The first time I went to hospital for anything gynaecological, was in late 2011 (I think?) when I doubled over in pain after pottering around the house and it felt like something had exploded inside my abdomen. It was the worst pain I had ever felt in my life and I was struggling to crawl around the house. I had no idea I had anything wrong with me gynaecologically, so I thought maybe my appendix had burst, because I had heard the pain with that was normally quite bad. Mark had just come home so we rushed to the closest hospital ER near us.
A day later I’d been transferred to a larger hospital that had gynaecological specialty facilities and staff. The hospital was public, so they were typically overworked and understaffed and the ambulances were backed up in ridiculous queues. People were dying in those queues and no one could do anything about it. The system was itself in a critically ill state, and it would take a few deaths and a few years before it would be somewhat corrected (I doubt it’s even really much better now but I don’t know for sure).
After some initial investigations, ultrasounds and poking around, they concluded that it wasn’t my appendix, but they couldn’t tell what it could possibly be until they had a look through surgery. They made an assumption that I had just checked in to get pain meds because apparently that’s what a lot of people do at hospitals, sadly, so I got lumped into that category too. I very politely kept my ground and told them that I wasn’t imagining any pain and that the pain was real and in certain areas of my abdomen to which they said they’d get me into theatre but that I’d be extremely low priority. I was thinking that I should just get out of that hospital and try a private one, I didn’t care about the excess I’d have to pay, at least I’d have someone possibly take me seriously, but even trying to check out of hospital was discouraged, despite them being extremely weary of me having anything wrong with me to begin with.
Once they had decided I wasn’t a drug addict, I was placed in pre-op mode for several days, meaning, I was on a drip, not given anything to eat or drink by mouth in case I was going to theatre at a drop of a hat. They always promised that, but it took several days before finally a surgeon came down and asked me if I’d even been in surgery yet (it was day 3 by then) and I said no one had taken me to surgery and I had basically been fasting for 3 days. (After which he consulted his boss and they took me to theatre straight away).
While I had been waiting for my operation, I was in a ward with 4 other women – the lady to my left had just had a baby, the lady to my right was suffering bladder problems, then across the path the woman to my front left was 8 months pregnant with a broken pelvis and the girl to my front right had been pushed through a glass door.
I definitely had nothing to complain about when I learned what all my neighbours were going through.
The girl who had been pushed through the glass door was a particularly sad case. She was very young, by the sound of her voice, and I had watched her walk past my bed and through the tiny gap of the curtains, had noticed a waif, 14 or 15 year old girl breeze casually by. I didn’t see the glass embedded in her arms, back or legs, but only knew of them when the doctors, nurses and police came to visit her and ask how she was. She was also waiting for her operation.
From the police visits and the nurses conversations, I had learned that it wasn’t a drunken circumstance that left the girl in hospital, or a fight with her boyfriend or a silly prank with friends gone wrong. She had been pleading with her mum to let her stay with her dad and in a fit of rage, her mum pushed her backwards through a glass door, leaving her with glass embedded everywhere in her body but her face and front section. The police asked her whether or not she wanted to press charges against her mum and she fought back tears as she said she hadn’t yet decided. When the police had left, she cried and cried and called her dad and other members of her family on the phone to ask their advice. No one was coming to see her because they lived too far or were too busy. She was alone to make the decision about whether or not to press charges against the person who put her in hospital; her own mother.
At that point I was sobbing in my bed, trying not to be heard, as everyone else had already had visitors of their own – partners, boyfriends, family, neighbours…. except this girl. I felt guilty that she should go through such a nightmare like that at the hands of her own family members and guiltier that she had no one to help or comfort her through it. The pregnant lady who had fractured her hip, had tried to sooth the young girl from crying, saying she’d be ok and that people were around to talk to if she needed. The girl sniffled and said thanks, and soon after she was wheeled away to theatre, and never returned.
I always think about that ward and especially that girl, whenever I feel alone and unsupported. I know that I’m not alone and that people are doing the best they can to be there for me and the memory of that girl always reminds me to not take the support I have for granted. I had a particularly bad day yesterday where I found myself feeling incredibly lonely even though my partner was in the house, but he was too busy playing with his friends and I felt like it had been his duty to take care of me first, so it upset me greatly. This morning, I thought of that girl, and reminded myself to leave the pity party.
I know I have enormous support from my family and friends, and even though they can’t physically be with me during the times I feel the loneliest, I have to remind myself that they are there and I can reach out to them for anything. I am really lucky, to the point of being incredibly spoiled and bratty sometimes 😉
For anyone going through any sort of illness at all, if you’re ever in a spot where you feel like no one is there for you all I can say is that when you reach out, someone will always reach back. The internet has especially made that infinitely possible.
Endo and Liz - an endometriosis journal 