HealingWell
Search Close Search
☰

whats your most memorible moment in in the hoospital

Support Forums
>
Ostomies
✚ New Topic ✚ Reply
❬ ❬ Previous Thread |Next Thread ❭ ❭
Posted 1/12/2012 5:52 AM (GMT 0)
so one thing that plays frequently in my mind is the 3rd day in the hospital (i was slowly etting my frlling back) my dad bought some movies and oneof them was Austin Powers Gold Member! i had never seen it. i thought i was going to hurt my self from laughing i lauged so hard and was in pain i told my dad he is trying to kill me because the movie was SOOOOO FUNNY. i think when i go back for my reversal surgery im gonna bring my movie again it definetly made the experince funny !!!!!! tongue
Posted 1/12/2012 1:20 PM (GMT 0)
I love that silly movie, so many, many hilarious parts in AP Goldmember, such silly slapstick and raunchy too! Mike Myers, he's a crack up isn't he?

I was in the hospital a total of 12 days, 7 for resection, ostomy etc. and 5 for takedown 12+ years ago.

My hospital stays were not memorable! Quite the flip side to yours, I was a bad patient first time around, I wouldn't cooperate with the breathing tube machine nor walk when I was supposed to. I thought those nurses were flat out crazy and wrong, told my surgeon and he laughed his head off. Saying, no they are right - you need to walk! So I came home and ever so slowly recovered. I also had a what I call a mini-breakdown that first stay, I was still on ice chips and those lovely sponge sticks (which I thought were suckers in my early blurry vision phase, when I could focus I yelled - those are just sponges on sticks - nurses again chuckled and asked - what did you think they were? I said suckers and you kept yanking them out of my mouth!). Oh yeah I was also bumped up to green watery soup (they said cream of pea, and I said - what pea? I don't see any peas!). I had 5 friends from my high school days want to visit and eat lunch with me. They were so excited to take time off from work to support me and bring me lunch. Lunch? I was so upset, I cried on the phone, I said - I can't eat, they won't feed me! My ever so kind ET nurse was in the room and she asked me - do you want visitors? I said - no, not at all, just my husband and my dad (but he passed away a decade before). Long story short, she put a sign on my door, no visitors, that door remained closed from then on, loved it. That's my memorable moment, crying so much with her and she did something about it, also turned off my phone, I could make out going calls but none came in.

Second hospital stay I knew better and cooperated with nurses. I brought gym shoes and a pad of paper, to keep track of my hourly laps and breathing exercises. Except for stool coming out so frequently, I recovered very well that time, had stamina and was able to eat much sooner. First time I know those nurses dreaded coming into my room - the grouchy, crabby patient.

Now I have an image of you watching Goldmember, trying not to laugh but you had to, that tent scene is funny too. I might have to rewatch that movie because of you!
Posted 1/12/2012 3:08 PM (GMT 0)
My most memorable moment was when I woke up from my second surgery to discover that the veneer on one of my two front teeth was gone. I have veneers on them because they were discolored because back when my mom was pregnant with me they gave her a drug - starts with a t? So every time they put a new veneer on they have to grind a little more of my teeth and now there's no a whole lot left. So as soon as I woke up I could feel it. Apparently it popped off when they put the tube down me. Freaked some people out in the OR. They gave my veneer to me in a little pill bottle and when I got back home I had it put back on. But I looked like a hilljack the entire week I was in the hospital - good times! I felt like a ventriloquist because every time I had to talk I barely moved my mouth.
Posted 1/12/2012 3:14 PM (GMT 0)
     I had two memorable moments and neither one pleasant.  First one was about two days post op.  One of the surgical resident's (the only woman and a real b****) was going to be on duty the 4th of July weekend which was approaching and I suppose she wanted to clear as many patients out of the hospital as possible and she told me I could eat!  Well, ate I did and that evening, a few hours later....UP IT CAME, plus some.  My surgeon happened to be on duty at the time and he came in and said he suggested they place the ng tube back down because he knew I would just keep upchucking.  When I told him the resident told me to eat...he was LIVID!!!  They did put the ng tube back down and over the next two days it brought up gallons of bile.  The next day, my surgeon came in with the woman resident and told me in front of her...."Don't let ANYONE try to tell you when you can eat.  Your body will tell you when you are ready to eat.  No one is going to rush you out of the hospital when you are under MY care."  She turned bright red.  Bet he read her the riot act.  From that day on, she was sugary sweet and very attentive to me..lol.

     The second memorable moment happened two days before I was to leave the hospital.  The nurse taking night time stats could not get a blood pressure reading on me.  She raced out of the room and brought back an old fashioned cuff.  The reading was 70/40.  My temp was 105 and pulse 152.  You never saw such action going on!!  Mama Mia.....lab people took blood cultures, IV's went in, CT scans, xrays!!!  All I remember is trying to get back to sleep and no one letting me sleep.  They even called my surgeon at 2am.   Seems like I was going into septic shock and I wasn't even aware of it!  SCARY!  Good thing I was still in the hospital.   All worked out well and here I am today!!! yeah

Posted 1/12/2012 3:41 PM (GMT 0)
Well there are so many, but the one that came to mind first when I saw your subject line (great idea!) was a funny one, so I'll lighten it up here....

This was before my surgery, on a different hospitalization, when I was starting to get better. I was off an IV for a bit, and I went to the family room to stretch a little -- it had carpeting. I was doing the pigeon pose in yoga (can't do that now w/my wound), but basically it's a hip stretch where I was lying flat on my stomach on the floor, with one leg bent up under me. My feet were by the door. No one else was in the room.

Well, my nurse walked by the room and saw me sprawled on the floor and panicked and started to call a code -- she thought I'd had a heart attack or something..... it was not funny for her in that moment, but when I realized was going on, I got up and told them I was just doing a yoga pose.... I was in the hospital a few more days, and after that, everyone was laughing about it ....

I have a lot of bad ones too, but I'm in a pretty good mood, so I'll just leave it at that for now....
Posted 1/12/2012 5:06 PM (GMT 0)
I have some bad ones that I won't go into, but the most funny thing was seeing the text messages I was sending people while I was still on the pain med pump. Some of those were crazy!
Posted 1/12/2012 9:29 PM (GMT 0)
Memorable moment......
I was in the bed by the window. I woke up in the middle of the night. Everything was white...ceiling, curtains, walls, bedding. Everything I could see was white. And I had all these wires and tubes connected to me. I thought I was in an alien spaceship being studied. I pushed the call button. I just needed to see a real person to calm down.

Dan
Posted 1/12/2012 10:07 PM (GMT 0)
The post-operative delierium. I wrote about it earlier, when it happened a few weeks ago. I hope it doesn't happen again when I have the takedown.
Posted 1/12/2012 10:48 PM (GMT 0)
Oh, I thought of another one.... I had an elderly roommate -- very nice, very social. Well, she took some meds that had a side effect of giving her diarrhea -- for an hour. She spent the next two days going on and on to many people on the phone and to visitors -- it was just pouring out of me, for the WHOLE HOUR, I had to go to the bathroom THREE times..... it seemed like it was quite traumatic for her, but all I kept thinking was a whole hour? try a whole decade..... (this was also before my surgery)

Dan, I often think those alien abduction stories sound just like surgery.....people in weird outfits knock you out and you wake up in a different place and they've taken organs and moved other ones around....
Posted 1/12/2012 10:57 PM (GMT 0)

blueglass said...
Oh, I thought of another one.... I had an elderly roommate -- very nice, very social. Well, she took some meds that had a side effect of giving her diarrhea -- for an hour. She spent the next two days going on and on to many people on the phone and to visitors -- it was just pouring out of me, for the WHOLE HOUR, I had to go to the bathroom THREE times..... it seemed like it was quite traumatic for her, but all I kept thinking was a whole hour? try a whole decade..... (this was also before my surgery)

Dan, I often think those alien abduction stories sound just like surgery.....people in weird outfits knock you out and you wake up in a different place and they've taken organs and moved other ones around....

LOL a whole decade.

Oh man, maybe aliens can abduct me and fix my problem. smilewinkgrin
Posted 1/13/2012 2:36 AM (GMT 0)
I have so many memorable hospital moments. I'm in a good mood, too, so I'll tell the one about being 3 days post-op after my small intestine perforated, and it was the 4th of July.

I had a perfect view of downtown from my hospital room where the fireworks were supposed to go off at 9pm, but I fell asleep and missed them. I woke up around 11pm feeling sad and pulled a chair up to the window. I was looking out over the dark city, when all of a sudden, I saw fireworks go off. Then, there were more. Then, the sky lit up for about 30 minutes with the best firework display I had ever seen! It was the downtown fireworks show... only 2 hours late!

I found out later that there had been technical difficulties that caused it to be late, and people were up in arms that it didn't start at 9pm as planned. I was so happy that it was late and felt like it was my own little celebration that I was still alive! Now, every time I see a fireworks display, I think of that night. :-)
Posted 1/13/2012 4:35 AM (GMT 0)
This is a great thread! I have only been hospitalized for my first surgery (I sometimes wonder how I escaped hospital stays with how bad my UC was), and there were definitely some interesting points to it. The funniest, to me, was when I was in the recovery room, still groggy and waking up, and I heard another patient being set up on the other side of the curtain from where I was. He was obviously still out of it, and I kept hearing him say, "I have to pee! I have to pee!", to which the nurses would reply kindly, "You have a catheter in, you don't have to go pee." This went on for several minutes, and then suddenly there was a commotion, the man loudly protesting that he did have to pee, and the nurse yelling, "No, stop! Don't pull on that! You'll rip your genitals off!" (Actually... she used a different word... lol.) Later on, when he had come out of his post-op stupor, I heard him talking calmly with the nurses, saying, "Really? I did? Oh, I'm so sorry." I'm sure he didn't find it as funny as I had... and I may have found it funnier because I was still a little drugged-up, myself. :-)
Posted 1/13/2012 4:57 AM (GMT 0)
I have some memorable moments too, most of them were VERY terrible, but I'm in a good mood, finally seeing snow here in Chicago.

Being in the hospital 6 weeks, I was able to catch several firework shows off of the lake. Forgot about them. Also, I had the best room in the house and my sister and friends came to visit me for the Water and Air Show. That was very memorable since I had gotten out of ICU 2 days before. Also my hematologist decided to grace our company and we all just had a great afternoon.

Something funny I can remember but didn't really have my sense of humor at the time. The following day after my colectomy, didn't have an ostomy, the aid came in to help me wash up. This was the first time I've gotten out of bed. And the 1st time I'd ever let someone bath me like this...my other surgeries or when I gave birth to my kids, had taken showers with assistance. I'm very conservative, so this was uncomfortable. So, I'm sitting in the chair, in a single room, the curtain half drawn, exposed and she's helping me. Around the curtain, in comes my surgeon. He apologized and left. 5 minutes later in comes around the curtain a flower delivery guy. He didn't even know what to say or do, his mouth dropped. The nurse entered right after him to take the flowers for me. He leaves and I'm livid. I said to the aid who has a smirk on her face, keeping her laughter in 'trying' to compose herself, 'Doesn't anyone knock anymore?' She said, 'well Christine, I bet you made their day!' I said 'really, and what makes you think that?' She said, 'well you are very attractive.' I said in such a harsh loud tone, 'attractive, are you kidding me? What the **** is so attractive about my entire abdomen having staples and a tube in my nose?' My angry voice made her burst out into laughter, which became so contagious, I couldn't stop either. That laughter was a blessing.

My most recent hospitalization, I got upset with a resident. In the ER, she took my history. At that time, a friend of mine was taking my kids to school for me. He then returned. The resident (female) comes back in and says...how nice of your FATHER to come? My friend was steaming. He's 56, I'm 38, guess it's possible but still. So, wanting to settle him down and give her a taste of her own medicine I said loudly to my friend, 'oh honey she thinks your my father' turning to the resident 'he's my husband!' She was beat red. Then she remembered I had told her I'm divorced and she said it and I just burst out laughing. Then we all were laughing but I still then told her, that in her profession she should not be making assumptions like this. Later that night, another friend came to visit me. He's 30 but looks very young for his age. In walks the resident. She says how nice it is for me to have another friend come visit. I said, no this is my son. Again, she's bug eyed, mouth dropping shocked. But again, she remembered how I told her my children were 8 & 9. She asked me if I hated her. I told her that I just want to leave an impression on her that she'd never forget.

I too have alien dreams. One I vividly remember, I was 9 months pregnant, day before my due date, first child. In my dream, aliens came, took me, and cut me open and took the baby out. I awoke horrified. But, I did go into labor that day, it was not only my due date but my 29th birthday, and thankgod didn't have a cesarean.
Posted 1/13/2012 5:08 AM (GMT 0)
Windy city the scariest dream I ever had was when I was pregnant, pretty early on and I dreamed that some black smoke came up, sort of like a ghosty thing, and took my baby right out of me! And I know that doesn't sound that scary, but when you are pregnant that's your worst fear, something happening to the baby. I still get chills thinking about that dream

But my most memorable hosptial moment (other than having my son) was the day of surgery, I had to have. A blood transfusion, I had never had one before. Well I don't know if anyone watches the simpsons, one of the episodes homer finds snakes hair and wears it as a hair piece, the hair then takes him over and homer becomes a criminal. I was convinced they were giving me blood from a criminal and I would become a murderer, or whatever that person had done! They said I screamed about that and did not want the blood!
Posted 1/13/2012 7:27 AM (GMT 0)
all of these stories are GREAT! as i read them i thought of the commition i stired when it was really no big deal!!!! i was getting my epidural out i knew how much if you move you can become paryalyzed ((completly spelledit wrong :/ )) and i thought it was some huge metal thing in my back two nurses came i freaked out im crying snot and saying how bad is it going to hurt .im so scared i shouldnt have gotten the empidural and then he said what getthis.. and showed me that flimsy pice of string i laughed i was so embarrased maybe if they would have said it is thin like yarn. OHH ANOTHER THING my drugs were GOOOOD like higher than morphine i think i had two difrent kinds of medicine but my friend was with me and i guess i said toher gurl when the nurse comes back in here im gonna ask if i can sharesome of this with you . then i started humming and i said IM DOING IT AGAIN im sorry ..(hmmmmmmmmmmmm) then back at it and i kept calling my littlesister and would say get up your gonna miss your bus! it wasa funny
okay i swear last story lol about 1 week and 1/2 i was sleep and woke up and saw my sister in my room and i was like Jada give me that button
jada-what button
me-THE GREEN ONE
jada-areyou sleeping jackie
me- (put my hand on my head) JADA! i am wde awake the green button
jada- looking at me
me- nevermind i dont want it no more
the nextday she told me i yelled at her because i wanted my PCA she asked me if i remember i told her yea i was talkin to you but i dont know what lol
Posted 1/13/2012 10:39 PM (GMT 0)
A week after my colectomy I was back in with peritonitis. The sutures at my rectum opened up. A week later I was out of intensive care and in a regular room. That day a young female resident Dr entered with three male interns and announced that she was going to do a prostate exam. I said "you're not going to do that". She "yes I am". Me "no you're not". She "but I have to". Me "I had a colectomy last week and the sutures at my rectum leaked. I don't have a rectum". Without a word Miss I'm full of myself turned and left, obviously embarassed in front of the interns. If I felt better I would have had her on the carpet in front of the hospital management for not lookng at why I was there in the first place. She could have killed me!

Dan

Posted 1/13/2012 11:40 PM (GMT 0)
I had a very memorable and moving experience. I was in the hospital when another patient arrived. She had a terrible accident and was in a lot of pain. She sat there in all of her pain and prayed not oinly for herself but for me who was the other patient . I was very ill. I had a ruptured intestin and a abcess the size of a basketball pushing into my hip. I had never seen this person before and there she was praying for me. I am a christian. I had just left everyone I had ever known and had no one except for my husband with me. I had gotten out of going to church like I should have and was feeling really bad about all of it. Over the next couple of days, time after time she would have someone visit her and they would pray for her, have communion with her. One night as I was laying there asleep and druged from the pain killers, I woke up. There were at least 5 people standing there and praying over me. I have never been so moved or touched byt the kindness of others in my life. I am thankful every day that I met her. She was a stranger when we met but her family and I have become very close friends. Things happen for a reason and I believe that I got sick so that I could get back onto the right path again.



































never
Posted 1/15/2012 6:12 PM (GMT 0)
Dan good for you for sticking up for yourself, even when so sick..... I had a much lighter story in the same vein..... a nervous med student asked if he could examine me -- I was in the ER back for a complication a week after I got home from my first surgery, and I'd already been examined by a real doctor. The student asked if he could see my butt wound, and then started joking, to reassure me, that he wouldn't do a rectal exam.... I said, no he wouldn't, no would anyone ever as I had no rectum...... he was embarrassed.....

I have definitely taught a few med students a few things....
Posted 1/15/2012 8:17 PM (GMT 0)
Nurse came in and said she had my blood pressure medication. I said I don't take BP medication. She said "are you Dan?". Yes I am. Then I said to the other inmate in the room "Dan, do you take BP med?" He said yes I do. This stupid nurse was going by FIRST NAME.

Gotta watch them every minute.

Dan
Posted 1/15/2012 8:37 PM (GMT 0)
"inmate", love it!

I remember thinking for the first 2-3 days post-op if there was a fire, I would surely perish. I couldn't get my legs to do what I wanted them to do, they felt just foreign to me. I asked those nurses to come rescue me if something happened, I had young daughters at the time at home. They smiled and said of course they'd rescue patients.....
Posted 1/15/2012 10:13 PM (GMT 0)

polishdan said...
Nurse came in and said she had my blood pressure medication. I said I don't take BP medication. She said "are you Dan?". Yes I am. Then I said to the other inmate in the room "Dan, do you take BP med?" He said yes I do. This stupid nurse was going by FIRST NAME.

Gotta watch them every minute.

Dan

No no, admit it, you don't take your BP medication. You tricks her, tricksy little hobbites.
Posted 1/16/2012 12:25 PM (GMT 0)
I wish I had a story about exposing a nurse for stupidity, presumptuousness, etc. but I don't.
All I can say is that it's ironic to get top surgical treatment but the barely survive staying there aftewards.
Posted 1/17/2012 9:10 PM (GMT 0)
I have two. First is finally being able to eat. I almost cried when they brought my clear fluids "food" tray.

The second was my amazing nurse and her student. The student was the best. When I was vomiting from the meds, she was kind enough to console me and rub my back until I had stopped. Nothing was too much trouble for her. Best care ever from the two of them.
Posted 1/17/2012 11:20 PM (GMT 0)
I remember being half unconscious in the recovery room, with terrible nausea, and 2 nurse excitedly chatting away and planning their upcoming christmas party. I had my surgery on 19. July, and it may have added to my confusion how long I was under...
Posted 1/18/2012 1:40 PM (GMT 0)
I really had the most amazing nurses during both of my hospital stays. They are the reason I'm planning on starting nursing school once all of this surgery mess is over. I remember, after step 1, I had an ileus and was in horrible pain and nauseous. It was during the night. My nurse was right on top of getting me the pain and anti-naseau meds and she stayed with me for hours putting cold cloths on my forehead, holding my hand, etc. It was almost like having my own mom there to take care of me!
✚ New Topic ✚ Reply