A few weeks ago I had to make a number of trips to the hospital, driving my grandfather as he has a tumor in his liver to get stuff done. He's doing fine now, and should be fine in the end, its just a matter of waiting things out to see how things go. But this entry is not to talk about my grandfather but I may write a little on him near the end. Actually I'll do it now, this is just something I remember once when I took him to the doctors for a checkup, to see how his cancer recovery has been going, which was good, he had no signs of the cancer returning as he spoke to the doctor through a translator. Then he talked about how he doesn't worry about it, because he has faith is God, which made me look up to him all the more. Faced with a life threatening disease and he doesn't worry about it at all, putting his faith in Jesus, so that's something I shan't be forgetting anytime soon, and should be how I live my life. But this entry is more my observations of being in a hospital, its been a while since I've been to one...
The hospital is Westmead, near Parramatta for those geographically impaired, the first time I went with my grandfather we had to get there at 9am for what I thought was an appointment (no one told me what is was for, they just said "Drive grandpa to hospital"), and just like any appointment at a hospital we had to wait, and wait, and wait until sometime over an hour later, 11am, they were ready for us. Well, we were ready for them a long time ago and were at the point of non readiness but what can you do, except nap. They put grandpa into a bed, and I sat next to him, and we continued waiting, being in a bed my grandfather nodded off, with nothing to do I too nodded off. We were soon woken up by the nurses and they wheeled grandpa off to some procedure, an Angiogram I think, but the nurses and doctors told me nothing, not that I asked. There we had to wait some more before going for the actual procedure, by this time it was around 1 or 2pm, and I was hungry to the max. Grandpa went in, and I went to get lunch, a salmon sandwich that was too cold for me and some juice, because juice is awesome. Grandpa then came out and he had to stay at the hospital for another 4 or so hours to be monitored for precautionary reasons which I didn't mind because it was for precautionary reasons, my grandfather however, wanted to go home and probably felt annoyed. We had hours to wait, I had brought nothing with me to entertain myself with. So as you can see, what I thought was just a quick appointment turned out to be hours and hours of waiting around and doing nothing. All I had was my phone, which I can't be bothered playing games on (Sudoku and imitation Snowboarding? No thanks), my ring, which I played around with a lot and coins to do random magic training. But hours of rings and coins gets tiring, fortunately there was a Bible around, which allowed me to catch up on my Bible reading big time. We got out at sometime past 5, not happy at the suprise wait of foreverness.
The second time we came, I was more prepared, I had a bag, and in that bag was my DS, I now had something to do with all the hours of waiting. We had to get to the hospital at 8:30am this time, which to me is early, but who am I to complain, some people have to get to hospitals at times like 6:30am! Things felt a bit quicker this time, with less people waiting around we were tended to sooner. My grandpa went in for his procedure, and I went to have breakfast, I got a bacon and poached egg sandwich which was pretty good! Then I headed back to wait for my grandfather, I played a bit of DS, but got stuck then I gave up. Then I decided to catch up on my sleep, which was when things got really weird for me. It was 10am when I started to try sleep sitting in a chair, and eventually I fell asleep and started to dream, except that I wasn't sure that I was dreaming because well, I dunno, I'll just tell you what happened as I remember it...
I was sitting in my chair, just waiting for my grandpa, random relatives appeared outta nowhere sitting around waiting as well, I then went back to sleep, arms folded, head faced down. Then, out the corner of my eye I see grandpas doctor walk by saying the procedures done, I also see the clock, it read 10:50am. So hearing that grandpa was done my mind said "It's time to wake up!", and I tried, but couldn't wake up...it was like I was stuck. So then my mind said "Let's start small, check your watch for the time", so I turn my wrist over to look at the time, and then try to wake up, but realise my turning of the wrist was only a dream. All this time my eyes are a quarter open, so all I can see are my folded arms. My mind tries to unfold my arms, and I do, but that turned out to be a dream. My mind says to lift my head, and I do, but that too was something I dreamt doing. I couldn't move and each time I thought I moved it only turned out to be something I dreamt I did. I think I was breathing hard too, trying to break out of the dream, so the people sitting next to me might've been freaked by me, not that I could see them as I was asleep. It was a weird yet cool experience. Eventually I somehow tricked my body into moving, and once I did move just that little bit (with my finger I think), I broke out of my dream sequence and was awake again. I looked at the clock and it was 11am, my grandfather still wasn't out, so I dreamt that the doctor came out saying he was done, I could've slept a little longer, panicked for nothing.
Not wanting to go back to sleep for fear of being stuck again, I busted out the DS and played a different game. And ended up playing the DS for the whole day, waiting with grandpa until we could finally go home, which was about 6pm. A whole day at the hospital, oh so much fun! So that was the basic gist of what happened at the hospital, now for the random pieces of observations I had.
- When I went to get my breakfast the cafeteria lady that served me seemed to be the type that lets people have their way. Since some guy was originally serving me, but he had to do something and made the lady finish my sandwich to which another lady said to her "You've got to stop letting them walk all over you", to which she replied "..I know" followed by a sigh. I just found it interesting for some reason so I'm sharing it with you, whether you like it or not!
- The nurses had chocolate, I know because they talked about it during the day. I didn't get any.
- While sleeping and dreaming, a Dr Malvin Wong had a telephone call, to which he never responded to because they made the announcement throughout the whole hour I was asleep and then some more after I was awake. Someone should've looked for Dr Wong.
- While waiting for my grandpa as he was getting his procedure done another man was in line to get an x-ray, I saw him go into the room, to quickly come wheeling out (he was in a wheelchair) frantically saying "Toilet! Toilet!" to his wife, who slowly walked infront of him to the toilet. A few minutes later he came back out, with a noticeable stain on my gown. I don't think he made it to the toilet in time...
- While waiting for my grandpa to rest up the needed hours some old man was making a racket, claiming his tea was too hot, spilling it onto the ground, then complaining to the nurse about how she was trying to hurt him. Another male nurse/doctor (I don't know) stepped in to help, but apparently he wasn't the old man's type. "Nooo! You're not my type!", the old man said over and over to which the guy answered, "Okay! It's good to know I'm not your type". Eventually he calmed down and was quiet again, either that or they wheeled him away so we couldn't hear him anymore. I'm not too sure, I was playing my DS.
- Clocks...everywhere I walked there were clocks around, and when there are clocks you look, look at the time. So that is what I did each time I looked at a clock, I checked the time, and soon enough I realised something. These times were WRONG! They weren't wrong by a few minutes or anything, they were wrong by a mile and a dead battery! That's right, some of these clocks had dead batteries and were at a stand still in time. But to tell you is not enough, because the sheer amount of dead clocks littered around Westmead needs to be exposed to you my readers even if you don't care at all! I've taken the liberty of proving this time ticking travesty through video, from my phone.
I had to wait for the halls to clear up before taking the video so no one could hear me say the times for added effect. That and I don't want anyone looking at me video recording a clock.
The first clock video was in the hall on the way to radiology. So it was one of the first clocks I noticed. Being cautious I recorded it and spoke very softly, so if you can't hear anything, you now know why. So enjoy the visual instead.
So early...
I got more confident afterwards and spoke more louder so you can hear me say the real time, followed by the stopped time.
Lunch time...
If only it were really 4pm...
There were other clocks as well, but I couldn't get around to all of them because it'd just be overkill for both you and me, once you've seen three clocks you've seen them all I say.
I suppose one day I'll do a hospital blog from the perspective of a patient and not visitor, but until I somehow hurt myself or contract some horrible disease you'll just have to be content with this hospital based blog. Apologies in advance :)
No comments:
Post a Comment