The not-so-nice night nurse
When I was in the hospital for my triple bypass surgery last year, I received excellent care, with one notable exception. We’re going to call the night nurse Chuckles (an ironic pseudonym for a cranky, dour man).
At the time, I was immobile because I had body fluid luggage, test tubes attached to my chest that drained blood into a metal box. I also had a catheter, connected to another part of my body, which drained into a pliable, plastic box. If you’ve ever taken the boxed wine out of the box, it looked like that.
Chuckles came into my room at the start of his shift, saying angrily, “I’m going to pull that catheter out in the morning.”
I had a problem with the word choice “pull.” I would have preferred “detach,” “separate,” or “remove.” Frankly, any word besides “pull” would have worked.
I questioned the timing; why did he choose to wait till the end of a shift when he’d be sleepy? I needed someone to be alert if they were going to be detaching tubes from that area.
I got the crazy idea to sleep in the recliner. At 5 a.m., they were sticking me in the recliner to take an X-ray, and it was already midnight. It seemed wise to stay put. I was not able to move on my own because of the body-fluid luggage.
When Chuckles left my room, I didn’t realize he had thrown the call button on the bed and closed the door.
Side note: I asked him to close the door because I was right outside the nurse’s station, and one nurse was a loud talker.
But I digress, like I do. At 2 in the morning, I shifted, and I started to slip downward. In addition to the attached luggage, I had a sore throat due to the breathing tube I had during the operation. When I called for help, it was a weak, pathetic noise. It was closer to a gerbil squeak than an actual cry for help. I tried to reach for the call button on the bed, but I slid further out of the chair, arms outstretched, reaching.
At 2:45 a.m., the base of my spine was on the recliner’s footrest. I would’ve fallen completely out of the recliner if not for those grippy hospital socks.
Luckily, there was a routine Buzzelli check at 3 a.m. Every night, I was awakened from my slumber to receive medication intended to help me sleep. Hospital logic. Chuckles arrived at 3 on the dot. He blamed me for slinking out of the recliner like a suicidal fish who jumps out of his bowl. Chuckles yelled, “Why didn’t you call for help?”
I wanted to say, “Dude, I did,” but I was afraid of him.
Did you know that, if available, you can request a different nurse? The next night that Chuckles was on duty, I was able to say, “Thanks, but no thanks,” and they assigned me a different caretaker.