I am adding posts that I have written over the months, but I have not figured out how to change the order of the posts after I add them, so this one should directly follow "Wrong Side of the Bed."
Friday Feb 22, 2008
I know why Asher was so difficult yesterday. He was getting sick. Last night Asher woke screaming. An hour later (still screaming in pain) we took him to the emergency room.
At 12am The ER staff checked us in. At12:01 am Asher started vomiting. I tried to catch it in my hand (I would not recommend this) and then in the blanket we brought. One of the front desk people non-challantly gave us one of those disposable barf bags (while never even looking up from her computer). At about 12:30 am Mark went home to get a few changes of clothes for Asher. I stayed with Asher and soon after, Asher shouted, "I have to poop!" So we went to the bathroom and gave it a try. Nothing. We went back out into the waiting area. More vomiting. Loud vomiting. Some guy was across from us sleeping in a chair and never woke up.
The next three hours seem like a blur as I write this now. I looked around the waiting room. One woman sat with her leg shaking uncontrollably for hours. The sleeping guy stayed asleep for a long time. A large older man sat and coughed and coughed and coughed. A couple with a newborn baby sat across from us for a while. A new guy checked in and the couple with the baby seemed to know him. He said that he was very sick and could not stop sweating.
For us there were several trips to the bathroom where pooping did actually occur. Asher fell asleep in my arms and Mark and I took turns holding him across two chairs trying to keep him comfortable and asleep. I think it was 3:30am when the nurse finally called us in. Before that, we thought of leaving several times, but each time Mark and I discussed going home, Asher would wake up and throw up again. We worried about dehydration. We worried that there was something else going on that needed attention or medication.
Why do these things always occur at midnight or on a weekend-or both?
While we waited in our little-now checked in but no doctor yet-room, we heard the doctor talking loudly to the woman in the next room. For a while we only heard the doctor's side of the conversation,
"What other drugs did you take?"
"Meth?"
"Did you inject it?"
"Who told you were bipolar?"
"How many pills of trileptol did you take?"
"Were you trying to hurt yourself?"
"Did you boyfriend threaten to leave you?"
"Is your boyfriend on his way?"
"Did he see you take the pills?"
We were convinced that the doctor was actually talking on the phone until we heard the patient begin to wail. Loudly. And the wailing didn't stop. My heart went out to this woman, and at the same time I felt like I was in some version of hell. I was so tired I could barely stand up. The normal amount of tired you would be at 3:30am was exponentially worse due to the trips to the bathroom, the circus act of catching vomit and my worry about my son.
Friday Feb 22, 2008
I know why Asher was so difficult yesterday. He was getting sick. Last night Asher woke screaming. An hour later (still screaming in pain) we took him to the emergency room.
At 12am The ER staff checked us in. At12:01 am Asher started vomiting. I tried to catch it in my hand (I would not recommend this) and then in the blanket we brought. One of the front desk people non-challantly gave us one of those disposable barf bags (while never even looking up from her computer). At about 12:30 am Mark went home to get a few changes of clothes for Asher. I stayed with Asher and soon after, Asher shouted, "I have to poop!" So we went to the bathroom and gave it a try. Nothing. We went back out into the waiting area. More vomiting. Loud vomiting. Some guy was across from us sleeping in a chair and never woke up.
The next three hours seem like a blur as I write this now. I looked around the waiting room. One woman sat with her leg shaking uncontrollably for hours. The sleeping guy stayed asleep for a long time. A large older man sat and coughed and coughed and coughed. A couple with a newborn baby sat across from us for a while. A new guy checked in and the couple with the baby seemed to know him. He said that he was very sick and could not stop sweating.
For us there were several trips to the bathroom where pooping did actually occur. Asher fell asleep in my arms and Mark and I took turns holding him across two chairs trying to keep him comfortable and asleep. I think it was 3:30am when the nurse finally called us in. Before that, we thought of leaving several times, but each time Mark and I discussed going home, Asher would wake up and throw up again. We worried about dehydration. We worried that there was something else going on that needed attention or medication.
Why do these things always occur at midnight or on a weekend-or both?
While we waited in our little-now checked in but no doctor yet-room, we heard the doctor talking loudly to the woman in the next room. For a while we only heard the doctor's side of the conversation,
"What other drugs did you take?"
"Meth?"
"Did you inject it?"
"Who told you were bipolar?"
"How many pills of trileptol did you take?"
"Were you trying to hurt yourself?"
"Did you boyfriend threaten to leave you?"
"Is your boyfriend on his way?"
"Did he see you take the pills?"
We were convinced that the doctor was actually talking on the phone until we heard the patient begin to wail. Loudly. And the wailing didn't stop. My heart went out to this woman, and at the same time I felt like I was in some version of hell. I was so tired I could barely stand up. The normal amount of tired you would be at 3:30am was exponentially worse due to the trips to the bathroom, the circus act of catching vomit and my worry about my son.
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