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arkallen

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Mar 8, 2009
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268
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Other
Diagnosis
05/2009
Country
AU
State
VIC
City
Wodonga
To date most of my respiratory issues have been solved through the agency of a party hire shop. True! My $3000 breathing machine is supplied and serviced by the same cheery gentleman who, on the other side of a brick wall, flogs funny masks, paper streamers, party favours and helium balloons. Lungs -- balloons -- the connection is obvious.
I guess.

I don’t know that my enterprising, balloon-blowing respiratory technician from the bush belongs down here in the big city hospital, especially not in the rarefied atmosphere of the thoracic ward. But – and this is the real surprise – the same paradigm seems to apply: a single skin of brick often divides hilarity from hurt, merriment from misery, laughter from lament, glee from gloom.

Take the thin brick wall that divides an absurdly spall space passing for an accessible bathroom in our ward. Some funny things happen in there! Yesterday a nurse accidentally dropped my clean, nicely folded socks straight into the rubbish bin. You really don’t want to contemplate the contents of such a receptacle in such a place. But she dove straight in after them, and simultaneously we both said exactly the same thing, she with words and I with a gesture: “3 second rule!” How disgusting. How funny!

My height, it would seem, is another source of great mirth for the staff. Throughout my adult life I have been followed by a whispering wave. In the general public I hear it as an appreciative, even awe-struck murmur: “…Gosh he’s tall!…” In the school yards where I once worked it was somewhat cruder and less enamoured; but either way it has been my permanent companion for many years. In my new sit-down world this has all changed of course, to be replaced, curiously enough, by a different chorus altogether, most commonly provided by grey haired biddies on busses crooning: “…Oooh my, look how he can spin that thing around, isn’t it maaarvellous…” (I do wish they would get it right: “…Look how he can spin that Bugger around…”).

My height is a secret these days, startlingly revealed only when I stand; unwinding from 4 foot 6 right up to 6 foot 7 inches! Nurses find this hilarious, especially as I have to slightly duck to get through the said bathroom door. You might think I am exaggerating, but I assure you, I am not. I have long known that extra height is the single physical trait that is somehow public property. Anyone can, and will, ask how tall I am. It is a daily experience for me, and people don’t hesitate for a moment to add their funny little jokes as well. Overwhelmingly popular is the inane, “your mum should have put a brick on your head” (If I had a brick right now I’d….). Can you imagine saying to a stranger, with feigned shock, “Crikey! How much do you weigh?” or “My word, you’re a little short-stack aren’t you!” Let alone laughing at the shape of someone’s head or the hook of their nose.

I suspect these moments in the ward are cathartic. Welcome flashes of comic relief from the serious, life and death business with which we are all engaged. From room to room, just a brick wall away, people’s lives are being saved and lost. There is drama everywhere; celebration and grief are inches apart.

In hospital our lives are on display to one another in physical and emotional detail that is governed by a new code of modesty, one with very different boundaries. From the moment of your admission you become public property. You surrender so much to so many. In this charged atmosphere life takes on an enhanced clarity, both the glee and the gloom are crisp. I find myself laughing at the antics all around; laughing with staff, laughing at myself; and then crying, quite literally, as I recite (or re-type!) my medical history one more time for one more therapist or one more doctor. Crying too in waves of apprehension as I wonder: will they believe me? O will they consign my problems once again to the too-easy bin of unexplained psychological hogwash.

In a way I like the season of being ‘public property’. I will be glad when it’s over, when I can return to the privacy of Paradise with my Favourite Wife and my family. But I can’t deny enjoying the honesty that is demanded here, the bracing truths that have to be faced, and the opportunity to live in the gaze of others that being ‘public property’ affords. These things are anathema in the insular individualism of our modern world, but I think we are more deeply tied to each other than we care to admit. In merriment as much as in misery, we are together. To borrow a Christian phrase, “and every one members one of another”.

Rejoice!
 
Roderick, I didnt know you were in hospital. Loved your prose, but I do hope you are Ok and that someone finally works out the mystery. puts the jigsaw together.

I do hope you washed those socks before you put them on :)
aly
 
:razz:Good writing.
The tallest man I met was assigned to a submarine! Seriously.:shock:
 
I hope you're doing as well as can be, Roderick. Thanks for all your very truthful and entertaining posts. You write so well! Take care....
 
Roderick, I trust your week ended well...by being home again if nothing more novel. And as Aly said, I hope the mystery is solved! KBO!
 
Roderick,

I just smiled and smiled as I read your post. In my case, all my life my best friend was a dwarf. He passed away
several years ago. My early childhood years were filled with experience like yours only small.
He was year older than me, but was held back in school..
He was a very close neighbor, lived right in back of my home. His parents were millioinairs. I always told him, he
could have been a poor dwarf, and we would laugh. I shot him with a bb gun once on accident, he swears I tried to
take him out.
One of the funniest things we used to kid him about was him having to ride the elevator to the fifth floor and
taking the stairs the rest of the way, because he couldn't hit the 6th floor button. Basketball and baseball were
quite the trip, boy scouts on and on it went. His parents told me through the summer that Teddy could go play
when the yard was mowed. He couldn't mow the yard and they knew it. So, I would get it done so we both could
go play. It didn't dawn on me at the time, they were using me... :)
Yes, you made me think of him. Your experience must also at times be funny, especially with friends.

God Bless you brother,

Jim
 
Rod, your post made me laugh! I remember when i was having our kids thinking that if simeone had on scrubs they felt entitled to look up my horrid hospital gown!
 
Roderick, I trust your week ended well...by being home again if nothing more novel. And as Aly said, I hope the mystery is solved! KBO!

My week is ending a little frustratingly, yet again! I'm discharging from hospital tomorrow; but none the wiser. I only saw the neurologists twice because I was here for a respitatory assesment. The head Neuro said he didn't think it was MND, and he seemed quite confident about that, but he didn't say what he thought it was either!

I have another admission coming up, at another hospital, so perhaps there will be some more light there.
 
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