Hospital Memoirs pt 1
Apr. 16th, 2023 04:32 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
raven_cromwellI'll eventually get round to posting these on tumblr, but the rehab center/nursing home they've temporarily sent me to has terrible internet that will barely load dw, much less tumblr. Or my school website, for that fucking matter; I’ve had to file for incompletes on all my courses, and hope I’m out of here well in advance of getting the work completed because to study in this tv -riddled sensory-overload landscape is impossible.
The details are so pedestrian: the common story for so many disabled folks of one mistaken step that jeopardizes all their hard-won independence. I took a fall doing something that was, retrospectively, rather thick. But I'm proud and stubborn and...and I paid a vastly higher price for being stupid than most people, because of my cerebral palsy.
Spinal fusion surgery is never an "easy" thing to recover from, but it shouldn't send you to a nursing home for a month either. Unfortunately, the way you need to sit up--and walk and do...everything really--is nigh on physically impossible for me. At least, while on spinal precaution, which is the name of the game for the first 4-6 weeks--one week already passed in the hospital, so four-five more of this. For so long, my strong back has compensated for my painfully weak legs.
And when it can't anymore, well...then we're talking about physical assists to go to the bathroom. And stepdad is 71; he has no business doing all that shit (he offered, repeatedly, because he knows what a deeply visceral terror sitting in a place like this is for me, but there are some offers you can't in good conscience take).
This place...it's not one of the worst. The nurses and staff care deeply, though they're painfully overworked. But it's hedged about with regulations. Take, for instance, the bathroom saga. I was evaluated by physical therapy on *Friday*. On *Friday*, they agreed it would be more than good for me to get the physical assists to go to the actual bathroom, with such unmentionables as adult diapers as a precaution if I couldn't make it, considering the added physical stresses. Galling, but fair.
Fast-forward to late Saturday night, warm trails of piss spreading in a lake around me in bed. Because y'know what they didn't do on Friday? Put it in the computer. Which means none of the aids will take me to a physical toilet because physical therapy hasn't verified my fall risk yet.
There are no words for how dehumanizing it is to lie in your own fluids. There will never be words.
Nor are there words for the simultaneous sensory-depravation and overload hellscape. No going outside, except with family, and I, who love this time of year am dying at missing the warm weather and smelling recycled air. So, no new experiences, but oh fuck, so much noise. Tvs constantly on as people try to relieve the unremitting boredom of just...existing here, waiting for various therapy appointments.
Oh, the staff say--and truly mean in many cases, particularly of the elderly patients--that they provide both medical care and a toolkit to avoid future falls. But I have a million hacks to avoid falls; I just also have cerebral palsy on the high end of the "moderate" spectrum, which means sometimes, they don't work.
My one uncomplicated delight is roommate, a wonderfully spit-fiery octogenarian. And her daughter brings waves of brightness into our lives like yesterday's fresh watermelon delivery. I'm overjoyed she's getting sprung on Tuesday.
I know why I'm here, and I'd do it all again to spare stepdad, who was there every second in the hospital and whom I love more fiercely than I thought I would ever love anyone aside from my Mom. I've made abundantly clear to the social workers I'm out of here the minute I'm off spinal precaution, fuck their recommendations. And I'm trying to learn some new therapy tricks. But oh GOD, y'all, oh GOD this place is bleak, and I feel like it's bleached everything from me but the need to survive till the end of four weeks. Fortunately, there are therapy services for the brain...they're not weasels anymore; depression is like swimming through treacle and slowly drowning and hasn't been this bad since I started my lovely brain-chemistry miracle meds.
There are so many memories I want to preserve--of deeply kind nurses and stepdad's forehead kisses and...so many things I'll write about another day. But right now, I just want to hold the brightness of watermelon close and try vainly to go back to sleep. Because of course, internal clock is utterly ruined, and sleep more an exercise in passing off time than anything refreshing. Still, there is watermelon in the world, and ice water in my thermos and I will survive this.
The details are so pedestrian: the common story for so many disabled folks of one mistaken step that jeopardizes all their hard-won independence. I took a fall doing something that was, retrospectively, rather thick. But I'm proud and stubborn and...and I paid a vastly higher price for being stupid than most people, because of my cerebral palsy.
Spinal fusion surgery is never an "easy" thing to recover from, but it shouldn't send you to a nursing home for a month either. Unfortunately, the way you need to sit up--and walk and do...everything really--is nigh on physically impossible for me. At least, while on spinal precaution, which is the name of the game for the first 4-6 weeks--one week already passed in the hospital, so four-five more of this. For so long, my strong back has compensated for my painfully weak legs.
And when it can't anymore, well...then we're talking about physical assists to go to the bathroom. And stepdad is 71; he has no business doing all that shit (he offered, repeatedly, because he knows what a deeply visceral terror sitting in a place like this is for me, but there are some offers you can't in good conscience take).
This place...it's not one of the worst. The nurses and staff care deeply, though they're painfully overworked. But it's hedged about with regulations. Take, for instance, the bathroom saga. I was evaluated by physical therapy on *Friday*. On *Friday*, they agreed it would be more than good for me to get the physical assists to go to the actual bathroom, with such unmentionables as adult diapers as a precaution if I couldn't make it, considering the added physical stresses. Galling, but fair.
Fast-forward to late Saturday night, warm trails of piss spreading in a lake around me in bed. Because y'know what they didn't do on Friday? Put it in the computer. Which means none of the aids will take me to a physical toilet because physical therapy hasn't verified my fall risk yet.
There are no words for how dehumanizing it is to lie in your own fluids. There will never be words.
Nor are there words for the simultaneous sensory-depravation and overload hellscape. No going outside, except with family, and I, who love this time of year am dying at missing the warm weather and smelling recycled air. So, no new experiences, but oh fuck, so much noise. Tvs constantly on as people try to relieve the unremitting boredom of just...existing here, waiting for various therapy appointments.
Oh, the staff say--and truly mean in many cases, particularly of the elderly patients--that they provide both medical care and a toolkit to avoid future falls. But I have a million hacks to avoid falls; I just also have cerebral palsy on the high end of the "moderate" spectrum, which means sometimes, they don't work.
My one uncomplicated delight is roommate, a wonderfully spit-fiery octogenarian. And her daughter brings waves of brightness into our lives like yesterday's fresh watermelon delivery. I'm overjoyed she's getting sprung on Tuesday.
I know why I'm here, and I'd do it all again to spare stepdad, who was there every second in the hospital and whom I love more fiercely than I thought I would ever love anyone aside from my Mom. I've made abundantly clear to the social workers I'm out of here the minute I'm off spinal precaution, fuck their recommendations. And I'm trying to learn some new therapy tricks. But oh GOD, y'all, oh GOD this place is bleak, and I feel like it's bleached everything from me but the need to survive till the end of four weeks. Fortunately, there are therapy services for the brain...they're not weasels anymore; depression is like swimming through treacle and slowly drowning and hasn't been this bad since I started my lovely brain-chemistry miracle meds.
There are so many memories I want to preserve--of deeply kind nurses and stepdad's forehead kisses and...so many things I'll write about another day. But right now, I just want to hold the brightness of watermelon close and try vainly to go back to sleep. Because of course, internal clock is utterly ruined, and sleep more an exercise in passing off time than anything refreshing. Still, there is watermelon in the world, and ice water in my thermos and I will survive this.
no subject
Date: 2023-04-17 01:56 am (UTC)I'm so sorry you're in that place, but I'm so relieved to hear from you. If there's any way I can help with anything, please let me know.