My Second Hospital Visit (in less than one week)
My dear, sweet husband. He had only retired from Augusta Richmond County three months prior, December 31, 2011. I became ill almost immediately, February 2012. I’d already been to the ER once, March 14, 2012 and now I was being admitted, March 16,2012.
Have I mentioned how much I hate hospitals? How about Needle Nazis?
I was so swollen and dehydrated when I was admitted that the Needle Nazi had difficulty finding a vein so they ordered a PICC Line. The damned thing itched the whole time I was in the hospital, BUT I’d rather have one very calculated and successful stick with a PICC Line than the 3 or 4 possible sticks of the alternative. HELL YEAH!!
And to take it a step further, how can you be both swollen and dehydrated at the same time? Excellent Question.
Anyway, the very first thing the Needle Nazi put into my IV……was Lasix. Now, I just want to say that Lasix isn’t anything like that other diuretic I was prescribed by Dr. Bee-ach. Nope. Not even close. The second it hit my vein I felt warm and gooey all over. I felt it travel through my whole body like a fine whiskey. That warm watery sensation almost like hot chocolate on a cold winters night. That is until it found its intended target…my bladder. Then it was “get the hell out of my way,” because I have got to use the toilet NOW. I would have knocked over Mother Theresa and peed through my underwear to get to a toilet in time. It became an all encompassing emergency to get out of that hospital bed, keep my dignity with the poor excuse of a hospital gown, hobble to the bathroom dragging my IV pole behind me, only to frantically pull my panties down to pee like you are standing next to Niagara Falls.
I must have gone to the toilet like that about 50 times over the next few hours and just when the urge to go went away, that damned nurse put another hit in my IV line and I was back to emergency pee stations.
Dr. Asshole visited me the next morning and did a comprehensive exam. He hung out for a while and talked to me like I was a human being. He started offering possible diagnosis such as Lupus, Diabetes, Nephrotic Symdrome, and cancer. That’s where I stopped him. I said, “Let’s not delve into possibilities, let’s just wait until the test results come back and deal with realities.” He stared at me for a few moments. Then he smiled and said he’d talk to me tomorrow. And he did.
Monday rolled around and all the lab tests came back negative, negative, negative so he scheduled a kidney biopsy for later in the day. And after four days, Friday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday, of peeing like one of those little Cherub water fountains, I was drastically smaller and in a lot less pain. And surprisingly, the prospect of a biopsy didn’t scare like I thought it should. I was tired. After all I had endured in the last 6 weeks, I didn’t care what they did to me at this point. I just wanted a diagnosis and treatment so I could go the hell home and sit in my recliner and watch my big screen TV. I’m such a guy sometimes.
The biopsy was a breeze. They wheeled me down to X-ray. Put me in an MRI on my stomach, hooked up some nice loopy juice to my IV, bared my ass to the world, draped a sterile cloth over my backside and hit me with something that sounded and felt kind of like a nail gun. I didn’t feel a thing. Heck, I spent the whole time talking to everyone around me, laughing and cutting up. The next thing I knew, I was back in the wheelchair going to my room still just a talking my mouth off.
Just so you know, sedatives make me chatty. Once, coming out of surgery, I told my anesthesiologist that he had a nice ass and would he shake it for me. OMG. How embarrassing… if I cared.
Dr. Asshole paid me another visit on Tuesday morning. He said the results would take about a week to come in and he discharged me. He only sent me home because my insurance company wouldn’t pay for another day. I was discharged on Tuesday, March 20, 2012. My follow up, to get my biopsy results was scheduled for March 28, 2012.