First time for everything...

For those of you who have been good friends and family members and have read my previous blog, my story continues...

Thursday night, my clan of 11 convinces me something more needs to be done to take care of the situation. No one is helping me, not the school, not the previous doctor, not my host family. I have NO clue what to do in such a strange and unfamiliar place. I call my insurance company and get the name of a doctor and then the name of a hospital under which I will be fully covered. I set up an appointment with a doctor for the morning. I inform my host family I have an appointment in the morning.

I wake up. It’s Friday morning. Liza Minelli is still singin’. It is the third day of my emtreme loose motions. This is far from normal ‘travelers diarrhea,’ and is getting to be more concerning. I want to go to school today, we have a field trip. I want this awful sickness to go away. I feel weak and tired. In these times I refer to my inspiration in life Lil’ Wayne “I’m sick and tired of being sick and tired.”

Pretty soon one of teacher’s is at my house. I am lying in bed…people are talking so loudly. All I want to do is sleep. Someone is calling the ambulance? THE AMBLUANCE? Well hot dang I only have loose motions…that’s enough to call the ambulance? Wait…calling the ambulance means…I’m going to the hospital??? WHAT?! Maybe I should get up and see what everyone is determining about MY health situation without consulting me.

Here is what I learn: I will not be going to school today. Instead my field trip will consist of the hospital. I must cancel my previous appointment with the doctor. Why didn’t I inform the school I wanted to be hospitalized? (UM who said I wanted to be hospitalized? And for that matter the school had done NOTHING until now to help me. VERY VERY FRUSTRATING). They are calling a cab because it will most likely take the ambulance 1 hour to reach my house (thank god I’m not dying or something).

Dazed and confused (good movie by the way) I take the bumpy ride with my guardian of a roommate, Amanda, who might I add planned to skip the field trip to stay with me what an angel, and my teacher Mitaji. I go into emergency care where I learn I will be given an IV to replace all the fluids I lost. Great. I have never had an IV before; guess there is a first time for everything right? An IV in India, now that’s my kind of fun. And I am still overcoming my anxiety with needles. They poke and prod me 4 places because my veins were so small from the absence of fluids. I’d only be in the hospital for an hour and then I could leave.

Weren't supposed to take pics in the emergency room. Whoops.

I had a tiny nurse, around 25yrs, that sat in the room to watch over me. She had the kindest eyes and such a soothing presence, like someone in the hospital actually cared. She would smile at me with those big beautiful brown eyes even though I looked like a crazed lunatic who is trying to ween off drugs. When I began shivering she brought me another blanket and tucked me in each time it fell off my feet. She would gently brush my hair out of my face. Something was so comforting about having her by my side even though we could barely say two words to each other.

I lolled in and out of sleep (that was easily more than an hour). And then: the butt shot. In the middle of my dream I was awakened by the sweet nurse (I would learn most of my attendants spoke incredibly poor English…that was fun), and she mimed for me to turn on my side and pull down my pants. And I saw the needle…a big fat stinkin needle that was going to go into my non-existent butt (for those of you who don’t know or haven’t noticed I am very much lacking in any backside action). She stuck that sucker in and it hurt like hell. Apparently it was pain killer for my stomach ‘snake bites’ but I think I would have preferred those than that horrendous shot. And then I began to cry. Doctors and attendants filtered in and out, “What’s wrong? What happened?” WELL let me tell you (Indians say that a lot here, it’s weird) I am stuck in this stupid sketchy-ass hospital where I have no idea what is going on and what is wrong with me. Instead I could be on a field trip watching people make paper and pottery, but I am watching my heart monitor beep. I am not allowed to have my phone so I can’t call my family to inform them I am in a sketchy-ass hospital in a third world country. I have an IV in me, of which could be any type of liquid like potassium nitrate, and I just got a shot in my butt. The school did nothing to take care of me and no one is translating for me what exactly is happening. Good thing I’m leaving this popsicle stand today.

And then just as I had magically arrived at the hospital, had an IV of god-knows-what shoved in my arm, was given a nightmarish butt shot, I was being rolled to the third floor on a gurney. I was going to be staying over night…

I guess there is a first time for everything...to be admitted to a hospital, to get an IV, to have a shot in one's butt, to stay overnight in the hospital...and why not in India?