This is me after surgery in ICU. Wonder what that other tube in the mouth is? There should also be a tube to my head. I'm holding a notebook to write my memoirs :) no but to write what I want to say.All this while my concerns were with the surgery when in reality I should have also thought about post surgery. Being a virgin warder placed me at a severe disadvantage. I really was not prepared for it and I will pay for it.
I woke up with an IV tube on my left leg, right hand and neck. I still hate those things. The one in the neck was so psychologically sensitive after all it's in you neck. Every time it gets tugged it feels like someone might pull at it. I also had a tube from my forehead to a little bag and a lumbar drain which is another tube into the spine in my lower back to suck the juice out of my brain, literally. I also had a breathing tube connected to a breathing machine and of course the mandatory CBT ie urine tube.
Can't remember which came first the neck cleaner or the bath. Let's go with the neck cleaner. So I have this breathing machine in my mouth which means I could not talk ... complain. So when they clean the mucus from your throat they start pounding your chest.That wasn't anything bad. Then they pull the breathing tube up making you cough like crazy. The mucus flies out of the tube and onto my face. When you cough your throat closes up and you cannot breath, I was about to panic. Then I tried through the nose, thank god that still worked. So I concentrated on breathing through the nose. However when the nurse pulled at the tube my lip was wedged between my teeth and the tube. Hurts like crazy! Thanks to the tube I couldn't complain. Dang! I was screwed. It was over when I didn't cough anymore signalling the lack of mucus in the throat. Ah it's over.
Next the bath. The nurse starts by wiping the face then pours the water over the body. It was COLD. She even wash the privates. Since I can't move about I have to wear diapers. What the. Glad I don't have anything to eat I don't have to do it in the diaper. Man no way I was going to do it there, it's like doing a number 2 in your underpants on purpose. Then the teeth. She uses a vacuum brush like one of those wet vacuum cleaners that pours water and suck it back at the same time. She brushes my teeth that's fine then she start to brush the roof of my down to the throat, it was not comfortable, how many people wash their throats!
I also needed to do a CT scan to check whether the doctors left anything behind like their watch :). Not really they just wanted to see hows things in there. I had to change beds and man it was cumbersome. All the tubes and wires, the one in my neck was the most sensitive. They cart me along the corridors and lifts, through the crowds. Reminds me of when I was at the other side watching the people on the beds being carted in but now I was the one on the bed. Then once there I had to move again onto the CT bed. Once done move back but this time I was too high and needed to be put lower on the bed. This assistant/nurse/dumbass grabbed me by the ankles and move me down. It was frickin agony. Where ever there is an IV (intravenous) and where there was an IV the veins are very SENSITIVE. This is because it get traumatised when stuff is directly injected (depending on the chemicals being injected) and also the veins can get stressed like a balloon depending on how fast you inject. Man I wanted to scream but the breathing tube was not gonna make that happen. I thought about about all the hands jestures just to say 'hey dumbo that frickin hurts like hell' but in the end I just had to accept it as I go back to ICU.
So the day ends but the story is not over. I am a shallow breather and when I sleep I sometimes skip or delay a breath. Unfortunately when this happens the machine pumps air into me and sound the alarm. I have to take a deep breath on the next breath to reset the alarm. Frickin pain in the neck just to satisfy this machine and get a night sleep. I'm thinking this is gonna make me look bad, the machine will say I needed lots of assist and I will never have this thing removed. Dang.
During the day I had relatives come and visit. It was good. I was not in the mood due to boredom, pain, whatever and a few people got a cranky me to visit. Apologies. One of my relatives T came early on the day, he says hi, I lift my hands to acknowledge. I then do the paper and pen signal. So he looks for scrap paper and pen but then begins writing! I make the gesture to give it to me don't write anything but he gave the signal no no no and kept writing. And then he shows me the paper. It had some greeting as I remember, actually I can't remember. I wrote " I am not deaf, just blind". Then he got the picture.
