#hitbyabus

When I get my wits about me, I’m using this term liberally, I realize that I have a catheter. The pee kind. Fine. Nancy tells me that I’m allowed to eat. I guess I’m hungry, I tell myself that I am because it seems like the right thing to feel. Nancy is my nighttime nurse and I immediately like her. She reminds me of someone I know that I like. This person is of course just an amalgamation of who knows how many people that I like. She has a subtle scent of a classy old lady smelling perfume that I have a fondness for. I’m blasted out of my mind on pain meds and, of course, I want to make phone calls. The phone in my room will not allow me to make long distance calls. The two people I want to call are my boss, Damian, and my co-worker extrodinaire, Ashleigh. They both live locally but have kept their hometown phone numbers. Nancy the Olfactory Delight lets me make a call from the actual hospital phone. She dials Damian’s number and hands me the phone. He sounds relieved to hear from me and typical of my beloved Damian, asks if it was my fault and laughs. I tell him that I’ve chipped some teeth and for some reason asking him to keep this disclosure confidential. I end the call and drift off to sleep for a few minutes with the phone in my hand. I wake up and scan the nurse’s station for NtOD, she has her head down. This poses a logistical problem because I need to get this phone back to it’s receiver. I consider calling out to her, but at least have the wherewithal to recognize that the phone I’m using is hot. I can’t draw attention to the fact that NtOD has gone rogue. She looks up and we make eye contact. She deftly scurries over and takes the phone. I decide it’s worth the risk of being judged as an entitled asshole to ask for another call. She looks around and dials Ashleigh’s number for me. I remember absolutely nothing from the conversation but I’m sure it was worth it.

Oh man, back to the food. My knight in shining armor of a husband (in all seriousness, he is too perfect for words) arrives for our romantic night in the shock trauma unit. NtOD rattles off our dining choices. Subway. That’s my choice. A spicy Italian. Nevermind that I’m a vegetarian. I got hit by a fucking bus and that was the first sandwich that came to mind. Gregg returns with my sandwich and a real Coke. Eating is weird. My teeth hurt because I slammed my jaw together so hard during the impact that I chipped a bunch of teeth. And I’m in a medicated haze so eating feels foreign. I eat half of the sandwich. I’m moved to an actual room. Gregg and I settle in for the night.

A barely legal nurse and/or her squire come by every 4 hours. They do nurse things and give me pills. I’m getting a bunch of immunizations because the integrity of my spleen has been comprised. Preventing blood clots is all the rage at hospitals. I get a shot in my abdomen and some of those things that go on your legs and squeeze the shit out of them every few minutes. It’s around midnight and they are going to ‘clean me up’. I don’t really want them to but this is a stance I’m not going to defend given the judgement that would surely be dealt to a competent adult refusing to bathe. So I get a sponge bath and a shampoo cap. My hair is matted with blood and my pillowcase ends up becoming bloody and is changed every 4 hours. I mention the situation, “Yeah, you have a gash back there.” Ok. I guess there’s no action item. I still have glass pieces in my left arm and hand so I don’t know what my expectations were. The ordeal would have been immeasurably worse had my inhibitions been functioning in the manner in which they were intended to function. Amy comes by before work with some kind of avacado bagel sandwich. It’s really good. Every 4 hours someone comes to check on me, extract bodily fluids, and give me pills. They are looking for something in my blood that indicates internal bleeding. I know that my parents are there for the bulk of the day, Gregg has gone home for a little bit to get some sleep. I miss him. I don’t know what to call them so I’ll choose ‘candygram people’. The candygram people show up with balloons and a gift bag. The gift bag contains various sundries and junky magazines. It’s from my work family. And yes, my workplace has a legit familial culture. My twofavorite co-workers are coming by that night, I better try to get some beauty rest. Before I drift off to sleep I get a text message from my mom containing a picture of the other shoe.

The day is a blur of sleeping, pain, squeezing, beeping, drinking water, taking pills, chocolate cupcakes, and itching. I’m still on oxygen, but sometimes it’s not enough. Every time my oxygen saturation drops one of my machines goes crazy. “Babe, take some deep breaths”, Gregg coaches me each time it happens. Ashleigh and MJ show up. If I recall, it’s around 8:00. They bring me a gigantic round ball of a unicorn. I name it Mashleigh. My sister shows up. Now it feels like a party, just your standard ‘night out with the girls’. They mercifully agree to take my leg squeezies off for a bit so I can really let my hair down. The pain meds they are giving me caused intense itchies. Supposedly they’re going to bring me a benadryl with my nighttime meds, although I thought it was a better idea to have Gregg bring me one. The girls and my parents head out, Gregg shows up. He brings me sweatpants, shoes, Marvel comics shorts, and my thug life sweatshirt. The cat scan people are going to come by and check out my spleen again. If it’s still self containing it’s blood stores I supposedly get to go home the next day.

My Gregory and I drift in and out of sleep. Every time I try to take my oxygen off, the beeping happens so often that I can’t deal. I put the mask back on until a nurse comes by and tells me that if I’m still on oxygen, they won’t let me go home. I don’t voice it to her, though I probably should have, but my primary concern is not going home. I would, in fact, like to be able to breathe without an oxygen mask before I’m unleashed to my natural habitat. Some people come by around 5:00 a.m. to give me a ride to have my cat scan and then back to basecamp. Some PT people come by to check out my mobility and strength. After they do some resistance testing, they want me to get out of bed. Trying to sit up sucks. On top of the searing pain THROUGHOUT MY ENTIRE FUCKING BODY, the catheter becomes even more uncomfortable when I sit up. I remember blaming the bulk of my struggle to sit up, then stand, on the catheter. The nurses just call it a ‘Foley’, but I refuse to give this thing the glory of a proper noun. Once I’m up, I’m super unstable. I try to explain that this is mostly due to seroquel, but these folk clearly have no idea what the effects of seroquel are. After my modesty is intact, we’re going for a walk. The extent of restoring my modesty is securing my gown so that my ass isn’t hanging out. They don’t try to disguise the bag of piss hanging between my legs. But at least I don’t have a shit bag. We return to the room and I’m deemed physically capable enough to go home. Shortly afterwards some nurse comes by and takes the catheter out. Now I just need to be able to pee on my own and have a spleen that is not bleeding and I can go home.

The cat scan looks good. I sign a bunch of papers, get a bunch of prescriptions, a trauma survivor binder, literally zero aftercare instructions or detailed explanation of my injuries, and instructions to follow up with my PCP and the outpatient shock trauma clinic. Well wait, regarding the aftercare instructions, I’ve been given an ‘incentives barometer’ that I am to use 12 times an hour to whip my lung back into shape. So ‘literally’ was an inappropriate word choice. They put me in a wheelchair and dump me outside. Well, not ‘dump’, they don’t actually tilt the wheelchair forward until I fall out.

A nondescript doctor comes in for what seems like a few seconds and announces that I have a pneumothorax. They might insert a chest tube. But until they have my cat scan read they won’t. I learn from a nurse ten minutes later that this is a collapsed lung. There is air loitering outside of my lung. I also have a broken rib. Duh. It’s obligatory. They take my collar off.

Ben is wearing blue scrubs, curly chest hair is peeking out and he has on a small gold chain. I’m put off but have to remind myself that the V-neck collar is standard issue. He’s an anesthesiologist and I know that they make a lot of money. This is reassuring to me. He does have a matter-of-fact, witty manner about him and uses medical terminology that seems legit so I decide he’s alright. My spleen is bleeding. They’re going to check it out through an artery in my groin. But I have to be conscious because I will need to hold my breath under their expert guidance at several times throughout the procedure. This is the first time I remember feeling a sense of embarrassment. It’s not happening at the moment but it is pending. ‘Groin.’ Uh oh. I mean I’ve been completely naked (save for the collar) and had a nurse use a baby wipe to get glass out of my butt crack, but this groin business is troublesome. My legs have substantial hair growth and the focal point, if you will, is extremely unkempt. Things have reached rock bottom down there because… I’m… I’m… menstruating. I mean obviously I don’t mention it. I’m fucked up enough from the constant pain meds and severe pain that I don’t care enough to verbalize it. Not even to my mother once we are alone.

He didn’t mention the chest tube at all, I figure the spleen embolization is the new chest tube. BtER comes in to tell me our time together is over. I’m saddened by this because she is like the perfect nurse. I’m introduced to my OR nurse, Jeannie. I don’t like her tone or bedside manner. She asks BtER dumb questions that my chart had the answers to. Maybe I’m just annoyed because I’m picking up on BtER’s vibe but whatever. I’ve expended too much energy worrying about my groin and I’m sleepy.

I have to pee sooooo bad. I try to tell them that I can get up and go to the bathroom. Lol, I don’t know why I thought I was capable of such a feat, but I sing this song to several nurses and techs. One of the techs almost buys it but uses her better judgement and goes to ask my doctor. A nurse returns with a bed pan. She sets it up and everyone leaves the room. I give it what seemed like an hour but was realistically 3 minutes before I call it a day. This sucks. I go through this unfruitful routine several times before I finally have success. And by success I only mean voiding my bladder. I make no claims regarding urine to bed pan vs urine to bed ratios.

Ben the Italian Stallion returns accompanied by Jeannie the One I Don’t Like. I’m wheeled off to the OR, it’s bright as shit and there are a bunch of people in there. We do the whole lifting and sliding bit and then BtIS puts a mask on me. I don’t remember anything until I feel a weird pressure and cramping sensation in my abdomen, but I must have been awake and following directions. ‘Ben?’ I let him know that whatever they are doing hurts, they do something to make it hurt less. Shortly afterwards Ben tells me that they’re done.

Oh fuck. For the first time, I’m happy to see JtOIDL. We women have means of dealing with menstruation and on this day I’ve chosen to deal with it internally. The device needs to be removed. I tell JtOIDL. She’s super cool about it. Let’s not mince words: JTOIDL REMOVES MY TAMPON IN A BRIGHTLY LIT OR FILLED WITH RANDOM PEOPLE. As a consolation I get a bunch of gauze mashed between my legs. I’m wheeled back to my room.