So as I revisited my first night at the Hospital, I did confirm that Marv had come and seen me while I was still in the emergency ward. He brought me some magazines and sat through my morphine induced ramblings and help me live some of the most painful moments in my life. Not long after Marv left later in the afternoon, they wheeled my limp useless carcass up to the 3rd floor ward 34, and gave me a semi private room. The nice thing is, it was a slow weekend so I had no roommates. So as I got into my new PJ top and my custom fitted super duper turbo charged bed, which had more buttons than my TV remote control. As they rehooked me up to a new IV and gave me a styling hospital garment, I settled into my new digs. The pain started to come back with a vengeance and the nurse came in and offered me some more of that wonderful pain medication called morphine. This time I asked for a double! Problem was , in the emergency ward, they injected my morphine right into the IV which gave me the instant high I was coming to know and love. On the wards they could not do that, and they had to stick me yet again with a needle. On further inquiry the reason was explained to me – in the emergency ward there are always doctors present should something go wrong from a direct injection, and on the hospital wards they were not allowed to administer the ejections through the IV. Also the nurse explained that the morphine in the IV was fast but didn’t last as long, which I agreed, and the injection into the arm was slower pain relief but lasted longer, which was good as my injection would only come every 4 hours, instead of every two which again I had come to know and love. So I got my usual morphine with gravol to ensure I would not be sick. Around that time, as I don’t remember much, Cathy and Brian returned with my belongings, PJ, bathrobe, and most importantly laptop, so I would go online and post all my whoas and get the sympathy factor on facebook! I curled up into the fetal position again and went into another morphine induced slumber. I awoke a couple hours later to the nurse taking my Blood pressure and my temperature. I was really hungry at this point as I had not eaten in two days. Because of my condition and impending possible emergency surgery I was afforded only a wee glass of apple juice. Ironically, my pain had also subsided to the point of being a dull throb in my lower rib cage. My 40 hour gall bladder attack was ending. I drank my apple juice and savored every lil drop of it. I logged on to my laptop and checked my emails and updated a couple posts and then settled back in for the night. As it was around 10pm, and I had not slept the night before , I was looking forward to a few hours of non drug induced sleep. I even turned down my happy morphine shot, for the sake of two Tylenol 3’s. I figured I didn’t want to have to go through an intervention when I got home!
It was around 2am when I woke up and grabbed my wash basin and threw up. I remember reaching around in the dark and things crashing to the floor. The last thing I wanted to do was throw up in or on myself in my bed. I managed to hit the basin, and at the same time push the call button...and push the call button and push it again for the nurse – little did I know the call button I was pushing didn’t work and there was an actual separate button from my souped up bed remote control. None the less the nurse heard my heaving and came into help me out. All I remember is I had nothing in my stomach except bile and a wee glass of apple juice....I miss that apple juice...anyways, I finished my pity display and the nurse got me some more gravol to help with my nausea. I declined any more barbiturates as my main concern now was would i just throw my gall bladder up and avoid the surgery! Finally I rested having been glad I had no roommate that night with my typical patient like display.
Around 6am I heard the hallways come alive as all the doctors were doing their rounds visiting all the patients and discussing their prognosis with the young interns. In came 3 young doctors, the resident, the intern and the chief surgeon for the general surgery department. They were super nice and treated me with the uppermost respect and talked to me and not down to me. They poked and prodded and decided at that time that although my attacked had subsided, and the ultra sound did not look all that bad, my gall bladder was still pretty sore and tender, and that surgery was the best option. I would be scheduled for emergency surgery that very day, and barring any influx of more serious patience, I would be in surgery before 2pm. Of course that meant no food again, no drinks except a small amount pf water with my new best friends T3’s. The day nurse came on, a young Asian guy named Quang and he was nothing short of amazing. This guy loved his job, and took care of me like my own mother (minus the yelling and screaming and being grounded). I was able to get a shower and get a new outfit(hospital gown and feel a little human again. Once I was done I settled back in for a nap. Then about 2 hours later, Dr. Shiller came in, the guy that would be doing my surgery. He told me all the risks and explained what he was going to do, and even sat down and scribbled on a piece of paper what the surgery entailed. I felt really good and confident that this guy knew what he was doing and I trusted him. When he left i felt pretty good about the surgery. I fell asleep again, and then call came, time for surgery! Quaing woke me and hustled me along to get ready and to pack all my stuff up, which Cathy and Brian would grab for safe keeping. On a side note, I guess a lot of things get stolen in a hospital from patience which is a pretty sad state of affairs for someone to do that. None the less, I packed everything up, and had to remove my under garments and receive my post surgery shot and get into the new bed with a porter who would escort me down to the surgery ward. Ok I am a pretty solid guy emotionally, but around this time, I must say I missed having someone there that I knew, and that I was a tad bit scared.
Ok I promise to get the rest of this done this week. I have been traveling so much my time has been eaten up.
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