Seventeen Hours p2

The paramedics arrive within minutes. One tests my pelvis by shifting her body weight up on top of me. Pain level check: 4. They tell me I probably bruised my tail-bone and I need an x-ray. I'm rushed off to the closest city hospital. They're full. I'm left on a gurney just inside the entrance to the ER while I wait. The hall was a cold and lonely place for hours.

A nurse decides to make it her mission to find me a bed but they are all occupied still. There's one bed reserved for life threatening injuries so they move me there. My mind begins to race. Life threatened? I feel threatened, but my life doesn't. Pain level check: 4. They're finally ready for me to have an x-ray. I get moved into the hall outside the x-ray room. They tell me that I'm up next. An hour passes. A few people needed x-rays more than me so I continue to be my patient self.

Two more hours pass by. The same nurse that moved me to the x-ray hall recognizes me. "Ready to go back to your room, yet? No? They haven't seen to you?!" Five minutes later I went through the most excrutiatingly painful experience. Not only do they need me to climb onto a flat metal bed, they require me to lay perfectly flat on my back and remain motionless. I try my best, but at this point, the pain is making me convulse. Perhaps someone notices because it's time for another pain level check: 8. I'm unable to climb off the bed without aid.

One can only assume they're used to people answering their pain level questions without thinking. I compare my current level of pain to all the pains I've ever felt or possibly could feel. I haven't experienced severe burns, lacerations or gunshot wounds in my lifetime so I can only speculate that these would be more painful than what I was currently feeling.

The doctor arrives in my room to tell me that I have a compression fracture of my L3 vertebra. Watching entirely too much House, I have a fairly good idea of what the options are. "So how bad is it?" I'm told that I'll be bedridden for a few months and more follow-ups were needed. They also tell me that since I have no medical insurance, they'll be giving me the "affordable drugs". Three more ambulance rides and a suppository later, I defeat the side-effect from the oxycodone, which was extreme constipation & dehydration.

Seventeen hours in hospital. Four ambulance rides. One broken back. Zero pain killers during my visit.

A few months later, while browsing the web lying-down on my make-shift sofa-desk, I spot this article. Our group had suffered headaches off and on for several months before and after my fall. Guess who's building is full of carbon monoxide detectors now?

Seventeen Hours

It was just another rainy November evening in Canada's capital. A handful of friends have gathered to mock and entertain one another while playing video games. An opportunity to score a ride home presents itself, so I quickly collect my coat and head for the door. I feel a sudden urgency to find somewhere to sit. I've had headrushes all my life. I consider them punishment for being so tall. I'm half way out the door when it happens. It sounds like a screen door was slammed next door.

Have you ever watched the rain fall from a worm's-eye view? It's mesmerizing. Under other circumstances I'd spend more time enjoying the view, but I have a ride to catch. "Dude, are you okay", is all I can hear over the rain. I realize that I am on the ground, folded up like a rusty old lawn chair. Rather then focusing on what happened, I brilliantly decide that standing is more important! My ride tries to help me to my feet but I get as far as kneeling. "I need to sit down again."

The ordeal still has not sunk in. I crawl a few meters back inside to get out of the rain. Lying flat on my back I feel fine. I'm just tired. "I'll be fine in the morning."

I'm awoken by the desire to answer nature's call yet I'm unable to. All attempts at moving lead to the same fruitless sofa I somehow managed to crawl to during the night. Feeling clever I spot scissors and an empty two-liter plastic bottle within arms reach. I make short work of one end, and chuckle as I awkwardly use my makeshift loo. "I'm so sorry! It was the bottle or your sofa!! PS, can you call me an ambulance?"