the hospital story

I've decided not to write the whole hospital experience in detail. Well, actually I did but I won't be sharing it with you. Sorry guys, I tried to write it down for this blog but it just kept coming out feeling like an "oh pity me" story, and that's not how I want you guys to remember it. (I really tried. I even tried a whole “Mr. Bean” theme to make it funny)

But for the sake of your curiosity, here’s the jist of my writing.

Friday Night: Ambulance takes me to the wrong hospital. I’m popular at the hospital (the right one); nurses even call me by name. I take Dormicom (1) before going to bed.

Saturday Morning: My old nurse-friend talks to me about why I’m back at the hospital while trying and failing to put the IV (2) in my hand. I actually help the orderlies in moving me from stretcher to stretcher to operating table. Again, I’m popular among the nurses and we have small talk before the surgeon comes. X-rays are taken before the surgery. We try to put a spinal anesthesia on my back. We go for general anesthesia instead (3).

Saturday Afternoon: I wake up screaming and flailing because of the pain in the Post Anesthesia Room (4). They put me back to sleep. I get three strong kinds of pain relievers before going back to my room. I spend the rest of the afternoon – around 3 hours - crying, non-stop.

Saturday Night:
The anesthesiologist decides to give me a double dose of Demerol (5) and a single dose of some other kind of pain reliever that makes me dizzy and starts with the letter C. That, with Norgesic and Toradol, makes the pain go away most of the time (6).

Sunday: I spend the day teaching myself how to tolerate the pain. I mostly sleep because of the Demerol.

Sunday Night: The nurses make a mistake by giving me Demerol and the C medicine at almost the same time. The result: I get delusional (and that is really scary).

Monday Morning: Nurses make mistakes with my meds – I really hate it when that happens. Nursing students are allowed to use me as a test dummy in giving sponge baths and taking vital signs – not my idea. I realize how Oprah and Iyanla from Starting Over 2 look awfully like my maid.

Monday Night: I convince my mom to give me one more day because my feet still hurt.

Tuesday: More nursing students. I realize how much water I consume in one day (7).

Tuesday Night: Another ambulance experience. They only send 3 people to carry me, and one of them is a little girl. My feet burn like they’ve never burned before.

So there you go, guys. Maybe when I find a better approach to share this story in the way I want to, I’ll post it here.

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1. A really good sleeping pill. REALLY GOOD.
2. Dextrose
3. We should’ve tried the spinal anesthesia again. That way, I wouldn’t wake up in the Post Anesthesia Room screaming and crying.
4. Where people under anesthesia go after an operation
5. IV med, I’m kinda addicted to it (not really). It makes you feel sleepy and just knocks you out peacefully.
6. You guys should realize that this is a lot of pain relievers - and they're round the clock. It’s not that I have a low pain tolerance. You’d be surprised to know that I can be really calm while going through a pain that raises your blood pressure to 160/110.
7. Around 5-6 liters per day.