Aug. 29: Much whining

I woke up with a headache Monday morning. Throughout the day it got worse, and by early afternoon the nausea had set in. It had “ER visit” written all over it. Sure enough, by 10:30 I decided to go in before I got too dehydrated. We dropped the kids at Vic’s parents and went to the ER.

When you’re carrying an emesis bag, they tend to admit you a little sooner than when your eyeball is dripping blood—my wait was shorter this time than on my last ER visit. When a nurse took us back to an exam room, we passed a crowd of cops; Vic said it was “the crazy end” of the ER, where put patients who have police escorts. Goodie.

Little side story: It was nearly two hours before a doctor came in to see me, and during that time we got to hear another patient—we’ll call him Dick—share his “How I ended up in the ER tonight” story with every nurse, aide, cop, and other patient who would listen. Dick had been at the airport, his flight had been delayed and then cancelled, and even though he didn’t do anything wrong, the police escorted him from the airport to the hospital. Even though he didn’t do anything wrong! From what we could gather, Dick had been given a drug to calm him down and they were waiting for it to take effect before deciding what to do with him next. Apparently Dick thought it was necessary to wait in the hallway rather than his exam room. This is why we were able to hear every single detail about Dick’s removal from the airport and treatment at the ER. Lucky us, no? (No.)

Dick had his preschool-aged kid with him, who ran up and down the halls of the ER, hollering “Daddy, I’m hungry!” and “I want to go home!” Then Dick would yell at the kid to shut up because there were people sleeping. But each time Dick yelled at his kid, Dick first opened the door to my room, stepped inside, and yelled it to me.

Well, it seemed like he did. Dick was very, very loud. I knew right then that Dick and I could never be friends.

Eventually Dick needed a cigarette, and we heard why Dick needed a cigarette over and over and over, and then got to hear Dick ask everyone he saw if they had one he could have. I don’t know if Dick ever got a cigarette, but I was ready to send Vic out to buy some if it would make Dick shut the freakin’ frackin’ hell up so I could sleep or at least not have to listen to Dick anymore. Because by that time a Law & Order marathon had started and I had only seen that one episode six times before.

Then Dick started asking if he could leave because was he arrested or not, and if there’s paperwork why isn’t anyone doing it, because he really wanted to leave, and did you forget that he wanted a smoke? His police escorts had no idea what they were supposed to do with Dick, I guess, because they kept asking each other what they were supposed to do. And so they didn’t do anything except continue to let Dick yell from the doorway of my room. This all went on way too long.

I felt bad for Dick’s kid having to go through all that with his jackass of a father, but I did enjoy when he started taunting Dick: “Daddy, are you going to jail? I don’t want to go to jail. But you should go to jail. You’re bad. Wheeeee!”

Dick was there for several hours and then just like that, Dick was gone. It was peaceful again. My nurse said Dick was a scary fella. I asked why Dick didn’t spend his ER stay in his ER room rather than my doorway, and my nurse pretty much confirmed my suspicions: Dick was a dick.

Anyhowsers…

When I was finally seen by a doctor, we decided to attack my headache and nausea with oral meds first, and if I could keep them down then I wouldn’t need an IV. I liked that idea, as I’m not a huge fan of the IV. They gave me Motrin for pain, a muscle relaxant, and melt-on-your-tongue Zofran for nausea. Unfortunately, none of them really worked. I ended up with an IV after all, to which they hooked up a bag of fluids, a shot of Phenergan that made me all bugs-under-my-skin jittery, and two lovely doses of morphine. The morphine was really good. I liked the morphine a lot. Morphine makes me happy. I think the world would be a much more pleasant place if everyone had access to morphine.

When we left the ER, I actually felt better than I had when I walked in—this has not happened at any of my last several ER visits. Too bad morphine wears off.

We got home at 5 a.m. and Vic slept for an hour before going in to work. I slept most the morning and still had a headache when I woke up, but the nausea was gone so I didn’t feel like I needed to go back to the ER. Darlene kept the kids all day—who couldn’t love that woman?—and I was able to rest and whine and moan in peace. When Vic got home from work he pretty much went straight to bed. Without even making me dinner!

By late Wednesday my headache finally started to disappear. So until next time—whenever that may be; I have no idea what the trigger is for these awful things—I’m home free, so to speak. I hate being at the mercy of this kind of spontaneity. Grrr, I say. And P.S. It sucks to be me.

I am done lamenting my ailments for now. There’s no moral to my long, boring story, but I do offer this advice: when you’re in a public place, especially if sick people are around, don’t be a dick.

Thank you, and good night.