‘I am Jack’s swollen head’.
The voices start to fade in. I open my eyes. It feels like one second ago that the room disappeared. In reality over four hours have passed.
I have a tube feeding saline solution into my left hand. I have a tube draining blood from behind my right ear. I am an over-complicated machine for turning water into blood.
My head is bandaged, and throbbing a little. I am wearing nothing but ill-fitting paper underpants, and some anti-DVT stockings.
And now, just to complete the utter demolition of both my comfort and dignity, the nurse informs me that if I can’t urinate in the next 45 minutes, she’s going to insert a catheter.
But I’m not going down that road without a fight. I drink so much water that I’m surely violating water restrictions, and strain so hard to piss that I’m at risk of popping some of the 56 staples holding my head together.
Fortunately I succeed.
Considering what has just been done, I’m in surprisingly little pain. I assume it is due to the morphine they injected before I woke up, but the hours pass and the pain stays away.
The combination of sharing the room with three other patients, the nurse injecting antibiotics every few hours, and the constant beeps, wheezes and clicks going on means I don’t sleep much that night. Eventually the sun rises, and soon after one of the surgeons comes to admire his work. He’s pleased with the result, and that I’m not in pain. He says I need to have some x-rays taken, and I can go home.
Thank-you sincerely to everyone for the well-wishes and thoughts. It really does help to know you all care.
And thank-you to the nurses and doctors, who did a great job. I am still very satisfied with our public health system.
‘All the King’s horses and all the King’s men, couldn’t put Humpty together again’.
Humpty really should have seen a maxillofacial surgeon.
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