Chpater 4: Leaving the ICU/ The world is full of stupid people/I have a beautiful girl

After several days of being hooked up to every machine imaginable (including the one that goes Ping!- a thousand points to the person who gets that reference), the doctors put in an order for me to be moved to a regular room. I remember someone asking me if I wanted a semi-private or private room.
"I don't feel like playing well in the sandbox right now," I replied.
"It's an extra $60 a day for a private room."
"I don't feel like sharing right now."
After a labyrinth of elevators and hallways, I was placed in a room that looked like it was state of the art in 1973. Unfortunately, I had been assigned to a medical floor. I didn't know what that meant. Hindsight being 20/20, I never should have been there or would have been better off staying in ICU. I should have been on either a maternity floor or a surgical floor. It seemed that no one quite understood my needs.

That being said. Here is a list of people who continually pissed me off:

Lactation Nurse 1: She "kindly" brought a hospital grade breast pump to me while in ICU so I could get my milk supply to come in. She didn't show me how to use the thing correctly. She told me that I only had to wash one part of the contraption and not the whole thing- like telling someone you only have to wash the lid of the pot you just used to cook dinner. She also said that breast milk will be fine without refrigeration for 6 hours which is sooooo not true. I thought she was being helpful. If I had followed her instructions, my Preemie Donna would have an infection right now from spoiled milk.

Diabetes Nurse: One night in ICU, I was being visited by DH, Momma Pug, The Aggie, and Texas Barbie. A timid looking nurse walked in and stood at the doorway clasping her hands waiting to be acknowledged. She had the demeanor of a kindergarten teacher and treated us all like five year olds. I don't remember this, but when she was acknowledged and introduced herself she asked, "And how did we get ourselves into this?"

"She had a baby," Momma Pug said. Diabetes Nurse then proceeded to explain to everyone else, but me, what diabetes was but not how to care for myself with it. After about ten minutes of her sickly sweet nonsense, even I had had enough.

"Look," I said not even caring about being nice about it, "I'm on a lot of pain killer right now and I'm honestly not going to remember anything you tell me right now." I was nasty, I know. I didn't care about hurting her feelings I just wanted to get rid of her.

"Well, thank you for your honesty," she said, not realizing she had been insulted. She left shortly after that and I pressed Tweety to try and stop the impending migraine that was coming.

Flighty the Nurse: This was the one who was assigned to me when I got out of ICU. I will sing the praises of those ICU nurses forever. Flighty was someone special who pissed me off every time she walked into my room. She was always forgetting something and had to go back and get it. Once, she was about to give me an insulin shot and she bent the needle. She stamped her foot, stuck out her lip to make a pouty face, and whined like a five year old.

"Hmph!" She said in a high pitched whine. "I bent the needle."

"So go get another one," I said like an adult. And let me be clear on this- this woman had to be at least 45. Also, once they took my button away, she was a fan of waiting until my pain killer had worn off before giving me more. If it says to give it every four to six hours, seven is unacceptable.

She was also incapable of taking my vitals and my blood sugar at the same time. Because, guess what? She forgot!

Now don't get me wrong, there were wonderful people there too. One night, I had a nurse, we'll call her Sweet T. She had two c-sections and understood what I was going through. She made special trips to check on me. There was also a young nurse who wore jeans instead of scrubs who made sure I had my painkiller when I needed it. Then there was Blond Doctor (I think either I or Momma Pug accidentally called her Blonde Doctor to her face, but if we did , she didn't notice it). She was the doctor who was called in to help me poop. I will spare you the gory details but 5 days worth of IV painkiller + childbirth = constipated. It was an ordeal which brought Momma Pug and I closer and swore us both to secrecy. We vowed never to speak of the experience and I shall not.

Dr. Anthony Edwards: I didn't have just one doctor through this whole experience but several. The last one I had was a guy who looked like our favorite nerd. At first, I thought he was an ok guy. When I called him in and begged for the catheter to be taken out of me, he agreed and put in the order very quickly. Until Sunday when he pissed me off. I had begged for DH to stay with me July 5 since I was over being by myself. Momma Pug had stayed on July 4 (we watched some fireworks that had reflected in the windows of another medical building). He slept while I watched Star Wars (As I said impossible to get any sleep in a hospital). The next morning was a glorious day for me. On July 2, I remember being told that I would be discharged on Sunday. I held onto that hope all week. Dr. Edwards walked in on Sunday morning and said, "We're going to see about getting you out of here tomorrow."

It took me a second to process this.

"Tomorrow?"

"Yes, I looked at your white blood cell count and that's ok. However, you're temperature is slightly elevated and we'll take your staples out tomorrow."

My normal response to this would have been: "I have not seen my child that I supposedly gave birth to five days ago. I'm leaving today."

His response would have been : "But we are concerned about your tempature."

"Of course my temp is elevated, asshole. Everyone in the place pisses me off! Now I don't care if I have to steal an ambulance or walk myself there, I am leaving this hospital today with or without your consent!"

My five days post pardum response was unintelligible because I was crying so hard. I couldn't stay in there one more day. I would have killed someone- probably Flighty.

DH, who was as tired of this as I was, said, "She was told she would be leaving today."

"Not with that temperature."

I calmed down enough to get out one sentence. "My mom is staying with us for a little while and she's a nurse."

"I feel a little bit better about it," Dr. Edwards said.

Through tearful eyes I said in the most assertive voice I could muster at that moment: "I will see my child today."

I must have been channeling the spirit of Linda Blair, a low level demon or something. Dr. Edwards said, "Ok, I'll get the paperwork started." I had never been more releaved in my life.

I finally left the hospital around 3 o'clock, which unbeknownst to me, in the middle of shift change in NICU at Women's Hospital. No visitors were allowed in during that time. My mom had the good idea to call ahead and ask if I could go in for just a moment since I hadn't seen her for almost a week. At first the charge nurse said no, but after I yelled and cried on the phone for a while, she caved and said, "Just five minutes." (I have since sincerely apologized to the poor nurse I yelled at over the phone. She told me if she were in my position that she would have done the exact same thing. Apology accepted.)

She was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen. She was tiny and full of tubes. The diaper swallowed her. All I wanted to do was pick her up and tell her that everything was going to be all right: Mommy had arrived and was never going to leave her again. When my five minutes was up, I decided to wait until after shift change was over because it just wasn't enough time. I could rest later. I had too much adrenaline pumping through my body to rest. While we waited, I met some of the other NICU parents, one of which I knew. Lola is the daughter of my high school counselor- who was also there- who happened to be close personal friends with my parents. Her child, Ark, had been in NICU for 13 weeks (and is still there since I saw Lola and her husband Iam in the parking garage yesterday). Iam told me that I had to take this day by day, to celebrate even the smallest of victories, don't become a victim of information overload, and that Preemie Donna is in the best place with the best care she could ever receive.

At 3:45, we went back in and I stayed until my mom pulled me out. She said that I was tiring myself out and had to get some rest. I could have stayed there forever, just watching her sleep. I cried when they wheeled me away from her warmer. All I wanted was my little girl, I finally got to see her and now I had to leave her again after I promised not to.

We went home. Home looked really good. I missed my cats and my bed. I kinda slept that night mostly because of the searing pain. Since I hadn't been forced to walk around, I was behind on my healing. I took some painkiller and tried to sleep knowing that tomorrow I could see her again.