"Free At Last" (Part 6)

It’s a gorgeous day. I wobble out to the car with Mom and the nurse-in-training who took my vitals this morning. I was tentative to let her “experiment” on me, but I trusted that she had had enough training to know what she was doing. I hadn’t keeled over yet, so I guess she did. We take the elevator down to the first floor, leaving behind all the hospital beds and IVs and entering into the playful-looking main lobby of Levine Children’s Hospital. It has color everywhere and toys scattered among the chairs. I remember when I was first wheeled in here, and people in the lobby stared at me. I had wondered if I looked that bad. We break out of the hospital and into the sunshine. It feels so warm and beautiful it feels foreign. If two days in the hospital do this to a person, I can’t imagine how people feel that stay in there for weeks. 

I sit with the nurse and make awkward idle chat while Mom gets the car. I’m loaded in and wave good-bye to the nurse, who waves back, the promptly returns to the hospital to go “experiment” on some other poor soul. The windows down, we roll through uptown Charlotte with the sun pouring into the window, onto my pale skin and on my face. It feels like it’s healing me just by its touch. It’s better medicine than anything the doctors and nurses could have given me. I see people walking, going about their business on this Sunday afternoon. I’m going home. I’m really going home. I start planning what I’m going to do when I get there. I’m going to go up to my room. I’m going to take a shower- the first I’ve had in days. I’m going to have a few Ritz crackers and water and sit on the porch to read some in Jane Eyre. I let the sunshine kiss my face. Oh Lord, you are so good to me. So, so good to me…

"Sleepless Night" (Part 5)

I wish I was home. I wish I was home. Where there aren’t nurses coming in and out, testing my blood sugar every four hours. Where it’s quiet. Where there isn’t any loud beeping from machines if I accidentally kink my IV. Where the bed is soft. Where the sheets are warm. Where I can wear my comfy pajamas and not these clothes I’ve been wearing since this morning. Where I can snuggle down into the mass of blankets and sleep. And forget all these things that have happened today. That I’ve found out about my body. Like a major organ not doing its job. Where I can push away all the worries that I have. The confusion. The questions like, “What am I going to do? What am I supposed to do?? Am I really going to have to deal with this for the rest of my life???” 

I’m still not used to the needles and constant pain in my fingers from the continual pricks, so I’m laying here in this hard hospital bed, watching the clock, waiting till a night nurse comes in and pricks me again. I try to keep my arm straight so that the IV won’t kink up, but the needle is in my right arm and the stand is on the left side of the bed, so I’m juggling this cord over my stomach. That makes it hard to lie in any position except on my back, which I’ve been doing ALL DAY. Or at least for five hours at the doctor’s office this morning. Whenever I roll over, though, the cord kinks and the machine it’s attached to beeps loudly till a nurse comes in to calm it down. Daddy is staying with me tonight and he keeps snoring, so there’s no peace in this god-forbidden place. A shadow just moved behind the door. Yes, here she comes again. That brown-hair nurse to prick my finger. Lord, help me get through this never ending night.

"Hospital" (Part 4)

We finally make it there. It feels funny being the one admitted into the hospital. We park along the curb instead of in one of the parking decks. I’m desiring sleep more than ever now. A man slowly gets me a wheel chair. I want him to hurry. We go through the lobby of the big children’s hospital. It’s just like I remembered it from last time. Colorful and playful, like the children’s theatre a couple blocks away. But the last time I was here, visiting a friend, I would have laughed in your face if you had told me that the next time I came here would be for me. Because I would be sick. I never thought I would have to stay here. But here I am. 

The receptionists and a few people in the lobby stare at me as we hurry past. Do I really look that bad? What DO I look like? I know I probably look horrible- I hadn’t showered in days, I had my rattiest sweat pants on, and I don’t even remember brushing my hair that morning. We ride up in the elevator- I’m glad no one else is on with us. We finally get to a room. But it lacks what I want most- a bed. It takes them awhile to find one, so I wait wearily on the little couch in the room. I just want to sleep. I finally get in bed. Daddy comes. He holds my hand as they stick me again and again- first with an insulin drip, then taking blood. After that a rather loud, curly-haired, funny looking man comes in. He’s the doctor. He talks for what seems like a long time, but it’s only about 10 minutes. I don’t even remember what he says. I just know he keeps saying something like, “It’s going to be a big adjustment” or “It’s not going to be fun” or something negative like that. I wonder why he keeps saying that- I thought doctors were supposed to comfort. The lights in the room are too bright. I just want to sleep. In my own bed. At home. In my dark, familiar room. Not here. Not here where it’s busy and bright and machines keep beeping. Not here.