Another ER Story

Yes, here it is, another story about a trip to the ER.  This time it’s me and not Elle.  I know, weird huh?  Let me start at the beginning.  If you don’t know, I have a hernia and I’m having surgery to repair it on the 30th of this month.  I had called the surgeon’s office the other day to ask about some pain medication.  The pain has gotten a lot worse lately and I haven’t been feeling that great.  Of course they didn’t call me back until almost 5pm that day, and I missed the call.  The Medical Tech (or whatever she was) left a message saying, “we do not condone the use of pain medication before surgery, take advil, tylenol and alieve to help the pain (which I already told her I was doing).  If you are in a lot more pain, you should contact your Primary Care Provider and get re-evaluated.”  Wait, what?  My PCP?  Why is that?  They are the one’s doing the surgery NOT my PCP!  The next day I called my PCP and told them how I was feeling.  They were nice enough to fit me into their schedule.  My PCP was surprised that the Surgeon’s office sent me to her.  When she examined me, she was worried that my hernia was “strangulated or incarcerated”, and would require immediate surgery.  She sent me over to the ER.

So here goes the ER story.  First off I had a very young Male Nurse examine me and push on my stomach.  OWWWW!  He wasn’t sure about it either, so he had the Doctor come in.  Okay, I was wearing leggings, and you know leggings are very stretchy, my hernia is on my lower abdomen where my c-section/hysterectomy incision is.  This doctor decided I needed to take my leggings completely off.  What the Hell?? (I know it’s not Wednesday, but seriously WHY would I need them off?)  It’s not like he needs to examine my legs or something!!  He starts pushing all over my stomach too.  Double OWWWWWW!  He isn’t sure either, and decides that I need to have a CAT Scan.  They gave me a dose of morphine and hooked me up to a few different devices to monitor my vitals.  I still at this point did not have my pants back!  They were across the room on the chair!  I took all the devices off and walked across the room to get my pants.  Of course all the monitors are beeping and the alarms are going off!  I got them on and got back into bed before the nurse came in.  She said, “What happened?  Is everything okay?  Why are you all unhooked?”  I said, “I wanted my pants and I wasn’t going to lay her pant-less!”  She just laughed and agreed that she would of gotten the pants too.

So I laid there for about an hour drinking the nasty stuff for the CAT Scan.  I got another dose of morphine that didn’t kill the pain, but made me dopey (insert joke here Elle).  Then right before I was going to go get my scan, a different Surgeon from the same practice that is doing my surgery came in to examine me.  He said that he had already been at the ER doing a consult.  He examined me and then said,“you have a hernia, it’s going to hurt, it’s going to hurt until you get it fixed.  If you had a “strangulated hernia” you would be a heck of a lot sicker than you are right now.”  I said, “I am NOT the one that came here, I called YOUR practice and I was told to go see my PCP, my PCP is the one that sent me here.”  He then said, “Well I’m glad I was here to examine you so they didn’t end up bothering me to come back in and examine you later.”  WHAT????  Hello, Mr. Jerky Surgeon guy who makes way too much money, it’s your freaking job!  I then said, “what about the CAT Scan?”  and he says, “Oh I would just cancel that you don’t need it, you’re fine, if you’re in so much pain you can call the office and see if they will move up the surgery.”  So at this point I’ve been at the ER for 4 hours alone and I am NOT in the mood for an attitude.  I say, “I just drank a Big Gulp of crap, I am NOT cancelling the Cat Scan now, and your office just called me and moved my surgery to a later date than I had!!”  He said something else before he left but at this point I was no longer listening.

Now comes the CAT Scan.  I haven’t had a scan in a long time, and apparently I’ve never had one with the dye they inject you with.  He injects the dye, and at first it felt cold going in, and then I felt it…….oh my god I just pee’d my pants!!  OMG!!!  I have never pee’d my pants, I am in the scan, holding my breath and freaking out that I just pee’d all over myself!  They pull me out of the scan I start feeling my legs and stuff and realize I didn’t just pee myself.   Huh?Apparently when they inject you with that dye they are suppose to tell you that you will feel like you just pee’d your pants.   They didn’t mention that to me!

Luckily my hernia wasn’t an emergency and they sent me home later that night.  I’m still in a lot of pain, and I’m really not happy with the practice that is doing my surgery.  But at this point I already have a scheduled surgery and if I were to switch to another practice it would be a few more months before I am able to have surgery.