we didn't make it to narnia.
Feb. 1st, 2006 01:49 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ewein2412On Friday morning we went to the hospital instead. Sara had her appendix out in the wee hours of Saturday morning. She and I have spent the past 5 days in Ninewells, the big university hospital at Dundee--they discharged her yesterday (my brain has been so fried by all this that when I tried to think of the word "discharge" yesterday all I could come up with was "manumission"; and for two whole days I could not remember Tim's cell phone number, which I have known for at least 8 years). Among other incredible joys and delights that we suffered while incarcerated, we had to treat Sara for HEADLICE; and when I finally got out to my car after 5 days, with Sara waiting in the ward in her coat for me to come to the door to pick her up, my battery was completely and utterly flat. Tim the Heroic arranged for someone to collect Mark from school, bought a set of jumper cables, drove the 20 miles to Dundee, found my car on the roof of the multistory car park, and by the time I had toiled back and forth between the car and the hospital to let them know what was going on he had got the car started.
Sara is fine. She is off school for all this week, but she is eating well and is of Good Spirit. She and I are now sleeping in the living room to spare her the stairs. Camping out in our own house is incredibly good fun (it doesn't take much).
The care we got at Ninewells was truly first rate; plus, never having had any experience of being in hospital except to have babies, I thought they did a superb job of making sure that the parents got to stay with the kids. While Sara was in the "high dependency unit" I had my own room in a Ronald McDonald suite one story up from her, and when she stopped being "highly dependent" I got to sleep in a bed next to her on the ward. From Sara's point of view it was all one big nightmare: she went in on Friday morning with a sore tummy, but not any kind of debilitating pain; they stuck needles in her and wouldn't let her eat for 11 hours, then cut her open, and when she woke up she was in considerably MORE pain. Everybody kept asking her, "Do you feel better now?" and she'd say, "YOU CUT THREE HOLES IN MY TUMMY AND PUT NEEDLES IN MY HANDS. I WAS FINE YESTERDAY AND I DON’T FEEL BETTER!"
She'd had all her drips piggybacked into her left hand (IV, antibiotics, morphine), and 2 days after the operation they put another needle into her right hand to take some of the pressure off the left. She was like a different person than she'd been on the first day because she was so much BRAVER now, and as they did the Evil Job I described to the doctor her performance on day one: "I HATE YOU I HATE YOU GET ME OUTTA HERE I FEEL FINE". She grinned a little and added, "'I'M GONNA TURN YOU ALL INTO FISH!" Which is my all-time favorite line out of Fullmetal Alchemist. So I knew her sense of humor was returning!
The dopey play specialists who kept coming around and asking her if she "had enough games" and offering her crayons (she couldn't sit up, and had big bandages around the needles in both hands) had got her name written down on their worksheet as "Sarah Grotland." When I showed her this she burst out laughing and then cried because it hurt so much.
It occurred to me that in its odd way hospital life is like what Anne Morrow Lindbergh, in Gift from the Sea, calls "island life"--in that your existence is stripped down to its bare essentials. You realize again just how little you actually need. For me, in particular, this was true, because I wasn't sick; but I found myself taking immense pleasure in such small luxuries as a real cup of coffee every now and then--by myself; the wonderful luxury of a clean, private room with a nice aspect--not that I spent any time there! But just knowing the key was in my pocket was a comfort. (You had to go up so many stairways and down so many halls and through so many fire doors to get there that when I took Mark to see the room he said, "This reminds me of Spirited Away!" What are my children LIKE.) And all I needed to feel clean and refreshed was a shower and a toothbrush and a clean pair of pants and socks. I ate cornflakes or toast for breakfast and a sandwich for lunch and supper. The fast food stand in the main concourse made excellent French fries (it was called "The Metropole." I could not even walk past it without thinking "I'm spending a weekend at the Metropole.")
But what we needed--what I discovered we MUST have, both Sara and I, when stripped of all other material comforts--is BOOKS. The first thing Sara asked for when she was conscious again, after the operation, was that I go to the bookstore in the lobby and buy her some new books. Tim and I had to read to her almost non-stop the whole time she was conscious; I myself went through three books while I was there, as well as all the reading to Sara. Whenever she had to have some horrible procedure done to her, another needle put in or something (they had trouble getting blood out of her hands and had to take it from higher up her arm), she made me read to her to stave off panic. We were surrounded by books--my books, her books, some that we'd brought with us, some that we'd picked up in the hospital bookstore, some that she'd picked up out of the "Fairy Box" full of really nice gifts for the hospitalized kids, some that Tim brought us, some that one of my friends brought us. When Sara was able to use her hands again she started reading to herself and went through two or three on her own.
She set off home with Fruits Basket 7 in her coat pocket. Can I just say that you get a heck of a lot more out of manga when you read it aloud--you have to concentrate on who's saying exactly what and just what every little picture means. It's not something I'd recommend but it was an interesting experience (we went into the hospital on Friday with Fruits Basket 5 and I was SO relieved when Tim brought in Prince Caspian--only because it's REALLY HARD WORK reading a comic aloud)!
What else? Well, there were no hair elastics to be had in the entire hospital and we had to tie off Sara's plaits with surgical bandages (you know you're in Scotland when you can't buy hair accessories in a HAIRDRESSER'S, for goodness sake). Hanging out in the Parents' Lounge of the children's ward was a bit like hanging out in the Big Brother House. But we don't have to pay for ANY of it--not even the prescriptions--because we have a National Health Service in the UK. It has its flaws, I know, but since I've been in the UK we've had 2 babies and 2 appendices taken care of for us. I didn't even have to pay for most of my weird vaccinations when I went to Ethiopia. I have no complaints.
"NOW THAT THINGS ARE BACK TO NORMAL I CAN GET SOME REAL WORK DONE" (hah).
Sara is fine. She is off school for all this week, but she is eating well and is of Good Spirit. She and I are now sleeping in the living room to spare her the stairs. Camping out in our own house is incredibly good fun (it doesn't take much).
The care we got at Ninewells was truly first rate; plus, never having had any experience of being in hospital except to have babies, I thought they did a superb job of making sure that the parents got to stay with the kids. While Sara was in the "high dependency unit" I had my own room in a Ronald McDonald suite one story up from her, and when she stopped being "highly dependent" I got to sleep in a bed next to her on the ward. From Sara's point of view it was all one big nightmare: she went in on Friday morning with a sore tummy, but not any kind of debilitating pain; they stuck needles in her and wouldn't let her eat for 11 hours, then cut her open, and when she woke up she was in considerably MORE pain. Everybody kept asking her, "Do you feel better now?" and she'd say, "YOU CUT THREE HOLES IN MY TUMMY AND PUT NEEDLES IN MY HANDS. I WAS FINE YESTERDAY AND I DON’T FEEL BETTER!"
She'd had all her drips piggybacked into her left hand (IV, antibiotics, morphine), and 2 days after the operation they put another needle into her right hand to take some of the pressure off the left. She was like a different person than she'd been on the first day because she was so much BRAVER now, and as they did the Evil Job I described to the doctor her performance on day one: "I HATE YOU I HATE YOU GET ME OUTTA HERE I FEEL FINE". She grinned a little and added, "'I'M GONNA TURN YOU ALL INTO FISH!" Which is my all-time favorite line out of Fullmetal Alchemist. So I knew her sense of humor was returning!
The dopey play specialists who kept coming around and asking her if she "had enough games" and offering her crayons (she couldn't sit up, and had big bandages around the needles in both hands) had got her name written down on their worksheet as "Sarah Grotland." When I showed her this she burst out laughing and then cried because it hurt so much.
It occurred to me that in its odd way hospital life is like what Anne Morrow Lindbergh, in Gift from the Sea, calls "island life"--in that your existence is stripped down to its bare essentials. You realize again just how little you actually need. For me, in particular, this was true, because I wasn't sick; but I found myself taking immense pleasure in such small luxuries as a real cup of coffee every now and then--by myself; the wonderful luxury of a clean, private room with a nice aspect--not that I spent any time there! But just knowing the key was in my pocket was a comfort. (You had to go up so many stairways and down so many halls and through so many fire doors to get there that when I took Mark to see the room he said, "This reminds me of Spirited Away!" What are my children LIKE.) And all I needed to feel clean and refreshed was a shower and a toothbrush and a clean pair of pants and socks. I ate cornflakes or toast for breakfast and a sandwich for lunch and supper. The fast food stand in the main concourse made excellent French fries (it was called "The Metropole." I could not even walk past it without thinking "I'm spending a weekend at the Metropole.")
But what we needed--what I discovered we MUST have, both Sara and I, when stripped of all other material comforts--is BOOKS. The first thing Sara asked for when she was conscious again, after the operation, was that I go to the bookstore in the lobby and buy her some new books. Tim and I had to read to her almost non-stop the whole time she was conscious; I myself went through three books while I was there, as well as all the reading to Sara. Whenever she had to have some horrible procedure done to her, another needle put in or something (they had trouble getting blood out of her hands and had to take it from higher up her arm), she made me read to her to stave off panic. We were surrounded by books--my books, her books, some that we'd brought with us, some that we'd picked up in the hospital bookstore, some that she'd picked up out of the "Fairy Box" full of really nice gifts for the hospitalized kids, some that Tim brought us, some that one of my friends brought us. When Sara was able to use her hands again she started reading to herself and went through two or three on her own.
She set off home with Fruits Basket 7 in her coat pocket. Can I just say that you get a heck of a lot more out of manga when you read it aloud--you have to concentrate on who's saying exactly what and just what every little picture means. It's not something I'd recommend but it was an interesting experience (we went into the hospital on Friday with Fruits Basket 5 and I was SO relieved when Tim brought in Prince Caspian--only because it's REALLY HARD WORK reading a comic aloud)!
What else? Well, there were no hair elastics to be had in the entire hospital and we had to tie off Sara's plaits with surgical bandages (you know you're in Scotland when you can't buy hair accessories in a HAIRDRESSER'S, for goodness sake). Hanging out in the Parents' Lounge of the children's ward was a bit like hanging out in the Big Brother House. But we don't have to pay for ANY of it--not even the prescriptions--because we have a National Health Service in the UK. It has its flaws, I know, but since I've been in the UK we've had 2 babies and 2 appendices taken care of for us. I didn't even have to pay for most of my weird vaccinations when I went to Ethiopia. I have no complaints.
"NOW THAT THINGS ARE BACK TO NORMAL I CAN GET SOME REAL WORK DONE" (hah).
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no subject
Date: 2006-02-01 06:12 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-02-01 06:37 am (UTC)incidentally, I am L. hee hee hee
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Date: 2006-02-01 06:46 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-02-01 06:47 am (UTC)Oh, headlice -- that takes me back. My elementary school was near a patch of woods and we'd have weekly lice checks every spring. I was convinced virtue kept me clear, until the year I got it. (I expect it was luck and avoiding the athletic field closest to the woods.)
My mother had no sympathy about the yucky shampoo. "When *my* mother was little, she had to douse her hair in kerosene to get rid of lice. She was terrified of setting her hair on fire."
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Date: 2006-02-01 06:51 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-02-01 07:07 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-02-01 07:08 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-02-01 07:14 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-02-01 07:14 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-02-01 07:20 am (UTC)you just have to check them religiously. CONSTANT VIGILANCE!!!
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Date: 2006-02-01 07:21 am (UTC)Yeah, constant vigilance is a good idea anyway.
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Date: 2006-02-01 07:22 am (UTC)The worst thing is the kid's fear, really. You can put them out of pain but you really can't do anything about the fear--they have to work through that themselves.
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Date: 2006-02-01 07:50 am (UTC)Hey, have you read Megan Whalen Turner's The Thief and its sequels? I ask because it's YA fantasy that feels a lot like historical fiction and it's always reminded me of your work, and in the latest edition there's an author's note that mentions you as one of her influnces.
Also, Mark and Sara might like it, too. :) Or the first one; I suspect the next two are too old for them.
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Date: 2006-02-01 08:17 am (UTC)I miss the Student Health Service at my uni in the States -- really it was the best of both worlds. Visits/consultations were free, prescriptions and tests were discounted, and everything was done promptly. I guess this is the "real world" sinking in. (And now I'm wondering if I should get any vaccinations while I'm here -- I think there are a couple I ought to have eventually that I've been putting off.)
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Date: 2006-02-01 08:47 am (UTC)i wonder what chocolate covered lice would be like.
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Date: 2006-02-01 09:07 am (UTC)The curious thing is that Megan Whalen Turner's mind does seem to work like mine in many ways... I'm always anxious to read her next book to make sure that we aren't using the same motifs YET AGAIN, as she is one step ahead of me in publishing the sequels to her own books, and I look forward to them with trepidation lest we have managed to come up with identical plots by accident. We haven't yet.
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Date: 2006-02-01 09:15 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-02-01 09:16 am (UTC)if you send books Sara will love you.
By the way, my new Sunbirds came today! Thank you!
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Date: 2006-02-01 09:43 am (UTC)Yes, I'm in Newcastle. I wouldn't say I've had a bad experience, just slow and a little frustrating. Fortunately almost everyone I've had to deal with has been very nice. It makes sense that care in cities would be more frazzled -- I hadn't thought about that. (A reason to be glad I'm not in London!)
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Date: 2006-02-01 09:47 am (UTC)did you know that in Perth they do chartered bus trips to Newcastle so that people can spend the day shopping there? (this is not cool, but it's kind of mind-boggling)
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Date: 2006-02-01 09:55 am (UTC)I remember you saying that people come to Newcastle for shopping. Bizarre! But there are plenty of places to shop. I've only been to Metro Centre once, and my main impression was, "Wow, this seems so American."
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Date: 2006-02-01 10:29 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-02-01 10:52 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-02-01 10:59 am (UTC)I think that the shopping trips to Newcastle are mainly focused on Metro Centre!
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Date: 2006-02-01 01:00 pm (UTC)If this had happened in the US she probably would have been discharged the next day whether she was ready or not, and you would have received a bill for several thousand dollars IF you had health insurance, and a lot more if you didn't. Sometimes I really despise my country.
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Date: 2006-02-01 01:22 pm (UTC)we do make a national health contribution via taxes, so it's not really "free"; but it feels like it's free, when you really need it and it's there for you and you don't get wound up in red tape.
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Date: 2006-02-01 06:45 pm (UTC)I'm a military dependent, and the healthcare system is, in a lot of ways, very much like a National Health Service. It has its drawbacks, but I love the free bit.
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Date: 2006-02-01 08:36 pm (UTC)The first thing Sara asked for when she was conscious again, after the operation, was that I go to the bookstore in the lobby and buy her some new books.
i couldn't help breaking out into a huge smile, reading this. your daughter is wonderful!
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Date: 2006-02-02 02:29 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-02-02 02:32 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-02-03 09:19 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-02-03 10:19 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-02-03 10:28 am (UTC)Metropole
Date: 2006-02-07 07:43 am (UTC)Re: Metropole
Date: 2006-02-07 07:48 am (UTC)