Hospitals
Forewarning: This was written while under the affects of some really neat pain meds.
Hospitals.
Having just returned from having an operation, my first and hopefully my last for at least very long time, I can now say I've experienced hospitals as a patient and not just a visitor.
They are very different places to what I expected.
Don't get me wrong, ask anyone what they think of hospitals and the usual answer you'll get is that they don't like them. That they are noisy, you can't sleep there, you go in and get sicker, that sort of thing. And to a large extent, that's true.
During my first two week stay sleep occurred only when morphine did, I managed to pick up someone else's lung infection and all I wanted to do was go home. The doctors rounds were erratic at best, and included one day when, without warning, not a single doctor saw any patient on the entire ward.
The nurses were, shall we say, less than happy about that.
Hospitals can also be quite scary places, quite apart from and on top of any fear you may have because of your illness. The noises, moans and often screamed complaints from other patients are all good for ramping up the tension level, and funnily enough, so are those rare moments when everything is perfectly still and quiet. I challenge anyone in hospital to wake up at one of these eerie moments and not think of the start of “The Day of the Triffids”. Or maybe that bit is just me.
And then, for good measure, we'll dump a reasonable amount of helplessness on the patient. Being attached to a drip means needing help to bathe, manoeuvring the “drinks trolley” around cables in order to pee and generally feeling tethered.
But there is one other thing that hospitals are, one other emotion they engendered within me that did surprise me.
They're safe.
Help in the form of the ever patient nurses, (apologies for the pun), is only the push of a button away. They help with the physical pain and discomfort, offer advice, answer questions where they can and they care.
They can also be very easily overlooked. Not only their knowledge, since it seems that they always need to check with your chart or a doctor before doing anything (and more often than not you end up getting what the nurse suggested in the first place and the rest is all just legalese), but also simply because of their omnipresence you forget to see them standing by.
During my two admissions I've been cared for by a large number of different nurses, male and female, as well as nursing students, and they each had something special to contribute. As well as all the 'official' advice and help they gave me there were also those times when no one else was looking that they passed on their own knowledge. I was taught a very clever breathing technique to cut down intense pain, and marvelled at the swift effect peppermint tea had on muscle pain caused by the carbon dioxide used in my operation.
And then I came home. Home is wonderful and perfect, but as I lie here waiting for sleep in my own comfortable bed I can't help but think back and only now identify that strange feeling I had while in hospital. That feeling of being safe.
So, hospitals. They are noisy, uncomfortable, scary, horrible places to be stuck in. And I am so very, very glad that they are there.
Hospitals.
Having just returned from having an operation, my first and hopefully my last for at least very long time, I can now say I've experienced hospitals as a patient and not just a visitor.
They are very different places to what I expected.
Don't get me wrong, ask anyone what they think of hospitals and the usual answer you'll get is that they don't like them. That they are noisy, you can't sleep there, you go in and get sicker, that sort of thing. And to a large extent, that's true.
During my first two week stay sleep occurred only when morphine did, I managed to pick up someone else's lung infection and all I wanted to do was go home. The doctors rounds were erratic at best, and included one day when, without warning, not a single doctor saw any patient on the entire ward.
The nurses were, shall we say, less than happy about that.
Hospitals can also be quite scary places, quite apart from and on top of any fear you may have because of your illness. The noises, moans and often screamed complaints from other patients are all good for ramping up the tension level, and funnily enough, so are those rare moments when everything is perfectly still and quiet. I challenge anyone in hospital to wake up at one of these eerie moments and not think of the start of “The Day of the Triffids”. Or maybe that bit is just me.
And then, for good measure, we'll dump a reasonable amount of helplessness on the patient. Being attached to a drip means needing help to bathe, manoeuvring the “drinks trolley” around cables in order to pee and generally feeling tethered.
But there is one other thing that hospitals are, one other emotion they engendered within me that did surprise me.
They're safe.
Help in the form of the ever patient nurses, (apologies for the pun), is only the push of a button away. They help with the physical pain and discomfort, offer advice, answer questions where they can and they care.
They can also be very easily overlooked. Not only their knowledge, since it seems that they always need to check with your chart or a doctor before doing anything (and more often than not you end up getting what the nurse suggested in the first place and the rest is all just legalese), but also simply because of their omnipresence you forget to see them standing by.
During my two admissions I've been cared for by a large number of different nurses, male and female, as well as nursing students, and they each had something special to contribute. As well as all the 'official' advice and help they gave me there were also those times when no one else was looking that they passed on their own knowledge. I was taught a very clever breathing technique to cut down intense pain, and marvelled at the swift effect peppermint tea had on muscle pain caused by the carbon dioxide used in my operation.
And then I came home. Home is wonderful and perfect, but as I lie here waiting for sleep in my own comfortable bed I can't help but think back and only now identify that strange feeling I had while in hospital. That feeling of being safe.
So, hospitals. They are noisy, uncomfortable, scary, horrible places to be stuck in. And I am so very, very glad that they are there.