February 20, 2022

Hospital pt4: I Only THOUGHT I Was Embarrassed Before.

Attempt #4 to write this entry.  I'm hoping that after having the previous three attempts fall over into the swamp, perhaps this will go better.


As you may remember, I had just informed a nurse that I needed to... um... empty my personal solid waste container, and she had just returned with a smile on her face and a bedpan in her hands. I suspect I had a look of horror on my face, both because of the... thing... in her hands and her first instruction: roll onto your side.

I tried. I tried very hard. I grabbed hold of the bedrail to my left and HEAVED... and sorta half-rolled to my side, kinda. My right leg was dead weight with the added fun of hurting like hell too.  I only thought I knew what pain was because the nurse put a hand on my right flank, another around my right knee area, and shoved.

I was later told that my scream could clearly be heard at the nurse's station half a floor away. My nurse was startled; she didn't really understand the situation. Once I could breathe again and my eyeballs stopped vibrating, she honestly apologized which was nice. At this point, allow me to mention something interesting ("Finally," says every reader of The Pond ever)... the bedpan itself.

I've seen bedpans before of course... big, metal things with a white color to it.  As it turns out, that was a very long time ago. Nowadays, they are a pale blueish-green thing made out of plastic, with so many swoops and curves it wouldn't have been out of place on a F1 car. Of course, aerodynamics is not exactly the point of one of these things, though sometime winds are involved. The nurse placed the device into the correct position and helped me slowly roll onto my back. And with instructions to press the call button when I was done, she sailed out of the room.

And then there was another problem. I hadn't voluntarily done... um... doo in bed since I was very very young and I was having a mental issue about letting fly. It wasn't until my guts were filled with stabbing pains that the cork was pulled and the contents decanted... and I still felt an intense embarrassment.  I pushed the call button...

...and very quickly, the nurse returned. Trailing behind her came another nurse... and I instantly wanted to die. This new one was younger and a LOT cuter.  That she was young enough to be my kid did cross my mind, and only added to my weaponized embarrassment. The two nurses together pulled and tugged me back onto my side. This time, my pride stupidly made me NOT scream in front of a cute girl. Tears, however, I couldn't quite control.

Then she walked by, carrying the bedpan while the other nurse began to clean my stern....

(I would like to point out that just now, this post attempted to make a break for freedom.)

...and I began to have a mental argument with myself: which is worse, having the cute nurse carry my pan of former food and clean it, or would it have been worse to have her cleaning me?

These are the sort of questions that try men's souls and keep me up at night. Does that surprise any of you? I mean, c'mon. Its me.

When they were finally done, I apologized to the first nurse. She just said it's the job, no worries, and they left me alone.

Some time later, a doctor walked in, introduced himself as the "(something) doctor, and I looked at your scans a bit ago.  Your kidneystone is too large to nibble out, so we've got two choices. The first is a full-blown surgery, which I think is overkill in this case."

I wholeheartedly approved of this assessment. "So what's the other choice?"

He gave me a real smile and said "We knock you out, run a tube with a camera up your lil' ducky, maneuver it up to your kidney, then slide a stent up it to the kidney in an attempt to let the stone escape on its own. And then we'll place a catheter in your dingus to your bladder to give it a path to follow!"

For the luvvapete, it's getting better and better by the moment. And despite my brain-addled situation, I had a feeling that I was missing something important...

Next: more zombies.

Also Next: Hospital pt5: The One With All The Hoses.

Posted by: Wonderduck at 11:33 PM | Comments (4) | Add Comment
Post contains 765 words, total size 5 kb.

1 I'm not sure if this is your intent, but you're doing a wonderful job of getting the message "eat better, take your vitamins, get some exercise and fresh air" across.

Posted by: David at February 21, 2022 12:11 AM (qSKtI)

2 So, hellish on a physical AND self-conscious level. Ugggh.

Posted by: GreyDuck at February 21, 2022 09:44 AM (rKFiU)

3 You know... It really is part of female programming to be okay with taking care of messes, and specifically of men. Possibly so that women can take care of baby and child messes too. So there is no getting over the unpleasantness, but there is a sort of satisfaction. Like cleaning the house or lining up paper in a row. Nurses are in a weird position of performing primate grooming tasks for strangers, but the good ones just adopt you mentally. I think male nurses also learn this trick. I am pretty sure that men are genetically programmed to be embarrassed when women take care of them, because otherwise women might be easily suckered into taking care of everything always. So you were just maintaining healthy boundaries.

Posted by: Suburbanbanshee at February 22, 2022 08:20 AM (sF8WE)

4 It is awful and humiliating to be in that situation, but it is definitely just part of the job for the nurse. 

Weird anecdote: When newly delivered, I actually preferred the lone male nurse, because he was the only one who actually asked permission before just reaching down and grabbing my tit to angle it toward the baby's mouth (nursing is a more complicated process than the uninitiated might imagine). 

Posted by: Kathryn at February 24, 2022 02:01 PM (8548M)

Hide Comments | Add Comment




What colour is a green orange?




31kb generated in CPU 0.0146, elapsed 0.1872 seconds.
49 queries taking 0.1761 seconds, 281 records returned.
Powered by Minx 1.1.6c-pink.