The Worst Thing For Your Health

 What is the Worst Thing For Your Health?

Birthday candle smoke.

The doctor told me that one as he was signing my hospital discharge papers Friday.

He said a med school instructor told him and it was five years before he got it.

He was too young to understand.

I’m not too young – for anything.

Birthday candle smoke means you just got a year older. Getting old is the worst thing you can do for your health.

 

You’ve probably seen reports about the hospitals on your local news. Long lines, lots of illness, not much staff.

I can give you an Up-To-Date Report From the Front.

Before you become concerned, I’m fine. Or as fine as I will ever be. I’ve inhaled too much birthday candle smoke to be in perfect health. The best I can hope for is: "You’re in good health for a person your age." Which translates to "You're in good health for an old man."

What happened to land me in the hospital?

My doctor prescribed a new medication.

I thought it was a substitution.

It was an addition.

I was not supposed to quit taking my previous medication. But I did.

It took 2 weeks but the result of going off the medication hit me with a wallop a week and a half aago, all my bloodwork numbers were out of whack, in particular my kidney reading.

I did have pain Saturday night and most of Sunday but that was from a UTI. Modern medicine is good at knocking out that pain.

But after a Monday trip to my urologist, followed by a Tuesday trip to my family doctor, I ended up Wednesday morning sitting in the Emergency Room, surrounded by people I would never sit next to in any other situation.

Pandemic Tip: If you have to go to the ER, earlier is better. I got there at 9 a.m. and was back in a room by 11:30 a.m. That same evening a friend’s sister called the EMT. They showed up, gave her a handful of meds and told her to stay home, the wait at the ER was 30 hours.

In the ER I had an EKG, which was over before I knew it had started. Then began the endless bloodwork. In 48 hours I was pricked in each arm, between my thumb and forefinger, on most of my fingers, and on both shoulders. Some were to draw blood out, others were to put medicine in.

Needles are so tiny today that I didn’t even feel half of them.

The worst pricks were the overnight blood draws, when a nurse sneaked into my darkened room, woke me up to tell me he was going to turn on the overhead 10,000-watt klieg light, and take blood. I was 90 percent asleep but cringing: which fleshy part of my body is he going to stick? He seemed to prefer the skin between my thumb and forefinger. Sounds awful but when you are 90 percent asleep it’s over before you can threaten to call the constabulary.

What you have heard about hospitals during the current pandemic surge is true: they are greatly understaffed. My hospital had closed one entire wing because of staff shortages. One of my nurses told me it wasn’t just COVID. Lots of nurses have left the profession during the pandemic for less stressful jobs, like, oh, prison guard or skyscraper window washer. Even with a shuttered wing, there were still staff shortages.

If every RN, LPN or CNA hadn’t told me about the shortage, I could have figured it out. Quickly. I was put on an IV drip first thing. Those tubes are always getting obstructed, occluded or tangled, setting off a piercing beep-beep-beep. The first time it happened I pushed the call button and was promised help soon. An hour later it was still beep-beep-beeping. I figured out where the temporary silence button was and was able to get relief, two minutes at a time, until a nurse finally arrived.

Apparently patients are a tad testy during the pandemic.

Every previous hospital stay of mine featured the cafeteria staffer who cheerfully wakes you up at 6 a.m. with your tray. The earliest I got breakfast this time was 9:30 a.m.

Two doors down from my room was a hospital fixture: The Old Man Who Moans Morning, Noon and Night. This one did it at 200 decibels. “Help Me!!!’ “Help Me!!” The nurse assured me he was getting help. She put it nicely, “He’s confused.”

But despite the fact that every one of the nurses was being run ragged, they were all kind and helpful. I did not starve or have an IV sack run dry. People who had every right to rage never failed to stop in and ask how I was doing, did I need anything.

They are the true saints of this era.

Thursday afternoon a lady came in to empty my trash can. As soon as she told me she wasn’t going to stick me or poke me or take me for a test, I embraced her – metaphorically – as My New Best Friend. She laughed.

As she was heading out the door, she smiled and said, “I guess you’re wondering about my new haircut.” She had a shaved head but I had barely noticed.

“I’m having brain surgery tomorrow.”

I was speechless. I was able to mumble something about good luck and you’ll be in my prayers.

This woman, on perhaps the lowest rung of the hospital staff ladder, was braving COVID and cold weather to work one more shift before major, major surgery.

I was in the hospital with tubes and blood draws, complaining about beeping machines and a braying old man. But I was the lucky one. My burden was nothing, nothing compared to My New Best Friend.

My heart was broken. While I was being discharged, this woman would be undergoing the most challenging, life-altering event of her young life.

I’ll never know what happened to her.

But I kept my word and uttered a prayer for my New Best Friend.