Hell to Heaven and Out

Thanks to mom for the creative title, as well as the blogging idea. This is a 2 part story...

Hell:

Last week I spent Monday night through Wednesday night in the St. Cloud Hospital. It was quite the adventure...

It all started Monday evening when the nurses had trouble with my IV's, because I was so dehydrated. I got poked about 5 times. This was to happen AGAIN on Tuesday night. I left the hospital with a total of 11 holes poked in my arms/hands from IV's alone. That doesn't include all of the bloodwork that was done...I have lots of annoying bruises.

My roommate Monday night was an extremely overweight black woman in her mid 40's. She had fibromyalgia and asthma, but insisted on telling the nurses (and me) that she had no interest in quitting smoking. Nobody asked, but she decided she wanted to talk about it. Among other things....

This lady was CRANKY, and I never said more than 2 words to her. She talked on the phone constantly, between coughing fits and spitting like a man. You know that gross spit they do where they clear their throat, sniff real hard, and then spit it out? Yeah, that nasty thing. GAG!

I wanted nothing more than to sleep during my 1st night in the hospital. I was so exhausted and had the worst headaches. However, my roommate decided since she was in pain, and couldn't sleep, I shouldn't get to sleep either. Literally, that was what she said to me. My nurse gave me some medication for nausea, which was supposed to help me sleep. Well, when you have a roommate who cannot stop gagging, coughing, snorting, farting, and then swearing about it all, the drugs are pretty useless.

She was very disgruntled that I was getting medications and she wasn't. She proceded to attempt to pull guilt trips on the nurses, and me. "Well, I guess princess over there gets whatever she wants because she's white, and I'm black. That makes perfect sense now." This made me rethink my future plans to become a nurse. A comment like that would just piss me off, especially coming from somebody that was calling me into the room every 10 minutes.

She insisted on watching tv every single time she woke up from her cat naps. As soon as she fell asleep, I would turn the tv off, only to have her wake up and flick it back on until she dozed off again. This went on for about 3 hours, until I asked the nurse for some earplugs. They didn't help, because i could still hear her coughing and snorting through the curtain.

She took GREAT pleasure in giving me crap when I finally puked at 3 am. I was starting to get really sick from a combination of no sleep and nausea from my headache. The entire time the nurse changed the sheets on my bed, she was over there cackling, then gagging. The next time I had to puke, I went to the bathroom and left the door wide open so she had to hear it. She wasn't laughing that time...I managed about an hour of sleep that night. It came in random 5 minute intervals.

She decided to use the puking to her advantage the next morning in the presence of the nurses, Mom, and myself. She said, and I quote. "I guess I have to puke to get some attention around here." She spent the rest of the day sticking her finger down her throat. Psycho.

Heaven:

So, the next morning I promptly asked for a room change, which came at about 5 pm that night. I was estatic to find that I was being roomed with an elderly woman who barely talked, or so I thought.

I was much more comfortable, and nearly asleep when her phone started ringing. "No big deal". I thought to myself. Until the phone rang a 2nd time, and a 3rd time, and maybe even a 4th time. I lost track, quite honestly. The only phone conversation I remember was just awkward to hear. It went something like this:

Nice old lady: "I'm telling you (insert name here), it is just not our time to die. We have to fight this! I am much more optimistic than these doctors. They just keep taking pictures of me, I don't know what the heck for. There's nothing to find."

Person on Phone: Some more encouraging, optimistic talk.

Nice old lady: "God this, God that. God, God, God."

The rest of the conversation went on about God and how he will not let her die. I appreciate optimism and religion as much as the next person. However, if you know me, you know about my EXTREME lack of knowledge of God, and my dwindling motivation to learn about faith. Needless to say, I was rather uncomfortable, but not to the point I was going to say anything. That would just be rude.

It took all I had left in me to not burst out laughing when she turned on the tv for a few hours on end to watch the Pope's march to the Vatican, or whatever the heck that event is called. (Lack of knowledge shining through here...) I seriously would rather have been surrounded by misquitoes. All of that humming made me feel like I was in a jungle. When you're on pain killers, your dreams take on your surroundings much more easily. I honestly dreamt that I was in a jungle, swinging on vines, and being chased by Tony the Tiger (the frosted flakes tiger).

It was all very exciting, until I could feel myself wanting to puke. I argued with myself for awhile between seeing how long I could frolic in the treetops and lead Tony on, or waking up to tell Mom to ready the puke bucket. I bid Tony goodbye, thanked him for a great adventure, promised to come back and visit, and then gave mom about a 2 second warning...good thing she has good reflexes. I saw the crossword book hit the floor, her hands swoop to the bucket, and the bucket appear before my very eyes all in the blink of an eye.

This was the beginning of what will go down as the worst migraine headache in the history of my 18 years. I don't even know how to describe it, so I won't. You all know what a migraine is, so just multiply it by like 10. Launch mission: Anxiety. I started crying and freaking out. I was completely inconsolable, despite Mom's best efforts. It came down to giving me something to rid me of anxiety, and another to just knock me out. I FINALLY slept through the entire night. Mom said the doctor came and talked to me, and that I responded. I don't remember that part, and that's okay by me.

I like to think that Tony and I rendezvoused in the treetops soon after I went back to sleep, but I can't say for sure. I just can't remember what I dreamt about the rest of the night. The next morning I awoke feeling quite refreshed. I spent most of the day in an empty room, because my roommate had been discharged. I managed to eat some of my soup and jello, since that was the closest thing to food I was allowed. We got discharged around 7 that night, and headed back to Hudson, where I caught up on my sleep for a few days.

I decided to share this story with all of you, because now that I look back on it, it can be pretty humerous. It wasn't when I was living through it, but now it certainly is. Plus, Mom and Erin won't LEAVE ME ALONE about not blogging.

Sheesh, get back to work, ladies.