Wednesday, February 01, 2012

Grace under fire

I have always admired my grandmother. She lived well into her 90s, and was bedridden the last year of her life. Her hips, which had been replaced earlier in life, basically crumbled away, and she was unable to walk. She handled her situation with grace and composure, and I never heard her complain about something I'm sure was fairly painful.

I've learned this week that I most definitely do NOT take after her.

I broke my foot on Saturday. I wish I could tell you that I did it in some awesome way, but really, I just misstepped and rolled my foot in a ditch at the end of the a driveway. I was carrying Little Sister, and I'm sure I compensated somehow so as not to drop her, and ended up with two avulsion fractures in my foot. Basically, that means that I snapped some ligaments, and they took small pieces of bone with them. Nice.

In the ER, things were moving slowly, as would be expected. When they x-rayed my foot, and twisted it in such a way as to get the picture they needed, I yowled in pain. When we got back to the room, there was a pain pill sitting in a cup, with water next to it. I asked my husband to give me the pain pill, but he decided he should ask somebody. The nurse and the doctor came in, and the nurse said, "I'll give you the medicine after the doctor explains things to you." I said, "Could you please give it to me now?" I wanted to say to her, "I don't know if you know this, but BREAKING A BONE HURTS LIKE HELL", but I refrained, thinking that being a nurse and all, she would probably know this fact. But she diddled, hemmed and hawed, and finally I said to my husband, "Just GIVE IT TO ME!" and the nurse only acted when my husband picked up the pill himself and got ready to give it to me. I also wonder if me closing my eyes and banging the wall with my fist in an effort to take my mind off the pain gave her pause. She huffed and puffed and said "Fine, I'll give it to her."

Well, thanks, nurse lady, thanks very much.

When she left in a huff, the doctor grinned at me and said, "She's having a bad night."

Really? Worse than mine? She broke her foot in two places too?

(See? Not gracious. Not gracious at all.)

(I actually didn't say that, though. Just because I'm not gracious doesn't mean I want to piss off my doctor. Plus, I'm kind of a coward when it comes to confronting folks, so I just usually say mean things about them in my head.)

While I sat in the hospital bed, enduring, well, the hospital, DH kept taking pictures of me on the iphone, just to show me how bad I was scowling. Apparently I'm funny when I scowl.

How I wished I had had something to throw at him.

I now have a storm trooper boot on my foot, something that will be my companion for the next 4-6 weeks. It could be worse. I could have a cast, or need surgery. As it is, I just get to hobble around for a month. But since it's my right foot, it means I can't drive for that long, either. Oh, the joy. It's like bed rest all over again, except at the end of it, I don't get a baby, I get a foot. Which is not nearly as cute.

The good news, though, is that UNLIKE bed rest, I have some excellent drugs to keep me company. And it's hard to hate the world when you're blissed out on Vicodin. Vicodin's my favorite.

3 comments:

Rob Monroe said...

EEK! Prayers for quick and complete healing!

Unknown said...

I came across your blog today while doing some PKD research and had to comment so I wasn't being a creeper ;) I also have PKD, and it's great to hear other people's experiences and everything. Thank you for sharing! You seem like an amazing person, love your blog!

Ewa said...

I'm sorry to read about your broken leg. I also have PKD. I'm writing to encourage you to have a DEXA (Dual Energy Xray Absorptiometry). It may be important when you have kidney disease and your bones broke easily. I'm sorry for my language - I haven,t been using english for a long time:)