Bad Times Timelion... Part 4
Ultrasound is this darkened room, now sometime in the a.m. The tech is listening to some earthy beats and it's like we walked in a yoga class. She smiles while shaking her head, then nods and says "no, no" very motherly. Am I in the twilight zone or what?
She asks us the same series of questions and tells us we should be worried... about the blood loss.
We try to ferret out information from her.
"I'm not allowed to say anything, but you can!" She smiles. What does that mean? I had visions of playing the equivalent of the poker player prank on her. But what is a ultrasound technican prank? Who knows.
She conducts the ultrasound while listening to the music and bopping her head. At the same time she is letting out all sorts of omnious "tuck-tucks" and awkward faces, even letting out an "ugh..." once.
"See anything?" my wife vainly tries.
The tech shakes her head and says "Yes."
"You can't tell us anything? Who will tell us?" I ask.
"Well, just know that's its very, very good that you came in here today." She points to the monitor and nods, "Nope, nope."
Wow. Talk about being ambigious but loading it with bullshit.
I can see my wife's fear rise, I'm now expecting her ovaries at any moment to explode. She later tells me she's focusing on some sort of cancer. She tears up, and I'm trying my best to console her.
They ship us back to the E.R. and this time I actually spot Doctor Combover using the door, he is human afterall.
"I just wanted to let you know, I'll be in when we get the results from the ultrasound, maybe 20 minutes..."
Now, he's f'ing with me.
"..."
"..."
I say "Okay."
He says "O-kay?"
My wife says "Okay!" And he leaves.
Now, let me tell you something about "20 minutes." Everything in the hospital apparently is 20 minutes away, and what that means is at a minimum 1 hour, maybe 2 but certainly not 20 minutes.
Later we are pumping some breastmilk for our baby to pass off to my mother-in-law who is waiting outside the E.R. and the nurse pops in and says, "Don't worry the radiologist is examining the ultrasound we'll have the results in probably 20 minutes." Is that an additional 20 minutes?
So, I walk through the E.R., and I see all these nurses and doctors standing around chatting like it's happy hour at an airport Hilton and I hear no doctor talk, it's all about the weekend and banal bullshit. Meanwhile, everybody else is in a room morbidly waiting for them to do something.
I keep walking holding these little bags of breast milk, and I see the security guard eyeball me again. He's still in the same spot harrassing the nurse who apparently sits there and does nothing else. His partner is one of those guys that just continously nervously giggles and frequently adjusts his gun belt.
The guard tilts his head at me when he sees me. Now, I'm getting REALLY pissed, but I suppress my anger, I don't need to be kicked out a hospital and try to walk out an exit. One of the guards presses a button and a quick honk/siren buzz goes off.
I turnaround, the giggler is talking, "You gonna have to go around. That's for emergencies."
I'm angrier and I notice the ice cream guy from Friday cop is tilting his head back and forth like we are in junior high and I just took his dodgeball from him. He's itching for a fight (in retrospect so frickin' weird).
I muster a smile at them. "Oh, okay, I wondered what you guys did all night. But I get it, you make sure we walk through the right door. Oh, okay, my bad. I'll walk around."
I see my nemesis puff up a little bit in the corner of my eye, as I walk out the correct door.
Later, and finally, the E.R. doctor returns after talking to the radiologist (why couldn't we hae talked to the radiologist?) and says, "We have to admit you. Will get you up there in 20 minutes. You've lost a lot of blood. Something is causing you to lose blood. It could be something from the pregnancy or something else. We want you to see your doctor in the morning and she'll tell you how to progress. Okay?"
"What about the..."
"Okay?"
"Okay, What about the blood loss and you know stopping it."
"We should put her on some medicine to do that?" Again inflection like a question.
"Yes, let's..."
"Okay?"
"Okay, okay, okay! Yes, okay, let's get her on some drugs, okay?"
"Okaaaaaaaay."
"Okay."
"Okay?"
"Okay!" my wife, the nurse and I all practically scream.
"Okay." He walks out.
Then we get shipped up to labor and delivery, where I wanted them to put us from the get go. We get nurses that know their shit, we finally get something to stymie and mitigate the blood loss (!), my wife's doctor shows up the next day, and tells us my wife's got some blood clots the size of lemons they have to remove, but might be able to do without surgery and some other things going on that also caused her to never really dilate during labor. She'll get that cleaned out but it doesn't look like anything major right now.
So basically, my wife is loaded up on four or five different medications, but everything looks good. Course now, I'm going from a totally inexperienced parent leaning on my wife for direction to the one doing almost everything for us both.
However, one last bit from my twilight zone experience. After getting admitted to the regular hospital and given some nurses that know their shit, I leave my wife's room to go home to get my wife some stuff around 3-4 in the morning and the floor is basically deserted. The lights are off and it's a bit like a horror movie. With weird noises coming from rooms, a mechanical grinding for mood music, and just nobody anywhere its eery and ominous. No nurses, patients or anybody.
I hear a rythymic slamming as I a turn a corner in the hallway. Violent slamming. I get to the main bank of elevators and there is this one door opening and closing the ding going on and off with each close and the light flickering like it's at a disco. Frickin weird. The up button is lit up and nobody is there.
I depress the down button. I wait and wait. Nothing. Elevators are broken in a hospital? Can't be good. I turn and around and I'm about to find a stairwell when I hear a ding. One of the elevators opens and its up arrow is lit. The door closes. 2o seconds later another ding and another elevator opens with the up arrow lit and closes. The another ding and a third elevator opens with the up arrow. Weird. Meanwhile the broken elevator is jerking like crazy opening and nearly closing it's door, and lights flickering at an increasing pace.
Then it gets even stranger, the broken elevator finally closes all the way, and nothing, then it dings and opens with the down arrow lit up. I look at the open elevator and shrug "why not,"and it a strange way that was our night in a nutshell and I ride it safely to the button floor.
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She asks us the same series of questions and tells us we should be worried... about the blood loss.
We try to ferret out information from her.
"I'm not allowed to say anything, but you can!" She smiles. What does that mean? I had visions of playing the equivalent of the poker player prank on her. But what is a ultrasound technican prank? Who knows.
She conducts the ultrasound while listening to the music and bopping her head. At the same time she is letting out all sorts of omnious "tuck-tucks" and awkward faces, even letting out an "ugh..." once.
"See anything?" my wife vainly tries.
The tech shakes her head and says "Yes."
"You can't tell us anything? Who will tell us?" I ask.
"Well, just know that's its very, very good that you came in here today." She points to the monitor and nods, "Nope, nope."
Wow. Talk about being ambigious but loading it with bullshit.
I can see my wife's fear rise, I'm now expecting her ovaries at any moment to explode. She later tells me she's focusing on some sort of cancer. She tears up, and I'm trying my best to console her.
They ship us back to the E.R. and this time I actually spot Doctor Combover using the door, he is human afterall.
"I just wanted to let you know, I'll be in when we get the results from the ultrasound, maybe 20 minutes..."
Now, he's f'ing with me.
"..."
"..."
I say "Okay."
He says "O-kay?"
My wife says "Okay!" And he leaves.
Now, let me tell you something about "20 minutes." Everything in the hospital apparently is 20 minutes away, and what that means is at a minimum 1 hour, maybe 2 but certainly not 20 minutes.
Later we are pumping some breastmilk for our baby to pass off to my mother-in-law who is waiting outside the E.R. and the nurse pops in and says, "Don't worry the radiologist is examining the ultrasound we'll have the results in probably 20 minutes." Is that an additional 20 minutes?
So, I walk through the E.R., and I see all these nurses and doctors standing around chatting like it's happy hour at an airport Hilton and I hear no doctor talk, it's all about the weekend and banal bullshit. Meanwhile, everybody else is in a room morbidly waiting for them to do something.
I keep walking holding these little bags of breast milk, and I see the security guard eyeball me again. He's still in the same spot harrassing the nurse who apparently sits there and does nothing else. His partner is one of those guys that just continously nervously giggles and frequently adjusts his gun belt.
The guard tilts his head at me when he sees me. Now, I'm getting REALLY pissed, but I suppress my anger, I don't need to be kicked out a hospital and try to walk out an exit. One of the guards presses a button and a quick honk/siren buzz goes off.
I turnaround, the giggler is talking, "You gonna have to go around. That's for emergencies."
I'm angrier and I notice the ice cream guy from Friday cop is tilting his head back and forth like we are in junior high and I just took his dodgeball from him. He's itching for a fight (in retrospect so frickin' weird).
I muster a smile at them. "Oh, okay, I wondered what you guys did all night. But I get it, you make sure we walk through the right door. Oh, okay, my bad. I'll walk around."
I see my nemesis puff up a little bit in the corner of my eye, as I walk out the correct door.
Later, and finally, the E.R. doctor returns after talking to the radiologist (why couldn't we hae talked to the radiologist?) and says, "We have to admit you. Will get you up there in 20 minutes. You've lost a lot of blood. Something is causing you to lose blood. It could be something from the pregnancy or something else. We want you to see your doctor in the morning and she'll tell you how to progress. Okay?"
"What about the..."
"Okay?"
"Okay, What about the blood loss and you know stopping it."
"We should put her on some medicine to do that?" Again inflection like a question.
"Yes, let's..."
"Okay?"
"Okay, okay, okay! Yes, okay, let's get her on some drugs, okay?"
"Okaaaaaaaay."
"Okay."
"Okay?"
"Okay!" my wife, the nurse and I all practically scream.
"Okay." He walks out.
Then we get shipped up to labor and delivery, where I wanted them to put us from the get go. We get nurses that know their shit, we finally get something to stymie and mitigate the blood loss (!), my wife's doctor shows up the next day, and tells us my wife's got some blood clots the size of lemons they have to remove, but might be able to do without surgery and some other things going on that also caused her to never really dilate during labor. She'll get that cleaned out but it doesn't look like anything major right now.
So basically, my wife is loaded up on four or five different medications, but everything looks good. Course now, I'm going from a totally inexperienced parent leaning on my wife for direction to the one doing almost everything for us both.
However, one last bit from my twilight zone experience. After getting admitted to the regular hospital and given some nurses that know their shit, I leave my wife's room to go home to get my wife some stuff around 3-4 in the morning and the floor is basically deserted. The lights are off and it's a bit like a horror movie. With weird noises coming from rooms, a mechanical grinding for mood music, and just nobody anywhere its eery and ominous. No nurses, patients or anybody.
I hear a rythymic slamming as I a turn a corner in the hallway. Violent slamming. I get to the main bank of elevators and there is this one door opening and closing the ding going on and off with each close and the light flickering like it's at a disco. Frickin weird. The up button is lit up and nobody is there.
I depress the down button. I wait and wait. Nothing. Elevators are broken in a hospital? Can't be good. I turn and around and I'm about to find a stairwell when I hear a ding. One of the elevators opens and its up arrow is lit. The door closes. 2o seconds later another ding and another elevator opens with the up arrow lit and closes. The another ding and a third elevator opens with the up arrow. Weird. Meanwhile the broken elevator is jerking like crazy opening and nearly closing it's door, and lights flickering at an increasing pace.
Then it gets even stranger, the broken elevator finally closes all the way, and nothing, then it dings and opens with the down arrow lit up. I look at the open elevator and shrug "why not,"and it a strange way that was our night in a nutshell and I ride it safely to the button floor.
www.gulfcoastpoker.net
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