POWs, Psychiatrists, and a Czech Maternity Ward
A few things today:
First, I decided to read John McCain’s account of his time as a POW, which was published in 1973. It somehow led me to look up the longest held American POW, which led me to this fellow, Floyd James Thompson. I’m sharing the link because that has to be one of the most depressing life stories I have read in a long time. It makes me feel grateful for everything I have.
Second, I saw my psychiatrist yesterday, and that went extremely well. He was definitely not phoning it in, and I think he may end up being the first person to screw with my medication in something like five years. For now, he has me charting my mood fluctuations along with things like how long I sleep, how big my appetite is, and when I’m on my period. He’s also interested to know if my mood is affected by the season or how much sunlight I get-I think he thought that my recent low had to do with the fact that it’s like winter here, but I don’t think so. So we’ll chart it. The other thing is that I must have piqued his interest in considering me bipolar. That’s partially because it runs in my family but, as of yesterday, it was because we were looking at the chart and I indicated that, sure, sometimes I would consider my mood to be “greater than normal.” Although, now that I’m charting these things, I’m not sure how exactly I would describe normal.
Third: Tuesday, I went to visit my friend Amy in the hospital. She delivered a baby via C-Section on Saturday and wasn’t allowed visitors until that day. I wasn’t allowed to hold her daughter, Emmy Jean, because she had jaundice and was receiving phototherapy. I’m not even sure that I was supposed to go into the room where she was, but the nurses threw a gown over me and let me step in.
After that, I saw Amy, who gave me the play-by-play of being induced, going into labor, having the C-Section, and then being in the ICU for 24 hours before being allowed to see her baby.
It sounds like it was really fucking horrible. Now, I know that giving birth is rarely portrayed as a day at the beach, but here are some of the highlights:
1. The hospital doesn’t provide its patients with water to drink, so Amy’s husband has been bringing her bottles of it.
2. The ward where she was staying (and potentially all wards) has one wheelchair. This means that when she went into labor, she had to walk to the delivery room. And when she finally got to see Emmy Jean, she was allowed to use the wheelchair but was told to hurry back, because they were going to need that chair soon.
3. Meals are not delivered to her room. She has to walk to a cafeteria to be served. The day that I visited her, she nearly missed dinner because they called for it in Czech. Fortunately, her husband showed up and told her that she should go eat.
4. I don’t actually know how women are normally induced and, frankly, don’t want to (I just went to WebMD but couldn’t even read through all of it, yikes), but it sounds absolutely horrible.
5. She was experiencing a blood sugar low (she’s diabetic) when they came to get her for the shower on Monday. Meaning that she was in a lot of pain and sort of dazed, but she still had to walk to the shower and then stand there and hold the shower head (why wouldn’t they at least have it mounted?) while she tried to clean herself with the other hand.
And there’s plenty more but some of it is graphic, some of it is personal, and some of it is about what you’d expect when having major medical treatment at a hospital where nearly no one speaks your language.
Basically, everything she described was the exact opposite of what I witnessed and heard about when my sister had her babies. I would much prefer what my sister went through, and so, if there are children in my future, I hope to have them in Western Europe or North America.
First, I decided to read John McCain’s account of his time as a POW, which was published in 1973. It somehow led me to look up the longest held American POW, which led me to this fellow, Floyd James Thompson. I’m sharing the link because that has to be one of the most depressing life stories I have read in a long time. It makes me feel grateful for everything I have.
Second, I saw my psychiatrist yesterday, and that went extremely well. He was definitely not phoning it in, and I think he may end up being the first person to screw with my medication in something like five years. For now, he has me charting my mood fluctuations along with things like how long I sleep, how big my appetite is, and when I’m on my period. He’s also interested to know if my mood is affected by the season or how much sunlight I get-I think he thought that my recent low had to do with the fact that it’s like winter here, but I don’t think so. So we’ll chart it. The other thing is that I must have piqued his interest in considering me bipolar. That’s partially because it runs in my family but, as of yesterday, it was because we were looking at the chart and I indicated that, sure, sometimes I would consider my mood to be “greater than normal.” Although, now that I’m charting these things, I’m not sure how exactly I would describe normal.
Third: Tuesday, I went to visit my friend Amy in the hospital. She delivered a baby via C-Section on Saturday and wasn’t allowed visitors until that day. I wasn’t allowed to hold her daughter, Emmy Jean, because she had jaundice and was receiving phototherapy. I’m not even sure that I was supposed to go into the room where she was, but the nurses threw a gown over me and let me step in.
After that, I saw Amy, who gave me the play-by-play of being induced, going into labor, having the C-Section, and then being in the ICU for 24 hours before being allowed to see her baby.
It sounds like it was really fucking horrible. Now, I know that giving birth is rarely portrayed as a day at the beach, but here are some of the highlights:
1. The hospital doesn’t provide its patients with water to drink, so Amy’s husband has been bringing her bottles of it.
2. The ward where she was staying (and potentially all wards) has one wheelchair. This means that when she went into labor, she had to walk to the delivery room. And when she finally got to see Emmy Jean, she was allowed to use the wheelchair but was told to hurry back, because they were going to need that chair soon.
3. Meals are not delivered to her room. She has to walk to a cafeteria to be served. The day that I visited her, she nearly missed dinner because they called for it in Czech. Fortunately, her husband showed up and told her that she should go eat.
4. I don’t actually know how women are normally induced and, frankly, don’t want to (I just went to WebMD but couldn’t even read through all of it, yikes), but it sounds absolutely horrible.
5. She was experiencing a blood sugar low (she’s diabetic) when they came to get her for the shower on Monday. Meaning that she was in a lot of pain and sort of dazed, but she still had to walk to the shower and then stand there and hold the shower head (why wouldn’t they at least have it mounted?) while she tried to clean herself with the other hand.
And there’s plenty more but some of it is graphic, some of it is personal, and some of it is about what you’d expect when having major medical treatment at a hospital where nearly no one speaks your language.
Basically, everything she described was the exact opposite of what I witnessed and heard about when my sister had her babies. I would much prefer what my sister went through, and so, if there are children in my future, I hope to have them in Western Europe or North America.