Good Hospital Tale (so you know the ending, but it takes a while)

Catching up and waiting with the rest.

There are easier ways to get breakfast in bed!

There was another test they were hoping to get done on Friday, the tilt test, in cardiology. Didn't make the time cut. Someone later told me they don't do that one often. I had to stay the weekend, monitored all the time. This would cause some mild issues, more later.

Cutting to the chase, there was a room with people monitoring me 24/7 - well, maybe not 7 and also maybe monitoring others in the unit, don't know. I didn't learn that until late Sunday. When I told the internist I had learned that, I started to cry, the amount of care.

Keen interest on my ekg activity.

I'll leave this at Friday night. The roommate is gone, I will play with the tv.
I haven't had a tv for a while now, but was a tv brat of sorts for decades.
Gadzooks, it seems a bunch of people yelling. Hysteric women with wide open mouths, what is that about? Hyper acting. Shills for sales, soul savers, and some kind of looped golf. I like golf in moderation but this was weird -
I saw Bob Schieffer talking seriously with promise to come back and talk more, and then something like a million hours of golf followed..

Then I found there were about fifty more stations. All as silly.
I came to rest on some baseball games, those were straightforward.

Osso!! Quit dithering and get on with the tale! I love the installments but the suspense is killing me!! Out with it!

Hi, Mame, glad to see ya. No, I had to wait, thrashing with wires, you do too.
It's fairly complicated and I still don't get it all. Which is why I'm explaining this way, not just for drama re me, but for the 'what is going on' chase. Saturday was a lull, except for the odd roommate who wanted a private room, didn't want to have to ask to go to the bathroom, didn't look at me, and so on, but sunday got interesting, and I'll get to that soon.

Meantime, Diane had been to visit every day and sometimes we needed to be quiet, re roommate family situations. We're both brats, so that was hard. On Sunday, she proposed a tour of the hospital in a wheel chair for me, and they said ok, but only on this floor (re the heart monitors). I suppose we'll both remember that ride for a while. Someone somewhere in the unit asked where we were going, and Diane said, we're looking for the bar..
the response was jolly.

This may be hard for Diane - Bob and she both had tough stuff going on when they were in this hospital.

Saturday was a succession of lollings. Some of my favorite people kept shutting the curtain, which closed me out from seeing what was going on at the desk. By the time I left, they all knew I wanted the two front lights and a window to the floor action.

Enough re Saturday, except the internist visited me again, with MRI data.

skipping to conclusion re the MRI stuff,

No acute intracranial abnormality. There is atrophy and small vessel ischemic change seen.
There is no significant atherosclerotic change or stenosis visualized in the carotid or vertebral circulation of the neck.

Thinking of you Ossy. If I was religious I'd pray for you, but I'm not so I'll just sacrifice a frog in Satan's name. Can't do any harm.

Hey, izzy. Leave the amphibians alone!

Hey, osso. Enough already. What the hell is the diagnosis?

Hi, love, and thanks for the virtual froggy. This was too bad, indeed not necessary, as I sacrificed my own and lab partner's frog in the name of medicine at sixteen. (Hope yours wasn't a tree froggy).

Temper, temper.

We still need to live through Sunday.

Hard to tell, I sacrificed him with a steamroller.

Sunday will be short as it was also sort of short in reality, my now being worried about the Tilt test - some people apparently vomit (perhaps rare) but in any case, no fun. I'd been worried about it since I first heard about it on Friday.

I had to wait. You too can do this waiting beeswax.

While waiting, and Diane was there, a new roommate was wheeled in. A woman rather out of it - I heard the word percoset - with an oxygen tank by her leg. I might be mixing this up, may have been late Sat. Anyway, she looked in trouble.

Mid day Sunday, there was a family flock of many ages reciting something of a theatrical nature to her, each person, man, woman, or child, saying some sentences.
I missed the import (I would, re hearing) but got the family was caring.
She was discharged before I was, whatever was going on.

My internist (by the way, she's pregnant, due in October, and besides I like her) came to talk. The test tomorrow could go different ways. If nothing shows up, I will be set up with a home monitor (these may go for 30 days). When I asked about them, she went and printed me a copy about possible monitors cardiology might recommend.

I asked if it turns out to be that I need a pacemaker, how long a stay is that.
Not as long as I worried about. I was worried about bill paying online, and whether I could access a computer. She said if it came to that they could find me one.

Anyway, she's not the cardiologist, who is a new persona in waiting.

Monday coming up.

Beats finding where you last put the iron.

I was swooped to cardiology to do the Tilt.

Gah, we'll see.

Ok, I'm there, in a small room. Door with a window. I look at the bed, it seems simple. Place you feet against the board. You will be raised. After that, you can move your feet if you need to.
I am strapped in, in case I fall.

In contrast to my worries, I was gently moved to upright. And then it starts.

The deal is, you have to stand there, strapped in, until you can't.
It's a boring room, but just yesterday, that is, Sunday, being bored out of my tree, I tried drawing my hospital room, nurse getting me some paper. I screwed up the drawing, but not horrible if I do say so. Ok, horrible, but I'll save that.

So in this situation I looked around. Talk about boring.

I moved my feet but also my arms and shoulders and hips and whatever. I was usually asked if I was ok.

I failed to mention one is not supposed to chat in all this, as that raises bp.

I also failed to mention that I early asked how long it took, 45 minutes? and the helper said maybe.