tech
ferried me back to my room herself, not wanting to wait for the orderly to
come fetch me. I think this was a ruse for her to get away from her
ultrasound room for a bit. I am happy to be an accomplice whenever I can.

            There was talk of having me stay "at least until tomorrow,"
which I found rather alarming since I hadn't brought a change of underwear.
This was supposed to be a simple ER visit - I go in, they test me, they
decide I'm fine, if deranged (it was the fever, I say, of course I was
deranged), give me something for the pain, and send me home to recover. 

            "At least until tomorrow," they repeated. The infectious disease
guy, who probably has a more impressive title than "infectious disease guy"
was still considering if I might have something infectious. I guess that's
his job. The surgeon was to come by and see me later, but I think he lost
interest when it was determined that I had nothing of value to offer up,
glistening with blood, which is what surgeons like best. 

            I spent most of the day dying (metaphorically dying, I was never
really dying, not any more so than we all do every day) for something to
drink. On the way to the ER I'd made my husband (I can now say I have a
husband! What fun!) drive through McD's to get me a Sprite, and I'd carried
that with me for as long as I could, until they took it away from me and
declared liquids off limits. They said that's what the IV was for. Really?
Then why was my mouth craving liquids? 

            Every so often someone would replace the IV, or stick something
special in it when I was unruly and/or in pain, and every so often someone
would come by and report on the absolute lack of progress that was being
made. My husband stayed with me all day, though it can't have been easy. I
was grouchy and out of sorts for no discernible reason. 

            In the afternoon, covered with blankets and receiving the much
desired pain meds, I dozed. Time would pass with me either in it or not, it
was hard for me to tell at times. The pain still throbbed off in the
background, but it was now background, and no longer foreground. 

            We waited in our little room, my little room, in which I'd
established my residence. I considered window treatments and painting the
walls a more pleasing color. They could not take me upstairs to a real bed
in the real hospital until . . . I'm not sure until what, I just know we
waited until 6 pm. 

            At 6 pm an older gentleman arrived to ferry me upstairs. He was
quite talkative, and on the way up he told us this hospital was slated for
demolition, and that a new one was being built in Bellevue. This one was,
after all, built in the 70's. Practically in the dark ages. The doorways in
the 

ER rooms are barely big enough to fit a gurney through, which is why the
door frames looked like they'd been in frequent accidents. They had. I once
saw a hospital demolished, bit by bit, one much older than this, and it was
an interesting sight. Half the hospital had been exposed to the elements,
bits of office and exam room paraphernalia (what an odd word! I couldn't
even spell it without looking it up!) hanging out the openings, and then the
wrecking ball would hit again, and walls, ceilings, and floors would fall,
and all the detritus would fly up into the air, before sinking slowly to
earth. 

            This hospital is surrounded by trees, it's a beautiful setting
to be sick if one must be in the hospital, and I had a private room (as much
as a room can be private in the hospital, as everyone and anyone is
wandering in and out) and the view from my big windows was all trees. In
this hospital, I always have a room with a view of trees, so all I can see
when I look outside is green and blue (assuming the sky is blue, which it
was on this particular day, but even green and grey is nice), and it reminds
me of being in a tree house. I'll miss that, when the old hospital is gone.
The new hospital is surrounded by concrete and parking lots, and the view,
when one is incarcerated, won't be nearly as wonderful. I won't like staying
there nearly as much.

            Let me be clear. I don't like staying there at all now, but at
least let me have my trees. At least give me that much. Is that too much to
ask?

            I'm moved into my official hospital bed, which has so many
controls I can amuse myself for hours. I'm given, at last, ice chips to chew
on. I feel like I've died and gone to heaven. Ice chips! Can you imagine my
joy? I have never tasted anything so wonderful! I hold them in my mouth
until they melt, and then I have more. There's not a lot else to do with ice
chips, but I make the best of it.

            While waiting for my nurse(s) to proceed with several tasks
they'd said they'd be attending to I flipped on the tv. House was on. I
silently gave thanks that he was not my doctor, since there was a good
chance he would have killed me five times while trying to diagnose me. The
diagnosis success rate of my doctor wasn't much better, but at least I
wasn't being subjected to treatments that could kill me, if I had "something
else." 

            When the nurse came back in I felt guilty for watching a medical
show that has so little relevance to real life. (A team of doctors providing
care? I was lucky to see a doctor pop his head in the door once or twice
during my stay to see if I was still breathing.) Should I turn it off?
Should I pretend I wasn't watching it? Should I say something about how
ridiculous it was? I chose the fourth option, which was to pretend it just
wasn't there. 

            During my incarceration I had teams of nurses and unidentified
others who seemed to change with my temperature, which was fluctuating up
and down but never did reach normal. All were unfailingly kind and polite. I
spent the night tossing and turning and reading "Water for Elephants," which
my husband had bought for me when we discovered that I was not going to be
going home. Considering he'd been purchasing blindly, he'd made an excellent
choice. Every so often I'd ask for pain relief, and pain relief would come,
and I'd doze off and on, stops and starts. 

            I was allowed jello in the morning, a watery substance that I
ate because I hadn't eaten since Sunday night, and it was now Tuesday. I was
also given apple juice. 

            An orderly encouraged me to take a shower, an idea I was all in
favor of. He had a heavy accent and often I didn't know what he was saying,
so I went along with it. He covered my IV site with Saran Wrap, gave me
towels and soap and a package of amusing hospital underwear, and took me to
the showers. I felt better afterwards, a bit more human, even if I was
wearing underwear that was some sort of odd netting. When I emerged from the
shower room he escorted me back to my room, continuing a conversation in his
heavily accented patois. He was quite enthusiastic about my return to good
health.

            For lunch I was given a soft diet. That's what they called it.
They gave it to me as a test, to see how I did. If I did okay, I'd be
allowed out later that day. This wasn't so much a meal as it was a test. I
had high hopes for this meal, for I was hungry. I was certain to be
disappointed, and I was.

            Vegetable lasagna that resembled neither lasagna, nor
vegetables, nor tasted of neither. I couldn't describe the taste, and it
wouldn't be a positive experience if I did, so I won't try. I took one bite
and was overwhelmed with confusion. What was this odd food? I took another
bite to give it another chance, and found my first instinct correct. It was
inedible. Green beans. I love green beans. I did not love these green beans.
How can anyone make green beans taste so non-green bean-like? Two beans was
all I could stomach. A bread stick. How can a bread stick be so inedible?
Two bites. A soup, with an odd flavor, but I drank half the broth. Saltine
crackers! I ate both of them. Fruit cocktail! Out of the can! This I
finished. It was quite good. You can't go wrong with fruit cocktail out of
the can. 

            Later, after I left the hospital, it occurred to me that it may
not have been just the food, for I was off on food for several days. My
appetite returned, but food was still iffy, there was little I wanted, in
theory, and it often tasted off. Perhaps the food was not as bad as I
thought, perhaps my body was still not ready for food and didn't want to
encourage me in the partaking of it. After all, who knew what would happen
once it was consumed? Better not to eat at all than to take a chance.

            I had no problems with lunch, physically speaking, but then
again, I hadn't eaten much. This was my ticket out! 

            At 4 pm, which was my anticipated check out, I eagerly clicked
on the "call nurse" button, not that I was in any great rush to leave, but I
had to get out of that place. I was tired of trying to bend my arm so my IV
would work and not hurt, I was tired of getting up every five minutes to go
to the bathroom and having to take my IV with me (it was obvious to me that
I was quite well hydrated, still they insisted on hydrating me more), I was
sick of trying to be comfortable. I felt like hell, but the pain had mostly
subsided. The fever was still there, but I kept down my food. It's not as if
they could be expected to send home one perfectly well patient - halfway
well was good enough for me.

            Consultations were held. The fever was still there, the
infectious disease guy had decided it didn't look like flu. In fact,
everything they had wanted to rule out had, indeed, been ruled out, except
for the cultures that would take more time. They removed my IV, and I was
free, once more, to bend my elbow without setting off alarms. It's the
little things we take for granted when we're well.

            I dressed. Then I realized I was too weak from dressing to take
myself downstairs, so volunteers were called to wheel me downstairs. I find
wheelchairs odd because I'm not accustomed to them. Odd, I mean, in that I
should be walking, and taller than many others, and not sitting down while
I'm driven around at the height of everyone else's stomach. 

            My volunteers were young, in high school perhaps, and one was
asking the other why she'd decided to be a volunteer. I was never
acknowledged - I was just a package to be delivered. "My parents want me to
get experience, they want me to go to medical school, and I respect my
parents. I want to do what they want me to do."

            This girl was obviously not reared by American parents. The
other volunteer asked her, "But what do you want to do?"

            "I honor my parents."

            "Do you want to go to medical school?"

            I found the answer unsettling. "No, not really." 

            And that was the end of the conversation. Apparently the other
volunteer also found the answer unsettling. What does one say to that? I
can't imagine taking on such a task as medical school just to please one's
parents, but I've never been very obedient anyway. 

Shortly after that we were outside, and Robin helped me into her vehicle so
she could take me home.