The PROFESSIONAL PATIENT
When the nursing staff knows your dinner order by heart, you've been there too long.
March 20, 2020
Right now is a complicated time for the healthcare system. Hospitals are understaffed, undersupplied, and operating under special orders that make caring for patients possibly more difficult than it was before.
As pandemic rages in the United States, causing turmoil and confusion, many people have chosen to avoid going to the doctor altogether, but sometimes you have no choice. When things get critical, you’ve got to go.
This was a decision that Myron Paine was going to face very soon. Myron and his wife Birdie lived together in a pleasant retirement community in the California Bay Area, and when word of COVID began spreading the whole complex was on high alert. News that the disease was more deadly for the elderly made all the folks living there especially uneasy, and for good reason. By March 20th, social distancing orders and stay at home restriction were rolling out, so Myron and Birdie made the decision to go stay with their daughter Tavee, who lived in the area. This would give them both closeness to family and a way to avoid being in such a densely populated living arrangement.
At this time Myron had been experiencing a growing pain in his stomach and developed an ever more concerning shortness of breath. As he packed up his CPAP machine the pain reached a point where his stomach felt bloated and firm, like someone had shoved an entire iron pot stove into his abdomen. The pain forced him to lay down for twenty minutes, his breath coming in short puffs. During this episode Myron wondered if they hadn’t made a mistake about moving to TaVee’s house.
Myron was able to stand by the time TaVee arrived after dinner, and they packed up the car and headed out.
TaVee had transformed her office room into a makeshift bedroom because Myron couldn’t get up the stairs, and she noticed a disturbing shortness of breath from him as they got things settled. Myron had complained of pain in his gut and was looking worse for wear. That night, Myron took his handful of pills that usually helped him through troubled waters. Then he drifted off to a fitful sleep. One that wouldn’t last.
March 21, 2020
Myron woke with crippling pain racking his entire abdomen and panted for breath. He lay in the darkness desperate for the stiffness and agony to subside. When it didn’t he reached for the chair by his bed, and pulled himself to his feet, determined to walk it off. As Myron shuffled into the front room he woke TaVee, who had chosen to sleep on the couch in order to keep an eye on her father’s condition. Her senses lead her true, and she ended up rushing Myron to the hospital at 3:30 in the morning.
The hospital was in full pandemic mode, which meant that Myron’s family wouldn’t be able to go in with him or visit him, and at this point Myron wasn’t sure he would see them again once they admitted him. The pain had reached a point where Myron feared he would die, and not peacefully.
The swirl of doctors, nurses, and tests passed in a blur of pain for Myron, the rest of the day lost to a black cloud of physical torment and probably pain killers.
He came into focus laying in his hospital bed with nurses moving him to a gurney. They wheeled him into a CAT scan room to look for a GI track block causing constipation, but they found none. Instead, they noticed that Myron had developed a serious lung infection and they needed to drain fluid from his lungs. The doctor told TaVee the procedure was not an end of life episode, so she gave permission for them to drain the lung.
March 22, 2020
The next morning Myron was still in pain. He was pleased that the nurses loaded him on the traveling gurney again instead of trying to have him sit up and get in a wheel chair. He thought they were moving him to the CAT scan. Instead he was taken to an operating room where a medical specialist, who was holding a long needle, was waiting.
The medical specialist said, “I’m the guy that’s gonna stick the needle in you, but you won’t feel it,” the specialist said. He lied. As Myron processed the statement the specialist proceeded to insert a long needle between two of Myron’s ribs and into one of his lungs, and it hurt like hell. Once the needle was in place the nurse went about attaching tubes and running them to something out of Myron’s vision. Myron later found out they ran to a box for collecting pus, but for the moment only knew he was in a bad enough situation that he required tubes to be implanted into his back. Never a good sign.
After getting tubed up Myron was wheeled back to his room and served supper, though he could only stomach two bites through his discomfort. The nurses gave him a round of pills and then the lights snapped off at 9:30. Myron was left in the dark with his thoughts. He rolled on his side, feeling the tubing protruding from his back, and thought, “I’m ready to let everything go. I’ve left nothing behind except Birdie and my daughters, and they are all strong women. I’ve got to die sometime, but it won’t be peaceful anymore.” He was floating down that dark tunnel, ready to face whatever lay on the other side.
March 23, 2020
Myron came awake to find himself on his back with his arms by his sides. Nothing hurt. There was no sound, no movement, nothing. He tried to check the clock on the wall, but his eyes couldn’t quite make it out and he didn’t dare move lest he wrench himself from this one moment of peace. Maybe fifteen blissful minutes drifted by before Myron decided to see if he could move. His hands responded weakly, fingers stretching to feel for life, but his feet wouldn’t obey his command.
Despite this, Myron had a sudden revelation, he had made it through the dark tunnel, and on this side of the tunnel wasn’t death, but life! He had made it back, and he was going to live no matter how many days it took. He didn’t know what he was about to go through during the coming weeks, but for the moment he was filled with elation.
Myron’s body slowly began to find more movement, and he was able to reach his phone. It was 3:43 AM. Myron lay awake and listened as the hospital slowly came to life. Nurses and doctors began filtering in to relieve the night shift, prepping for the day ahead. Myron learned from the nurse that after he had rolled on his side in the night he had passed out. The nurses had come in and flipped him on to his back again and when he had woken up in such euphoria, he had been on painkillers. It didn’t matter though, Myron knew from that point on that he was going to live.
March 26, 2020
After feeling like he had made it back to the land of the living for sure, Myron spent a few days in a haze just hanging on and hoping for relief. Eating hurt due to the equipment that was hooked inside his mouth, so he ate only a few bites, though he was later to learn that the food at the Walnut Creek Kaiser was surprisingly good.
By the night of the 26th Myron was more cognizant and just getting used to being in his bed when four ladies wearing blouses with white flower designs on a dark back ground and dark pants came into his room. They were there to move him to a more permanent bed (apparently they expected his stay to last longer than he hoped).
They asked Myron to stand, make a short 45 degree turn and sit down, but the pain was overwhelming and it made Myron angry. One of the ladies came and grabbed his right hand and placed it on her shoulder for support. Myron felt her muscles under her shirt and thought, “This lady is tough.” This thought at that moment brought Myron a sudden flashback from his wrestling days.
He was on the mat at University of Nebraska in 1955, weighing 147 pounds, and under pressure to win. His teammates had won their matches and if he could win they could at least tie and at best win as long as their one remaining teammate could land a tie as well.
“This guy is tough, but I am faster,” he had thought. The ref's hand dropped and Myron yanked his opponents shoulder, dove, clasped the other man’s heels and drove his shoulder into the man’s shin. He drove into a classic one leg take down. Myron was able to take rest of the match out to a draw, but at the time he was one point ahead. Myron’s other teammate was able to hold his own and tied, which gave Myron and his mates the win!
As the flashback faded Myron found himself sitting on the new bed and he laid down, thankful to be back resting and he fell asleep almost immediately.
March 27, 2020
Myron lay half dreaming around midnight or one in the morning. With his eyes closed he felt four pairs of hands running up and down his body and it seemed like his right side was uncovered. “I don’t think I’ve died and gone to heaven,” he thought as he blearily opened his eyes. He was definitely not in heaven. There were a couple nurses putting EKG pads on different parts of his body. One of the nurses was explaining to the other nurses how to place them correctly. Myron began to wonder if they were using him as practice for any new nurses.
Before drifting off again, Myron thought to himself, “I’ve become a professional patient.”
When Myron woke again at a more reasonable hour he felt something wrapped around his leg. He glanced down to find one of his legs strapped into a padded boot that looked almost like a ski boot. It was made from a soft material and had a triangle of padding velcro to make it so that it almost impossible for him to roll over. He soon learned from the nurses that the boot was designed to keep patients laying on their back while they slept, but if he needed he could remove the triangle padding.
Myron had always slept on his right side ever since he was in high school and had to share a bed with his brother and he had the right side of the bed. With the boots on, sleeping on his back was comfortable.
That day Myron was moved to yet another room and he began to think, “I’ve already been in several beds here, how many more until I own the place?” The doctors told him they originally estimated he would be there for three to four days but now it seemed like it might be even longer. Myron was soon to find that laying in a bed for days on end anything but a vacation, and he would have plenty of time to lay and think about things happening.
March 29, 2020
After a few days with nothing to do but lay in a bed and think while puss drained from his lungs, Myron perused his own memories and enjoyed a few funny recollections from his own life. He thought back to a hunting trip in a snowy valley.
He was out hunting as a teen aged boy and was posted up on one side of the snowy valley with his uncle on the other side, both laying in wait for the other hunters to drive the deer through the valley. The deer came thundering down the center, jumping over snow as high as Myron’s waist and throwing snow in every direction. Myron swung his rifle up and pulled the trigger.
A resounding boom exploded through the valley. A puff of snow flew up into the air from the shot and Myron’s uncle came through the snow cloud with his arms waving and hollering. Myron saw his uncle’s arms flailing and thought, “Oh no! I’ve just shot my uncle!” so he dashed into the waist deep snow and shouted out, “Are you ok!?” His uncle replied, “No!” and Myron’s heart sank.
“I’m not ok because the deer got away!” his uncle yelled. Relief flooded Myron’s heart.
Myron also thought back on a time when Ed Cothee did get shot. Ed Cothee was standing beside a big boulder and somebody from somewhere else mistook Ed for an animal and took a shot. The shot missed and exploded against the boulder, metal shrapnel ricocheting into Ed’s rear.
The men drove Ed 30 miles into Deadwood, the nearest town with a doctor. They got Ed to the Bodega Bar after 6 o’clock, where the doctor had an office upstairs. They hauled Ed in and found the nurse, who wanted to get a look at the injury. So she pulled Ed’s suspenders loose. His pants fell to the floor. The guys, despite the grim situation, never let Ed live down the fact that he dropped his pants for the first woman he met when he got to the bar. Thankfully Ed ended up okay, beside the constant jokes about his pants dropping.
As memories, time, and puss dripped by Myron began to notice the routine at the Walnut Creek Kaiser. To his engineering mind it seemed like the hospital was quite the well oiled machine, with a schedule that ran like clock work and numerous devices to ease the life of both patients and staff alike. Myron let his mind preoccupy itself for the next handful of days by unraveling just how the hospital system worked.
April 1, 2020
April 1st rolled around and Myron was hoping someone would come tell him it was just a joke and he was free to go home. The tubes still draining pus from his lungs told him his stay wasn’t over yet. By this point Myron had witnessed the routine of the nurses enough to have it memorized and admire its efficiency.
A typical day for Myron started around 7:30 AM with the arrival of what he calls “the bloodsuckers.” A nurse would step in, usually a different one than before, and say something like, “Hi, I’m So-and-so and I’m here to draw your blood.” Then, before he was awake enough to complain they’d stick a needle in him and draw out his blood for fresh tests and be off.
Next came breakfast, which was always ordered the day before from a staff member who came in after dinner that night. For the first few days that Myron had been in the hospital he hadn’t had much of an appetite, and had only eaten maybe five bites of food. When he finally did start getting hungry he found that the food the hospital served was better than he had expected, even better than the food served back at his retirement home. After discovering this mealtime became one of the main things Myron looked forward to.
Then came the nurses Myron liked to call “the drug dealers.” This was a nurse who showed up four times a day holding a plastic device that covered the nose and mouth, almost like some kind of gas mask. They’d place the mask over his face and use a lighter to light something near the base of the device and have him inhale the smoke that began to fill the device. Apparently whatever they were having him smoke actually helped his lungs expel oxygen molecules that had built up in the lining of his lungs and were causing him problems, but to Myron it always felt a little like they were doing something illegal.
Soon after another nurse in a hurry would zoom in, change the boot that kept him from turning on his side, and be off before Myron could blink.
Lunch would be delivered promptly at 12:30, again something that Myron had ordered the previous night. The choices were simple; a side, an entree, and a little dessert, but they always managed to serve slightly different meals. If Myron ordered turkey for lunch two days in a row one day might be sliced turkey with cranberry sauce and the next might be a ground turkey sandwich on wheat buns. Without fail, the food was just what Myron was craving. It never failed to satisfy.
At 1:30 a nurse with a laptop on a wheeled cart would slide into the room to take Myron’s orders for dinner as well as the next days breakfast and lunch. “I don’t think I need to order tomorrow’s breakfast,” Myron would tell the nurse,
“I’ll be out of here by then.” The nurse would give him a look and say, “Well, tell me what you want, just in case.”
The rest of the day continued through the routine of “drug dealers,” the boot changers, and others dropping by to check a chart, change a pus bag, what have you.
The only thing that happened at random intervals was the arrival of the EKG people. They seemed to be using Myron for practice as well as to monitor a blocked lower ventricle in his heart which gave them some worry (although Myron was unconcerned because this is something he has had all his life and it hadn’t killed him yet). A team would come in, practice placing the EKG pads on him, get a little instruction, then monitor him for an hour or so before leaving him to his thoughts.
Dinner and dessert showed up at 7 PM, but the nurses soon learned Myron’s preferred routine involved chowing down on whatever delicious meal they brought but then delaying dessert till just before bed. The nurse that wheeled in one hour later would bring ice cream in a Dixie cup just for Myron. This little Dixie cup of creamy delight became Myron’s favorite meal. Then a hush came over the hospital and lights went out until the next morning when it would all start again.
April 4, 2020
The twelfth day of Myron’s stay rolled around with no flare or flavor. It was just another day spent laying on his back as the hospital buzzed with life around him. He reflected on his wild ride from the first night being admitted till now and realized he had seen procedures and medical devices he didn’t even know existed.
One that he really had never expected to encounter was a thing he deemed “The Crapper Cart.” This thing was essentially a wheeled cart with a platform for your feet and a bar for you to hoist yourself up onto the cart. Once you were on the platform two big paddles were placed under your butt for you to sit on. The nurses would wheel you off to the bathroom and maneuver the cart so that you were hovering over the bowl of the toilet. Then the paddles would be pulled away so you could do your business, and then snapped back in place so you could be returned to bed, well relieved if not a little perturbed knowing that everyone who saw you on the cart knew exactly what you just did.
Another contraption Myron grew to appreciate was “the Sound Paddle.” This simple invention was a little paddle to control the volume of the TV, but the ingenuity was that the speakers installed near each patient’s ears so that they could each individually change the volume for themselves and not interrupt anyone else.
By far Myron’s favorite thing was the boots he received on his first night, which prevented him from rolling over or turn too much in his sleep. He found it so useful that he requested to have one sent home with him whenever he was finally sent home. That was standard operating procedure.
As Myron ruminated on these devices and his hospital stay Dr. Lum, the lung doctor, stopped by to check over some things on Myron’s chart.
“Hey Dr. Lum, how many patients go through what I’m going through?” Dr. Lum paused a moment then said, “Nation-wide? Maybe a few thousand per year. You’re the second one here today.”
Myron was surprised to hear this, thinking it wasn’t so common, but Myron was in for an even better surprise. Not too long later a nurse came in and told him he was done, the pus was fully drained from his lung and he was free to go. After twelve days, Myron got helped out to where his daughter, TaVee, was waiting to take him to recover in her home, and ended his stint as a Professional Patient.
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