Monday, December 3, 2007

Fun Monday #6

Our hostess for this week is Robinella at Robin's Nest and here is what she wants us to do:

Take a moment in this last month of 2007 to reflect on the past year. Okay? Done? Now…

In honor of exhaustion, color and self-love, I present you with this week’s assignment. I want you to dig through your blog files and show us your best effort. Why you consider it your best is up to you. C’mon, you know you have a favorite - show it to me one more time.


Okay. Will do. I have to say though that this wasn't an easy job to pick one post. Even though I've only been blogging since the end of March, I had troubles. I feel vaguely disloyal to some others that were in hot contention. But here's the one I picked, originally posted on April 23rd.



JER-RY!! JER-RY!!


I am here to tell you that the people who go on the Jerry Springer show are real. They are not actors. Just because they are throwing punches and marrying first cousins doesn’t mean this mess is scripted. Just because it all seems so over the top as to be laughable doesn’t mean it isn’t really happening. What makes me so sure of my position? Simple. Twelve hours in our ER yesterday = the Springer audience is alive and encroaching on our reality. I can only hope it’s our reality and we aren’t really living in theirs.

All of us on days started off on a high note since the snake incident had happened on night shift. Some yahoo had gotten bitten by a snake. In the middle of the night, god knows how. He came in to get his hand looked at and to make sure it wasn’t a poisonous snake. So when the ER doc asked him to describe the snake, the man reached into his bag, pulled out a MOVING pillowcase and said “hell, I don’t know what kind of snake it is. You look at it”. Seems he had caught the snake, put it into a pillowcase, whacked it against the side of his truck to stun it and come on in. That was one ticked off rat snake and one very fast moving ER doc. Poor doc is from New York City. Never even knew what hit her.

The layout of our unit is a big square with rooms and patient bays all along the perimeter. The middle of the square is a big work station where all the nurses and docs hang out and try to get something productive done. You need to try to visualize this as a playing board to fully get the impact of yesterday. Ready? Big square, rooms along the edges, work station in the middle. Let’s start our day, shall we?

Enter patient #1 who is escorted in by our fine men in blue and handcuffed to a stretcher. Massive alcohol ingestion + paranoid schizophrenia + LSD = one cop permanently placed outside of this patients door. Take your little plastic cop marker out of your game kit and place outside room. Depending on this patient’s minute by minute status occasionally move all your cop markers to his room. Every now and then a nurse with a loaded hypodermic would go into the room flanked by two cops running interference and attempt to land a sedative shot somewhere helpful. Eventually he had “improved” to the point where he paced the room incessantly, dragging the bed he was handcuffed to with him and shouting all the while.

Patient #2 also came in with a wave of blue uniforms. Blood alcohol level off the charts at ten in the morning and decided it would be a beautiful day for a bicycle ride. Maybe he ran out of supplies, who knows. Unhelmeted (of course) head + concrete curb = big old head lac bleeding everywhere and a belligerent patient who kept telling us his name was F*!$ You. Take another one of your cop markers and place outside his door.

Patients #3 and 4 came in together, also escorted by…Guess who? Some kind of family argument turned physical and this brother and sister act found themselves injured and arrested. They had to be separated, so place them at opposite corners of the square and put a little cop marker next to each of them. You aren’t running out of cop markers are you?

Patient #5 was a young, heavily tattooed woman with abdominal pain, who actually came in without a police escort. She was pretty anxious, but very cooperative. There were family members who came in later, a young man and the patient’s small baby. The baby pooped his diaper and the guy never thought to change it, so now we have the sense of smell involvement as well. Even after the guy and the baby left, the aroma lingered. Imagine that whole corner with a stink bomb marker in it.

Patient #6 was another young woman who had been sick for a month and was just miserable. She also had family with her, a young woman and that woman’s baby. The patient was very anxious about a domestic situation at home and needed to get out of the hospital as soon as possible to lock her boyfriend out of the house. I took this woman’s history. Bipolar, Anxiety Disorder, Explosive Anger Disorder. I asked what meds she was taking for these and she said none, because they don’t work. I took a big step back from the bed and kept writing. She actually was very easy to deal with, except for the fact that her whole body never stopped shaking. Her friend left the room for a minute and when she came back she was really upset about something I couldn’t follow, but it seemed to have something to do with her baby. The patient was discharged and got ready to leave, carrying on a heated conversation with her friend the entire time.

They left the room and walked down the cop lined hall toward the door. I was right behind them and it looked like they were having trouble finding the exit door, because the friend opened the door to the stink bomb room instead. I thought it was an accident until the friend started yelling at the tattooed woman, and come to find out that the friend’s baby’s father is the tattooed woman’s fiancĂ© who had been visiting with her own baby by another man. Are you following this? It came to blows as all the cops left their respective posts and rushed to break it up. Move all your cop markers at high speed to the stink bomb room. I give the tattooed woman props for throwing a great punch while hindered by an IV and a bag of fluids. On the other hand, the friend was holding her baby while she swung with the other fist, so maybe it was a fair fight. Those aren’t skills you run into every day, you know what I mean?

The day wasn’t even over yet, but you get the gist. We kept looking for the hidden cameras that would prove we were being Punked or something, but we never found them. It would have been a great day for a crime spree, since we had at least half the force with us for the better part of the day.

I’m still glad we missed the snake. They’ve never had a snake on Springer, have they?

40 comments:

Kim said...

Only in this part of the country would a grown man put a rattler in a pillowcase and bring it to his doctor.

I loved this!

Swampwitch said...

Was it a rattler or a rat snake? Geez ! Wouldn't have mattered to me. I would have skee-dattled out of there.
I can't answer your question about Snakes on Springer. I don't watch that show.
http://anecdotes.typepad.com

ped crossing said...

Truth is stranger than fiction. And never a dull moment!

I think I will stick with education. A little less drama in the elementary school.

Irene said...

What an exciting story. It would be scary to be a normal patient there with all those loonies in all those little rooms. I would want to be treated very quickly and be out of there in a hurry. I don't suppose you can refuse to treat anyone at all.

Brave men and women you all are. You must never have a dull day. I am sure you have lots of adrenalin flying around there. It's better than a talk show set. Springer or not.

Flowerpot said...

you couldn't have made that up could you?!

laurie said...

holy shit! please tell me this isn't a typical day. though if it is, i understand why you only work a few shifts a week.

wow.

Anonymous said...

That was one of my favorites too. The ER must be a different world than the rest of the hospital.

Jill said...

okay u, i got through patient number one and was laughing out loud. just thought you ought to know! HA HA HA. now back to play the rest of the game!

Jill said...

ok i emailed my hubby with the link AND posted it on my blog. SO FUNNY!

the planet of janet said...

i just sprayed my keyboard with eggnog latte... but at least it didn't come out of my nose.

this is a freakin' riot!

Jenny, the Bloggess said...

This. was. awesome.

Also, I'm pretty sure the guy with the snake in the pillowcase was my father. Of possibly a cousin.

A Slice of My Life said...

One day? This happened in one day?? Amazing. I'll never complain about my boring job again!

Susan at A Slice of Life

Kaytabug said...

Holy crap this is funny! You really couldn't make this up! Great choice!

ChrisB said...

A typical day wow!?!?

Joy T. said...

One day?? Springer doesn't have anything on this. I say bring in the cameras and make your own reality show. People would watch it all over the world!

Unknown said...

I can't believe he took the snake in with him! I would have fainted, or now I would I have ran and then fainted.

Anonymous said...

Reptile snakes no, but Springer has definitely had his fair share of the human snake variety.

http://anticsofacrazymom.typepad.com

Diana said...

Well, now, looking at Snake Bite in a logical manner, it's really not too different from bringing in one's pill bottles for identification, right? Pill bottles with explosives rigged under the caps.

Even if Springer did have a snake-in-a-bag (pissed off, I'm sure with the bashing against the side of the truck), I'm sure he didn't have the psychotic chained to a bed on the same show along with the Hatfields and McCoys. It's not just the quality but the variety that wins you and yours the prize.

Beth said...

Still laughing...because I know how calm and nonchalant the dictating doctor will be about the guy pacing and pulling his bed with him across the room.

I know you couldn't make this up. Unless they make this stuff up here in GreatLakesLand too.

Tiggerlane said...

OMG...too....freakin'....hysterical! You are making me wish my hubby still worked in the ER...I totally miss these stories!

Snakes in the ER! LOL!

Akelamalu said...

You paint a wonderful picture Correspondent, do you do the casting for Jerry Springer? You could never say ER was boring could you? LOL

Unknown said...

I'm having a hard time with the snake incident. I would've been the NYC doctor freaking out.

The Springer factor? Live it. Just walk into small town Walmarts.

Sandy said...

Abso-freakin-hilarious! and AFF is right - any small town WalMart will do although with the ER, you get cops!

Too funny!

Potty Mummy said...

RC; have you thought of submitting this one to ER for them to base an episode on?

If they're not interested there's a series called 'Green Wing' in the UK that has a slightly more surreal take on hospital life that might work better.

In any case; fabulous...

Madam Crunchypants said...

I may just have to tell the story about the week that flesh eating disease came to the surgical floor now. It's a springer episode in the making too.

willowtree said...

This is why America is the leader of the free world, it's also why America bombs the rest of the world.

Anonymous said...

Holy moly - that was some day in the ER. It blows my mind there are truly people like that (i'm thinking the tattoo lady and the other lady). Crazy.


Dreaming What Ifs...

Bren said...

Wow!! What a story!

Sauntering Soul said...

Hysterical!

This reminds me of a story my older brother tells. He used to be an Atlanta police officer and often worked on his days off doing security in an ER. A lady came in who was in labor and appeared to be going crazy from it. The ER was packed and so he decided he would try and calm her down by talking to her. He asked her what she was going to name her baby. She looked up, said "I've seen a sign from the Lord. I'm going to name my baby Nosmo King." My brother looked up and there was a No Smoking sign on the wall.

Mya said...

I love that post - don't think I caught it first time around.

One of my favourite RC posts was from quite a while back - it has really stuck with me. Remember when you wrote about not having a daughter? Having three boys? It was prompted by dealing with a young girl in the hospital. It was beautifully expressed. That was a great post.
Mya x

junebug said...

That puts a whole new meaning for me on "May the force be with you!" What a nightmare.

Stepping Over the Junk said...

I-can-not-deal-with-jerry-springer....

Jo Beaufoix said...

I loved this the first time I read it and it's just as good now. I have this image of that man trying to catch the snake. Mad.
Hey baby. I'm back. I think...

Molly said...

Oh my, that was a day. Hopefully, most days are calmer that this.

Rose said...

Yowser! And I thought middle school could be tough! You've got me beat by a mile. Thanks for sharing; love your writing.

Susan said...

Didn't even have to read this one again. I knew when I saw the instructions this would be it.

Robinella said...

Funny. My sis works at an urgent care facility and she has some stories too.

Anonymous said...

Put this stuff in you book, I tell ya. Best seller. Your writing skills and your life experiences, the way you connect with people all equal a very good book.

I think the snake would have done me in. Moving from NY to Tennessee when I was a teen, it was the huge increase in snakes that made its biggest impact. Were talking serious, poison, killer snakes. I have never, ever seen one here, in TN, I have seen 100's, no lie. YUCK-O. They freak me out.

pursegirl said...

Right when I had finally gotten that snake out of the bag vision out of my head. This is a VERY good one. And kudos to the non-issue English report, working appliances,and a lovely fire.

Kerith Collins said...

that is so funny...but i hate snakes...but i would watch your ER funnies over Springer any day.
kerith
http://momdumchronicles.blogspot.com