Patient Missus Em
For those of you who were hoping I had 'softly and suddenly vanished away', this is bad news. I am back. As to why there was a longish by my standards break in posting, here's some explanation:
How soon can you admit yourself, dear? No ifs and buts, I notice.
It will take me a couple of hours to organise things.
Who is the patient?
I am.
Who is admitting you?
I am.
There are consent forms, things to sign…
I will sign them.
This is very irregular.
I know.
We will be giving you an IV channel.
Does it take six nurses to do that?
The junior sisters are here to learn…
I do not want to be a practice dummy, thank you.
Don't move please.
Then listen to me please, before you touch me again. You are trying to put clamps on my wrists and ankles, and those are the most painful parts of my anatomy. Tell me what you are going to do, and I will be prepared.
Make a fist.
I have.
Make a tighter fist.
I can't make a tighter fist. If I may suggest something, try to find a vein in the right arm, you can search all day on the left.
What is this?
Your tea.
But why have you given me cream crackers?
You are put down as diabetic on the chart.
I said I take my tea with no sugar and very little milk. That doesn't make me diabetic. Do you think I wouldn't state such an important thing when admitting myself?
Toast and tea for breakfast?
Yes, fine.
What is this? This bread isn't toasted. Where is the butter, jelly or jam? What is this white thing?
That is paneer. Butter is spread in the kitchen. Jelly isn't served.
Are you trying to starve me to death as you treat me?
I'd like to use the bathroom, please.
The ayah will get a bedpan.
No, I will go the bathroom.
Junior sister will carry the IV bottle.
Call your senior.
Sister will stand outside, with the drip.
It's not long enough, call your senior.
Hello, I am the RMO. What seems to be the problem?
I need to use the bathroom.
Sister, stop the drip. Let the patient finish and start it again. Oh, and get the portable IV stand.
Ah, my dear, are you all settled in and comfy? Sister, this is a patient very dear to my heart. South Indian lady, you know. Such a wonderful person. She puts up with so much pain, never complains. Such a pleasure to treat.
The nurses exchange a doubtful look and stare at the doctor and me as though we were Bug Eyed Monsters.
Cheers!
posted by Lalita | 09:02
19 Comments:
I have been wondering whats up with you?! And I came here to actually write a comment.."why have you not been writing" and poooh pahh!There is your post...what a coincidence!
I am sorry to hear you had to be in Hospital. But you put humor in such a way..I can't help but smile!
So how are you now!!? Hope u are better.!
GET WELL SOON!
Take good care of yourself!
Aiii.. hope all is fine now? Take care Lali..
So your courtesy is only for peers, it seems. I hope you are better now.
Johnnie
Be well soon, Lali. Take care.
You strangely reminded me of my own mother when she recently underwent surgery. Same streak of independence - and, if I may say - stubbornness. :) Best of luck with your health and recovery.
Veens- You don't know how much it cheers me up to learn you were going to nag me about posting. Thanks a ton.
Neha- We cope, dear, we cope. And thanks for that belligerent bird, it made my day when I came back home.
Dear John- Please read my post again and tell me where and when I was rude to people. I am better now, thank you.
Dipali- Like I said, life goes on, lady. I am back and in the midst of the usual mayhem compounded by the son and heir's vacation and other woes. As I said to Neha, we cope, that is what we are famous for. :-)
vivalavi- Thank you, your mother must be quite a lady. It is not just a streak of independence or stubbornness, though. It is how we deal with the world.
I have large doubts on your last line - " nurses exchanged .." etc.
It must have been just your imagination.
Nurses generally leave out all faculties for reason, doubt, extrapolation and so on when they get into the uniform.
Hope you celebrated your Pongal/sankranti !
:D glad to know you are out and well enough to post. i hate hospitals and i hate nurses and i particularly hate it that they treat you like an imbecile.
Sivaram- Come on, they aren't that bad.
The MM- Thank you. The worst thing is how they assume your brains leaked out because you are ill. Weakness of body has nothing to do with sharpness of mind, after all.
Hope you are feeling better Lali. Another game of scrabulous when you are free? (before they take it off Facebook)
WA- Lady, we still have an inactive game between us, you know? But yes, start another game. And what, they are going to take it off? Boohoo.
ooh the inactive game doesn't load :( And yep mattel I think are threatening to sue facebook over scrabulous as its breaching the scrabble copyright. So yep it could disappear
WA- In that case, quick, let's play another game before it is 'sic transit gloria mundi' time. :-)
I'm a major fan of Scrabble, but it only after reading about it in the newspapers that I got to know that there was on online version of it called Scrabulous. I logged in to my Facebook account, the first time since I created it about a year back and got spooked! So many notices, tabs and sliders, options... Gosh. I guess I need another long layoff from Facebook just to work up the courage to log in! I now understand why my dad has such a fear of email and anything related to computers! Whatever happened to the mantra of keeping things simple?
Complexvanilla- Prash, I know exactly how you feel. I ignore most of the notices and ditto options, and just play the game, ha! But if they take it off, I will need another site for the fix, I must say.
In the quest of a cash-cow, these sites don't stop trying to milk, even it's a bull and not a cow! Nice ideas and innovations are fine, but I feel they ought to provide a plain-vanilla option too, for people like us who are in only for a few things and not the whole lot!
This reminded me of a joke: A farmer goes to the church to attend the Sunday sermon, but finds that he is the only guy in the whole church, other than the pastor that is! The pastor asks the farmer whether he ought to go ahead with the sermon as there is none besides the farmer. The farmer says "Dear Father, I'm a chicken farmer and I rise early everyday, to feed my chicken, but on somedays, only one or two turn up. I don't send them back hungry". The pastor, now enthused, proceeds to deliver a three-hour long sermon. At the end of the marathon session, the pastor asks the farmer "Did the sermon satisfy you, my son?" The farmer, in return, says "Dear Father, when only one or two chicken turn up at feeding time, I only feed them as much as they require, not the entire bucket of feed!"
Complexvanilla- :-) Exactly! But the best way to play Scrabble is face to face, in a leisurely fashion, arguing about words and challenges. For me, anyhow.
Yup. Though I'm a techie by profession, I'm a true-blue romantic by heart. Just like ebooks and pdfs cannot replace the joy of turning pages and smelling the unmistakable smell of old paper, I'm sure the online version of Scrabble can never replace the joy of playing it face to face, watching with trepidation as your opponent's eyes gleam with secret strategies and watching with glee as they grimace when you come up with the elusive seven-letter word that conveniently happens to land on a triple-word score tile! Home-made snacks and a flaskful of tea would complete the dream setting! Ah, heaven!
Complexvanilla- Perfect. I couldn't have put it better. And there is the squabbling about scoring, accusations of forgetting some points... the joy!
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