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Friday, November 23, 2007

Gratitude

My work sent me flowers today. I totally didn't expect that... how nice of them!

Hm... I feel like I've had to tell this story a hundred times this week already, but here it is one more time:

Jules and I went to the Edmonton Oilers / Vancouver Canucks hockey game on Tuesday night. It was a great game and the Oilers were winning... I was teaching Jules various things about what we saw (she's British and had no idea what was going on and why). If you can picture the shape of a hockey rink, we were sitting right in front of the face off circles in front of the net, right where the netting for the crowd ends (it's only around the curved part of the glass) and the glass gets lower. We were sitting in really expensive seats (courtesy of Jules' co-workers - I can't afford $130 per ticket!) and I remember thinking when we sat down that it was kind of scary being that close with no netting to stop the puck from going into the crowd, but then I thought 'What are the odds of that happening?'... um... apparently pretty damn good on that night.

The second period had barely begun and the play was leaving the far end of the ice and was coming up our side into the Canucks defensive zone. I was watching the play intently as I always do (I'm definitely not a person who takes their eyes off the puck when it's in play) when suddenly everything went black and it felt like someone had kicked me in the face or hit me with a freakin' frying pan. My first thought was, "What the fuck?! Who hit me?" I honestly thought someone in the stands accidentally hit me with something... which is stupid because really, nobody was sitting on my right side and nobody was up from their seat or anything.... and then I realized, "Oh my god, I must have gotten hit by the puck!" My hands went over my face then and I cupped my nose. By that time, blood was pouring out of my nose and through my fingers all over my jeans, polo shirt, seat, floor, everything. Jules told me later that she didn't even notice that I was hit until the people in front of us turned around because the puck apparently hit some guy in the back of the head after it hit my face. I swear, within ten seconds, the first aid team was there tending to me. They gave me some sort of trauma towel and I actually got up and walked down the aisle and up the stairs to the first aid station. I remember feeling like I wasn't even in my body because I was on auto pilot. Everyone was, of course, staring at me because I looked like a massacre victim. I heard later that I was on TV (oh yay... another TV moment for me this year... definitely not one I wanted) as well as the big screens at centre ice. Jesus... I'm sure that looked pretty. Anyway, at the first aid station, they basically just determined that I hadn't blacked out and my neck hadn't snapped back. Then they gave me the option of going to the ER by ambulance or by private vehicle and of course I chose private vehicle because there's no fucking way I was going to pay for the ambulance AND then have to go back there somehow to get my vehicle. So yeah, Jules and I walked VERY slowly to the car. It took about an eternity and a half to get to the car and then Jules drove me to the ER in Sherwood Park because it was closest to where I live. She hasn't driven in a long time so she drove me absolutely insane with her timid driving. I think she was scared that she was going to drive over bumps and potholes but I was yelling at her to drive the speed limit and not to care about the bumps. It's Edmonton... every fucking street has pot holes and bumps!

So, we got to the ER and go figure, the hockey game was on in the waiting room. They took one look at me, asked me what happened and I just pointed to the TV. Well, holy cow, I got fantastic service once they knew I was hit by a puck! That apparently classifies as a 'cool' injury and several doctors and nurses stopped by to take a look. I got X-Rays and was icing my face while waiting for the shot of painkillers to kick in. The doctors told me my nose was fractured so much, they couldn't even count how many fractures I actually have... but could clearly see it was at least 5 or 6. Jesus. At this point, my sister had arrived to take pictures for Facebook (clearly very important to her, lol). The doctor sort of adjusted my nose into the straightest he could get it and said I was lucky that it was pretty aligned on its own, but to tell for sure, I'll have to wait about ten days when the swelling goes down a lot more. When he started adjusting it, it started pouring blood again, so he packed the one side with these nasal tampons (they were actually called that on the package) but I kept bleeding through them, so they taped up a whole bunch of gauze in front of it and told me I had to go to the U of A hospital ER where they had an ENT doctor who could pack it better and/or do something else to get it to stop bleeding.

Soooooo... 25 minute trip to that ER.... same thing, triage nurses were in awe of my story, I got in within 10 minutes despite the waiting room being so packed, it was standing room only (at this point it was midnight) and got a blood test to see if I had lost too much blood. By this time, the painkillers I had initially received were wearing off, so I was given two Tylenol 3's and some general anesthetic inside of my nose. I then sat for an hour before the doctor came back and re-packed my nose. Holy mother fucking hell... that is the most painful thing I have ever experienced. Picture shoving an emery board slightly longer and a little wider than your middle finger up each nostril. Then picture shoving a second one up there on one side. It felt like it was piercing my fucking brain, or at least my sinuses. Jesus fucking Christ... I was yelling and managed not to swear, although after the first one went in and I had nearly squirmed off of the chair (in the ENT rooms, they have chairs similar to dentist chairs), the doctor told me that I had every right to swear at her and curse as loud as I wanted and encouraged it if it made me feel better. I was sobbing, it hurt so fucking bad, which only caused my nose to move and the packing to feel like it was piercing even further upwards. It burned sooooooooo bad. I had slumped over against her at one point because she asked me in a panicked voice if I was alright. Then she apologized several more times and told me that of all the terrible things she has to do as a doctor, packing noses makes her feel the worst because she knows just how much pain she has to inflict. Like that made me feel better, but whatever.... I sat there unable to stop crying for a few minutes. The super cute and nice nurse came back and tried to make me feel better and it was at that time that she asked how I had gotten to the hospital. I told her that my girlfriend and sister were waiting for me in the waiting room. The triage nurse, for whatever reason, wouldn't let them come in with me initially. Well, she thought that was absolutely horrible, so she took their names and went out there to get them. Chantel, my sister, took more pictures and then we waited another hour to see if my nose would stop bleeding. It soaked through but was only oozing, so they decided to release me with painkillers and antibiotics and told me that if it didn't stop bleeding by Wednesday night (at that point it was around 4:30 am on Wednesday) to come back to get it re-packed.

We stopped off at the drug store to get the prescription filled and to pick up some Ensure meal replacement drinks that I could take with my meds (at that point I could barely open my mouth to even drink... I kind of just poured it in as best I could). At home, Jules helped me take off my blood-soaked clothes and wiped as much blood as she could off of me and then I went to sleep propped up on five pillows in a sitting position. She told me I snored all night because I had to breathe through my mouth but that it was okay because she knew I was at least sleeping.

I ended up having to go back to the ER on Wednesday night because my nose ended up bleeding slowly all day and by the evening, I had blood in the back of my throat. Again, they took me in within minutes and I had three doctors look at me but they decided not to re-pack it because it was a slow bleed and eventually the blood stopped going down the back of my throat. I was kind of glad because I didn't want to go through the packing agony all over again. I did have the constant urge to sneeze though, so he gave me a prescription for more painkillers and for antihistamine to curb the sneezy, watery eye, runny nose feeling.

By Thursday afternoon I had finally stopped bleeding, but the packing in my right nostril had completely pushed itself out while I was sleeping due to increased swelling. I was happy to be able to breathe out of one side but I looked grotesque (or rather even more than I already was). I had been in contact with work through e-mail on Wednesday and Thursday and knew I was in no shape to go into work so they had no choice but to call my boss in who is on maternity leave. She didn't know when she'd be able to get in (she lives an hour away and had to make arrangements for the baby) so I decided to go in for 20 minutes to check on things and put out any immediate fires. Thank god I did because honestly, they had so many things fucked up, it's obvious how valuable I am to them. I literally had a line up in the conference room where I logged onto the computer and they all brought their problems and issues and questions to me one by one and I dealt with them. After twenty minutes I was so dizzy and exhausted from the effort that I passed out for a four hour nap when I got home. Apparently my boss got there a few hours later and took over from there.

Today she called me to ask me a few things because she's been away from the job for so long that she was afraid she'd mess up some stuff so I talked her through a few things. She was so nice to me on the phone, it took me off guard. I don't know why, but I was expecting it to be a pain in the ass for her to cover for me. I'm just amazed at how my co-workers and family are treating me. I'm not sure why it amazes me, but it does. I think they're actually surprised that I'm intending on going to work on Monday.

Last night I was able to get the packing taken out of my nose and didn't get a nose bleed but the pain of not having the stability of the packing in my nose is very painful. I've had a headache all day and am constantly dizzy. I'm told this will pass in a day or two and that getting the packing removed usually causes the injury to hurt almost as much as it did initially. I at least look better - no black eyes, only bruises under my eyes like a football player and the swelling in my nose has evened out a little more. I've decided that I look okay enough to go to the company Christmas party tomorrow night.

As for my gratitude list... I think I'll just reiterate what my family, friends and co-workers have been saying for the past couple of days:

I'm grateful that:

* I didn't get hit in the mouth
* I didn't get hit in the eye
* I didn't get hit in the temple
* I didn't get a concussion
* I didn't get whiplash
* My nose isn't too crooked, despite having multiple fractures
* I didn't have to get my nose re-packed
* I have painkillers
* I have a wonderful girlfriend/nursemaid
* I have wonderful friends, co-workers and family who really do like me, as it turns out
* I'm needed at work
* My boss came in to cover for me with no problem
* I can breathe out of one nostril and have regained some sense of smell (could smell the flowers I received a little bit)
* I have the puck that hit me

3 comments:

Angele said...

When I get to work tomorrow (Monday) I'm going to look up the game and get it on tape and send it to you!!!!

Shannon said...

Oh god, that sounds like the worst experience ever. Glad to hear you're on the mend, and at least it's a really really cool story to tell!

Stacey said...

Hope you're feeling better today. Did you go to the Christmas party? How was it? I can't believe you went to work!!! Your work really needs to have back-up folks!