The Bendy Straw

When I was little being sick meant getting to stay home with Mom. She would make a bed for me on the couch and bring me a drink with a bendy straw in it. I got to watch TV or read. When I wasn't too sick to enjoy it, it was heaven. Beyond the bendy straw being sick comes with certain privileges. The sick person like old folks and pregnant women is excused from certain responsibilities along the lines of hurrying, lifting, being patient and so on.

Last Sunday we did the grocery shopping and I decided to test drive one of those little motorized buggy things. I would have survived the trip walking and pushing the cart but it would have been it for me for the rest of the day so I figured what the hell? Are they going to tell me I look too healthy to ride one of these? I'll just pull up my skirt and show them my incision. I admit I was curious, too. "What's the top speed on this thing?" I wondered as I careened into produce. I think I finished the shopping in less time with this thing not because it whirred along so fast but because people got the hell outta my way. I don't think they were being polite. I think they were frightened.

All in all I don't find the privileges of being sick to be a fair trade for good health. Being sick pretty much sucks. I'd much rather be able to drive, walk as far as I want, and bend over without having to plan it out in advance than be excused from carrying in the groceries. I can't wait to be downgraded to the bendy straw.

knit me a moustache!

knit me a moustache!
Originally uploaded by splityarn.

This is not my knitting or my photo. It did make me laugh though so I'm sharing it with you.

Bobble Head

My last posting was written in a burst of happy energy over being at home at last. Since then I've done little to nothing. I feel like a bobble head. My head is light. It feels strangely outsized and if I sit still it seems to sway entirely of it's own accord. I need vast amounts of sleep. 12 hours at night and a 3 to 4 hour nap is not too much.

The hospitalization went smoothly for the most part. Unfortunately waking up abruptly from anesthesia seems to be more about me than about the anesthesia. This time I tried to extubate myself but had enough awareness of what was up that I let go of the tube when told to. I mentioned this to My Esteemed Surgeon on my last hospital day and immediately regretted it. He had seen the whole thing and naturally found it distressing. I think he had been hoping that I wasn't as aware as I had seemed.

Something that was very different this time was the whole incision thing. The first time I had surgery I remember being awakened from sleep on hospital day #3 by the resident ripping the bandage off of my belly in one movement. I also had staples. This time My Esteemed Surgeon instructed me to remove the bandage myself and just work at it slowly. I also have plastics quality stitches closing the broad smile at the bottom of my tummy.

Both in the hospital and at home I am caffeine deprived. I can normally drink hot drinks in warm weather but I don't seem to be able to right now. In the hospital they only served me decaf tea. I finally broke down and got someone to bring over a 2 liter bottle of coke. I'm also hungry all the time. I can only eat a little before I'm stuffed and then shortly I'm famished again. This is a problem since I'm really not up to all those trips to the fridge so I sit around hungry with my head bobbling slowing in the breeze.

Condition D

There are all kinds of overhead paging codes broadcast in the hospital. Condition A and Condition C are requests for the code team to either an airway or cardiac problem. These are usually called to patient rooms but sometimes the destination will be a testing area or hallway. Condition H is initiated by a patient or family member who feel the patient needs more help than he or she is getting. This condition exists due to true and horrible cases in which patients' needs were not addressed resulting in suffering and even death. Unfortunately some people call a Condition H because they're out of toilet paper. Condition F means a fire alarm has been triggered.
I decided during my recent admission that there should also be a Condition D for when a doctor has become a patient. I did the best I could to let people know I was going to be making an appearance in their department/ward not because I wanted special treatment but to avoid any embarassement. It is painful to watch people shift gears from their canned patient schpeel to their "I'm talking to another physician" stammer. It is also uncomfortable to know things that require them to change their routine. Like "I know this is Same-Day surgery but I AM being admitted after this." This may be said in a couple of situations. It might be the opener for a follow-up comment such as "so you might want to put that freakin' 16 gage IV in my arm instead of in my hand for Chrissakes." It might also lead up to statements such as "Now seriously do you really think my surgeon would send me home after a laparotomy?" You dear reader do not need to know what that is only that my Doubting Thomas should have looked at my chart.
Condition D would serve to shock people out of their drone routines. If the overhead paging system announced "Condition D OR POD A" or "Condition D GI lab" intermittently throughout the day everybody would look a little sharper. It would be at least as effective as the time I saw a hospital administrator in "business professional" dress strolling down the hall saying "The Health Department is in the building" over and over again in a conversational tone to no one in particular.

So You Have to Do a Bowel Prep!

I understand there are people who undertake colon cleansing processes even when they aren't going to have anyone mucking around up their behinds or in their bellies. I think these are some seriously misguided folks. I don't see how medical science will ever be able to eliminate the delightful process of cleansing one's digestive system prior to certain tests and procedures but our modern consumer culture has managed to make the experience a little easier to bear for the person who plans ahead.

Now seriously doing a bowel prep as it's called is no joking matter. If you try to bend the rules your gastroenterologist may miss a menacing lesion hiding behind some hunk of poo you didn't see fit to expel. If you vary from the prescribed diet that innocent dish of red jello could buy you a work up for GI bleeding. If you aren't spotless in there and your surgeon has to manipulate your bowels whilst redoing your insides you run the risk of a major toxic spill. The ecosystem inside your belly will not take this kindly. That said here is my advice for an almost painless bowel prep.

Make reservations at a really fine restaurant for 36 hours before your test. Eat anything and everything to excess. Most importantly drink heavily. A bottle of wine, some port and some Havana Rum if you can get your hands on it. Feel free to begin you celebration of all things "clear" at this time by having white Bordeaux and white port. If you can't get Havana Rum tequila makes a fine substitute. Be sure and follow dinner with about half a pound of white cherries. This will jump start the process. When you wake up in the morning you will have all day to rehydrate yourself with the ginger ale, white cranberry juice, peach juice, and lemonade with which you have stocked the fridge. Breakfast should consist of poached, or soft boiled eggs and white bread. This will be about all you can handle anyway. When you wake up again around 4pm you have to drink your magnesium citrate or phosphosoda. Chase it with any and all of your "clear" liquids. A routine bowel prep without the debauchery at 36 hours requires that you drink at least 8 ounces of fluid every hour while awake. If you have chosen the debauchery option I suggest you shoot for 24 ounces per hour. At 9 pm it is time to take the bisacodyl tablets. I strongly advise that you have several interesting magazines, perhaps a radio and definitely some "Kandoo" flushable wipes at the ready in your bathroom. Kandoo wipes in case you aren't familiar are "your little one's first toilet tissue." In other words Kandoos are for kids learning to doo doo on the can. Do not get baby wipes. Baby wipes are not flushable and this is not something you want to find out during a bowel prep. While hanging out in the bathroom feel free to take one or several showers with antibacterial soap. I personally recommend Dial antibacterial "mountain fresh" body wash plus moisturizer. Who wouldn't want to smell "mountain fresh"? A last word about fragrance: to avoid any embarrassment once at the hospital I suggest you avoid the fruit-y or "jungle-fresh" Kandoos. Finally, an hour before you leave in the morning do an enema followed by one more mountain fresh shower. Please do not ask anyone to help you with the enema. We are born alone, we die alone and we should always do our enemas alone.