Monday, August 10, 2009
Sunday, August 2, 2009
An Old Story
A few minutes ago, I had one of those sudden urges to document my life in this blog. But, as fate would turn out, my mind has been left completely blank about what to write about. So in order to satisfy my appetite for writing, I'm going to recall an old story, and probably my favorite one to tell.
This story starts during the end of my sophmore year in high school. Some of you guys that are closer to me and that have known me for quite a long time could probably figure out by that first line what story is being told right now, but for others that have recently come into my life, this story is a look into one of the more serious, yet comical times in my life.
In my English class, our final project was to re-enact a chapter out of the book that we had just finished reading, which happened to be a book called "Kindred". If I remember correctly, this book is about a female slave traveling to the past to help out her owner, or something like that. Sorry, 5 years kind of has that effect on the mundane things in ones memory. Well my group decided to make a movie out of one of the chapters in the book, so we met up at this park in Pinole to film. Since I had a feminine figure and long hair at the time, I was naturally chosen to be the female lead in the movie, so my dress went according to my newfound gender. Filming went along smoothly until I began to notice a pain in the left side of my stomach. I thought it was just one of those hunger stomach pains, until the pain became severe and I started throwing up. Imagine a crossdressing boy wearing an oversized dress, hunched over in stomach pains. I must have looked like I was going into labor.
We quickly finished filming and I went home, where my condition became even worse. At this point, my stomach pain shifted from my left side to the right side, and my parents did some research in their medical books and they figured that I had appendicitis, because the whole shifting pain is one of the signs of that. They took me to the hospital that night and in what seemed like a blur, I was admitted to the hospital and became their newest patient. Of course, wearing one of the hospital gowns is one of the luxuries of being admitted to the hospital, except that mine was defunctional, in that it didn't tie together in the back. If you don't understand this, then imagine me wearing a Snuggie with nothing on underneath. No backside coverage. Sorry if thats not really the mental image you wanted to see, but it wasn't really the physical image I wanted to show people either.
I'll let everyone know right now, I had really bad luck with nurses during my hospital stay. I don't think I got one that was competent enough to even be called a nurse. My first nurse at the Richmond Kaiser hospital was this immensely large lady that seemed to have trouble walking. This nurse did pretty much the most horrible thing I've ever had done to me in any of my stays in a hospital. As usual, I had an IV tube inserted into my arm so I could stay nourished. But my tube seemed to get backed up and a mixture of blood and saline fluid became immersed in the tube. So my nurse, decided a good way to get rid of this fluid in the tube AND get rid of the blockage in the IV tube, would be to push the fluid in the tube back into my arm. Can you imagine the feeling of random liquids rushing into your arm? You don't want to. For people that are actually into nursing or doctor type stuffs, is this something you would typically do?
After the doctors took a few blood tests, they decided that I needed to have surgery to remove my appendix because it had become infected. It also turned out that there wasn't a doctor at my current hospital that could operate on me, so I was going to be transferred from Richmond to Oakland. I was actually kind of happy about this, because I'd be able to check off one of the things on my life list, which is to ride in an ambulance. The EMT's that gave me a ride were probably some of the cooler medical people ive met in life. The driver was this guy with some of the biggest muscles I've ever seen. He was able to lift me up into the ambulance using only one arm. The lady that rode along with me in the back of the ambulance was really talkative and made it seem like I was more of a friend than a patient. The lady was pretty resourceful though. My IV tube kept on hitting the side of the ambulance an it was annoying to hear, so due to a lack of tape in an ambulance, she used bandages to patch my IV tube to the side of the ambulance. Hella ghetto right, but I expect about that much from an EMT at the Richmond hospital.
When I arrived at the new hospital, I had to wait for a little while in the reception area, next to the doors that led to a very cold night. While I was here I spied a very cute nurse, and to be honest, like any guy in that situation, I couldn't help but hope she would somehow end up being my nurse, but as stated before, my luck with the nurses wasn't with me as I found myself being wheeled away by an elderly lady that seemed to have problems walking. Well I was finally able to catch some shut eye at this point, since it was about 3 in the morning. I was awoken by my nurse telling me it was time for surgery though, and a few guys came into my room and wheeled me away. To be honest, this whole part of my hospital experience was exactly like how it was in the movies. Hospital lights flashing repeatedly overhead, hospital rooms with lonely people staring off into space, that one random old doctor that seems to know everything and sends you off with a "Good luck kid".
Well I finally arrived in the surgery room, which was actually kind of cool because I'd never seen a room that clean and white before. At this point, the doctors began to prep for surgery and they gave me some gas to put me to sleep. Right about now was where I made a decision that seemed fun at the time, but later came back to punch me in my lungs. I decided to try and stay awake no matter what drugs they gave me, and I guess that motivation caused the gas to not work. So the doctors had to inject me with some unknown fluid that I had no chance of staying awake through. The next thing I knew, I awoke in the recovery room next to some homeless looking guy that was complaining that his knees were still hurting.
I was pretty happy that I was quickly removed from there and placed in another room to share with this one other kid. I felt super sorry for this kid though, because apparently he was having migraine headaches at only 7 years old. He was a really cool kid and I remember staying up that night watching the Digimon movie with him. His mother was also staying in the room with us, and she slept on the couch in the room. Well that night, I had to use the bathroom, and the bathroom was all the way on the other side of the room, so in order to get to the bathroom, I would have to walk right by the kid's sleeping mother. But, if you remember correctly, my hospital gown didn't work the way I wanted it to, so if his mother woke up while I was heading to the bathroom, then she got a full view of something nice to dream about.
Well the next morning, I was feeling very sleepy, even though I got a really good nights sleep after watching that super awesome movie. It was weird because the machine I was hooked up to that was monitoring my heart rate and my breathing and all the things vital to my life, kept on beeping whenever I felt myself being consumed by my dreams. My new nurse, who wasn't very competent, pretty much ignored the beeping and she even put it on silent for a little while. As this was going on, some EMT's came into the room to take away the boy next to me to go get an MRI, but one of the EMT's noticed that my machine was beeping and he noticed me being really drowsy, so he came over to check it out and he immediately said the one line that will forever endebt me to all EMT's. "HEY don't fall asleep! If you do, then you're not going to wake up!!". And I woke up. The EMT went to get a real doctor, and the doctor explained to me that they gave me too much medicine during surgery to put me to sleep, so it made my lungs collapse a little and I wasn't getting sufficient oxygen in my body. I guess trying to stay awake wasn't really the best idea huh? Wells they put me on another machine that was supposed to help expand my lungs again, but still even to this day, it feels as if I lost all my stamina. Sophmore year was the year that I played soccer, and I never got way tired at all during my time on the team even though it was alot of running, but ever since my surgery, I get super tired everytime I play any sport that involves alot of quick bursts of speed. So yay for screwing myself over for the rest of my life. Well, at least I have a life after that haha.
My story gets quickly boring after this though. Other than nearly throwing up in front of a group of new doctors and finally receiving a second hospital gown that I wore over my back like a cape (yeah hospital super hero!!!), the rest of my stay was pretty uneventful. I remember leaving the hospital the next day, and being so not used to walking that I almost fell down while walking to the car. I also remember that very first shower when I got home, and having my mother duct tape a plastic bag to my stomach so that water wouldn't get on my fresh wound. I also remember going back to school to finish out the last week and having my friend greet me by punching me in the stomach. Such great friends back in the day ya know?
Well thats my story. Its probably my favorite story to tell, even though its really long. I usually save it for people when I take them on really long drives and if I need to talk to people to keep myself awake. So yeah have fun reading this story and hopefully I kept you entertained throughout the length of this story.
This story starts during the end of my sophmore year in high school. Some of you guys that are closer to me and that have known me for quite a long time could probably figure out by that first line what story is being told right now, but for others that have recently come into my life, this story is a look into one of the more serious, yet comical times in my life.
In my English class, our final project was to re-enact a chapter out of the book that we had just finished reading, which happened to be a book called "Kindred". If I remember correctly, this book is about a female slave traveling to the past to help out her owner, or something like that. Sorry, 5 years kind of has that effect on the mundane things in ones memory. Well my group decided to make a movie out of one of the chapters in the book, so we met up at this park in Pinole to film. Since I had a feminine figure and long hair at the time, I was naturally chosen to be the female lead in the movie, so my dress went according to my newfound gender. Filming went along smoothly until I began to notice a pain in the left side of my stomach. I thought it was just one of those hunger stomach pains, until the pain became severe and I started throwing up. Imagine a crossdressing boy wearing an oversized dress, hunched over in stomach pains. I must have looked like I was going into labor.
We quickly finished filming and I went home, where my condition became even worse. At this point, my stomach pain shifted from my left side to the right side, and my parents did some research in their medical books and they figured that I had appendicitis, because the whole shifting pain is one of the signs of that. They took me to the hospital that night and in what seemed like a blur, I was admitted to the hospital and became their newest patient. Of course, wearing one of the hospital gowns is one of the luxuries of being admitted to the hospital, except that mine was defunctional, in that it didn't tie together in the back. If you don't understand this, then imagine me wearing a Snuggie with nothing on underneath. No backside coverage. Sorry if thats not really the mental image you wanted to see, but it wasn't really the physical image I wanted to show people either.
I'll let everyone know right now, I had really bad luck with nurses during my hospital stay. I don't think I got one that was competent enough to even be called a nurse. My first nurse at the Richmond Kaiser hospital was this immensely large lady that seemed to have trouble walking. This nurse did pretty much the most horrible thing I've ever had done to me in any of my stays in a hospital. As usual, I had an IV tube inserted into my arm so I could stay nourished. But my tube seemed to get backed up and a mixture of blood and saline fluid became immersed in the tube. So my nurse, decided a good way to get rid of this fluid in the tube AND get rid of the blockage in the IV tube, would be to push the fluid in the tube back into my arm. Can you imagine the feeling of random liquids rushing into your arm? You don't want to. For people that are actually into nursing or doctor type stuffs, is this something you would typically do?
After the doctors took a few blood tests, they decided that I needed to have surgery to remove my appendix because it had become infected. It also turned out that there wasn't a doctor at my current hospital that could operate on me, so I was going to be transferred from Richmond to Oakland. I was actually kind of happy about this, because I'd be able to check off one of the things on my life list, which is to ride in an ambulance. The EMT's that gave me a ride were probably some of the cooler medical people ive met in life. The driver was this guy with some of the biggest muscles I've ever seen. He was able to lift me up into the ambulance using only one arm. The lady that rode along with me in the back of the ambulance was really talkative and made it seem like I was more of a friend than a patient. The lady was pretty resourceful though. My IV tube kept on hitting the side of the ambulance an it was annoying to hear, so due to a lack of tape in an ambulance, she used bandages to patch my IV tube to the side of the ambulance. Hella ghetto right, but I expect about that much from an EMT at the Richmond hospital.
When I arrived at the new hospital, I had to wait for a little while in the reception area, next to the doors that led to a very cold night. While I was here I spied a very cute nurse, and to be honest, like any guy in that situation, I couldn't help but hope she would somehow end up being my nurse, but as stated before, my luck with the nurses wasn't with me as I found myself being wheeled away by an elderly lady that seemed to have problems walking. Well I was finally able to catch some shut eye at this point, since it was about 3 in the morning. I was awoken by my nurse telling me it was time for surgery though, and a few guys came into my room and wheeled me away. To be honest, this whole part of my hospital experience was exactly like how it was in the movies. Hospital lights flashing repeatedly overhead, hospital rooms with lonely people staring off into space, that one random old doctor that seems to know everything and sends you off with a "Good luck kid".
Well I finally arrived in the surgery room, which was actually kind of cool because I'd never seen a room that clean and white before. At this point, the doctors began to prep for surgery and they gave me some gas to put me to sleep. Right about now was where I made a decision that seemed fun at the time, but later came back to punch me in my lungs. I decided to try and stay awake no matter what drugs they gave me, and I guess that motivation caused the gas to not work. So the doctors had to inject me with some unknown fluid that I had no chance of staying awake through. The next thing I knew, I awoke in the recovery room next to some homeless looking guy that was complaining that his knees were still hurting.
I was pretty happy that I was quickly removed from there and placed in another room to share with this one other kid. I felt super sorry for this kid though, because apparently he was having migraine headaches at only 7 years old. He was a really cool kid and I remember staying up that night watching the Digimon movie with him. His mother was also staying in the room with us, and she slept on the couch in the room. Well that night, I had to use the bathroom, and the bathroom was all the way on the other side of the room, so in order to get to the bathroom, I would have to walk right by the kid's sleeping mother. But, if you remember correctly, my hospital gown didn't work the way I wanted it to, so if his mother woke up while I was heading to the bathroom, then she got a full view of something nice to dream about.
Well the next morning, I was feeling very sleepy, even though I got a really good nights sleep after watching that super awesome movie. It was weird because the machine I was hooked up to that was monitoring my heart rate and my breathing and all the things vital to my life, kept on beeping whenever I felt myself being consumed by my dreams. My new nurse, who wasn't very competent, pretty much ignored the beeping and she even put it on silent for a little while. As this was going on, some EMT's came into the room to take away the boy next to me to go get an MRI, but one of the EMT's noticed that my machine was beeping and he noticed me being really drowsy, so he came over to check it out and he immediately said the one line that will forever endebt me to all EMT's. "HEY don't fall asleep! If you do, then you're not going to wake up!!". And I woke up. The EMT went to get a real doctor, and the doctor explained to me that they gave me too much medicine during surgery to put me to sleep, so it made my lungs collapse a little and I wasn't getting sufficient oxygen in my body. I guess trying to stay awake wasn't really the best idea huh? Wells they put me on another machine that was supposed to help expand my lungs again, but still even to this day, it feels as if I lost all my stamina. Sophmore year was the year that I played soccer, and I never got way tired at all during my time on the team even though it was alot of running, but ever since my surgery, I get super tired everytime I play any sport that involves alot of quick bursts of speed. So yay for screwing myself over for the rest of my life. Well, at least I have a life after that haha.
My story gets quickly boring after this though. Other than nearly throwing up in front of a group of new doctors and finally receiving a second hospital gown that I wore over my back like a cape (yeah hospital super hero!!!), the rest of my stay was pretty uneventful. I remember leaving the hospital the next day, and being so not used to walking that I almost fell down while walking to the car. I also remember that very first shower when I got home, and having my mother duct tape a plastic bag to my stomach so that water wouldn't get on my fresh wound. I also remember going back to school to finish out the last week and having my friend greet me by punching me in the stomach. Such great friends back in the day ya know?
Well thats my story. Its probably my favorite story to tell, even though its really long. I usually save it for people when I take them on really long drives and if I need to talk to people to keep myself awake. So yeah have fun reading this story and hopefully I kept you entertained throughout the length of this story.
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