I am, as you would say, "accident prone". That's French for "not at all graceful or coordinated". I will begin by saying - this is a long story. But then, stories usually are.
PART 1 : FAIRY WINGS AND LAYING ON THE GROUND
Sometimes at work, we do parties. I don't usually brag, but it's straight up a big deal. And you can write that down.
Anyway, the parties we do are for kids. (Or adults who really like to color and walk in single file lines, I guess. I'm not there to judge. I do judge, but that's not why I'm there. I'm an educator.) Essentially, for a reasonable amount of money, I stand around and yell about educational things, hand out crayons and people take pictures of their kids next to me and the animal du jour. Sounds safe doesn't it?
But alas.
A while back, some little girl dressed in sparkly fairy wings tripped me with what I will assume was evil malice.
I was walking quickly, picking up supplies, minding my own business, carrying armfuls of random decorative crap. Fairy Wings ran around in circles as children often do and I pivoted to avoid crushing her like a bedazzled bug.
We were running 20 minutes or so behind so I was probably not paying a great deal of attention to the ground. (Hey, it's usually there and most of the time it seems sturdy enough.) Evil Fairy Child had apparently dropped some cake on the ground which I ever so gracefully stepped in. That's real nice.
I definitely remember that as I was falling, I was thinking; "Ughh. This is going to be so embarrassing." I was right.
I fell face first, landed on my right arm, felt a disgusting crack, rolled to my back and laid in the dirt, contemplating my next move. Of course the usual crowd of people ran over pretending to care if I'm dead or whatever (we all know you're just morbidly curious) and someone's mom who is a nurse was trying to 'calm me down' by carefully explaining that no bones were sticking out of my skin. I just laid there, thinking; "Aw, crap, I hate my life" - but with obscenities.
At that point 911 was called and I was told to stay down by the everyday heroes at the museum. ("I was like, "Yeah guys, I'm just gonna chill here in the dirt.") Somewhere between everyone becoming overcome with glee by the commotion and everyone wanting to see my arm as it doubled in size, I thought maybe I should alert someone to my condition. I figured, if I'm going to die, I have to tell someone who gets all my stuff. So as I laid on the ground and my supervisors ran around with ice packs and clipboards, someone called my sister over (she was working on the other end of museum grounds) and EVERY PERSON in a four mile radius stared at me like I'm RAPTOR FREAKING JESUS, I called Boyfriend.
The phone call went like this:
ME: "Hi. What are you doing?"
BF: "I'm kinda in the library. What's up"
ME: "I fell and broke my arm. I'm actually laying on the ground right now. I just figured I should tell someone."
BF: "OMG. Are you okay? You should call 911. Did you call 911? CALL 911."
ME: "They did. I'm cool, not moving or anything. Just thought I should tell someone. I'm gonna lay here and wait for the EMTs. Love you."
BF: "SOMEONE CALLED 911, RIGHT?"
ME: "Okay. I'll call you later. Bye."
BF: "CALL ME RIGHT BACK."
I totally didn't.
Forever and a half later, the EMTs arrived after the least urgent ride to an emergency ever and proceeded to tape my arm to a board and drag/carry me into the ambulance. My sister was invited to join us in the ambulance and, delighted at the prospect of shiny emergency transportation, she did. Once inside, one EMT tried to use flat out trickery to stick my arm with a needle for medication while the other EMT told me about his St. Patrick's Day experiences with little people. (Dwarves, not children.) I saw pictures on his phone and everything.
After an absurd number of unsuccessful needle stabbings and lots of yelling, my internal monologue turned to questioning the education and experience of my emergency medical team. As we had been sitting in an ambulance in the middle of museum grounds for a while, they gave up on me and my horrible pain and asked me which hospital I wanted to go to.
My brain clicked on. Random trivia fact: my mom had recently told me that one of the hospitals in town kills all their patients and the other one kills far fewer. In my daze of frustration and arm related agony, I vehemently told them the hospital that kills the most patients. Hindsight is 20/20. I get that.
It took 40 minutes to get to the hospital as we had to sit in traffic. My thought is this: I feel like if I’m in an ambulance, we should need to go fast. But we dutifully stopped at every light. As if it was too late to save me or something.
PART 2 : “WE USE CRASH CARTS FOR EVERYONE. DON’T WORRY.”
Upon arrival at the hospital, I was ID bracelet banded incorrectly (my FIVE LETTER LAST NAME is "HARD TO SPELL") and was told to wait quietly while they fixed my ID band/admissions girls talked about what they were eating for lunch. My sister stood next to me looking interested. Still no pain medication.
Once banded with my correctly spelled name, I was handed off to about 11 nurses who put me in a tiny room with curtain dividers and gave me some pretty white pills. I sat there for a while, listening to the incessant talking of an elderly gentleman on the other side of the curtain who had no medical need to speak to me while I was dying of arm pain. After an additional 45 minutes, I was wheeled in my hospital bed down the hall for x-rays.
In x-ray, you are asked to bend and move so the technicians can get the best possible image. I find this incredibly ironic because if I could have, I don't think I would have needed an x-ray. I cried like a baby - partly due to agonizing pain and in part because I wanted the x-ray techs to feel guilty for touching my injured appendage. (I pride myself on my maturity.) All four x-ray technicians made scary noises in reference to my x-rays and wouldn’t show me anything. My sister, who had been dutifully tagging along, tried to act out my injury.
I was wheeled back to my little room. There, with the world’s most talkative old man, I was informed by a doctor with a creepy ponytail that I dislocated and broken my elbow. (WHO DOES THAT?)
At that point the drugs had started kicking in and I was just kinda…hanging out. My sister had called a friend to come pick us up as neither of us had our cars, and the two of them sat in the corner watching with morbid amusement.
Doctor Ponytail started talking to me about how hard it is to break what I had broken and how impressive my injury was. As if I gave a crap – then turned and asked a nurse to bring in a crash cart. (He should never have said that in front of me. I’ve seen Grey’s Anatomy. I know what that is.) I made the "I'm about to freak out" face. He looked at me and told me “We use these for everyone. Don’t worry.” I don’t know if it was the ponytail or the Percocet, but it was very hard to take him seriously.
I resisted futilely and watched with abject horror as nurses violated my personal space to stick heart monitor stickers to my chest under my museum t-shirt and the finally successful IV was connected to an ominous bag of fluid. I was knocked out (I'd say about 92% without my consent) and they re-located my elbow. This procedure felt like an unwanted roller coaster through pink, sparkly marshmallow fluff.
Apparently, during this procedure, I said unflattering things about my caretakers. Not surprising, given the circumstances, but I'm usually more passive-aggressive. When I woke up, my sister was scowling so it must have been pretty good.
PART 3: "...HELP ME....? (NEVERMIND, I'LL JUST LAY HERE AND DIE.)
Once awake, I was largely ignored by doctors, nurses and my sister - who, I believe, was knitting in the corner. (Literally knitting.) After a few minutes of laying very still, blinking quite a lot, I started feeling sick. I tried to get the attention of a nurse.
ME: "Umm...help? Can you help me real quick? Um...Nurse? I feel like I'm going to die. Is that normal? Help please?"
UNIVERSE: Disinterested. Ignore.
I halfheartedly and very awkwardly tried to curl up in a ball (minus the right side of my body) as my heart monitor started freaking out.
Within about 8 seconds all 11 nurses paid attention to me. I was given more IV fluid and an impromptu nap.
PART 4: THE SPACE TIME CONTINUUM WHEN YOU'RE HIGH ON DRUGS
After eight hours of solid ER time, I was released with several pill bottles and absolutely none of my dignity intact. A group of very nice nurses wrapped up my arm in a temporary fiberglass cast and about a hundred ace bandages and I was told NOT to move my arm until I saw the orthopedic surgeon.
I was steered out of the hospital by my sister and our friend, both of whom probably had a lot of fun at my expense. I was probably moving with all the speed of a dead three toed sloth, but for some reason I was sure I didn't want a wheelchair. I was a little disoriented by my traumatic experience and the presence of narcotics so I just picked a spot on the floor and carefully moved towards it, picked another spot and repeated. When we got to the car, my sister seat belted me in like a small child and I lolled around uselessly in the backseat, intermittently whining about bumps in the road and threatening to hurl.
Once at home, I called my parents. They were out of town and I hadn't wanted to bother them until I knew what was wrong as it would just make them freak out. Of course neither of them answered their phones. They never do in emergency situations. Maddening. I left them a quick message.
"Hi Mom/Dad. It's me...accident...I have drugs now...hospital. Call me...you can....Okay. Bye."
A few hours later, my dad called me freaking out. For some reason, he had immediately assumed that I had totaled my car. (Thanks for the confidence in my driving abilities, Dad. Let's focus on my walking abilities. That seems to be a more relevant issue.) I explained what happened and then my sister took the phone and explained what happened in sober-speak.
My parents decided I needed to stay with them because 1) I have stairs in my place and I could fall and die, 2) my dad could take me to all of my doctor's appointments as it would not be advisable for me to drive and 3) the universe hates me and wants me to suffer.
PART 5: RESIDUALS
Reverting to big-girl status: After a 6 week absence from my life, I went back to work. Due to drugs and range of motion issues, my dad drove me to work and everywhere else until recently. (Yes. My coworkers saw me getting picked up by my parents. This is a whole new level of FML.) As of his graduation from school and subsequent move back to the sunshine state, this duty was passed on to Boyfriend. I moved back into my own place after an excruciating 2.5 months of guilt trips, nagging and being carted around by my father like a small child while heavily medicated and dressed in horribly mismatched pajamas. (He felt that we needed to go visit my job, his job, run miscellaneous errands and have lunch in public.)
Misshapen arm factor: Due to insurance issues through workman's comp, I was not seen by an orthopedic surgeon for several days after my little adventure. This lead to multiple short term problems including; inability to move my right arm, shower and eat/write without looking incredibly disabled, as well as long term issues including inability to straighten/bend my right arm and/or do anything remotely useful with it. I was in physical therapy 2 - 3 times a week until I couldn't take it anymore. I played with silly putty there.
I look like half a T-Rex. But a little less awesome. For obvious reasons.
Drugs: For a long time I was taking Percocet as prescribed for pain. No one mentioned it was addictive and I didn't really think that through. When I tried to stop taking it (I didn't like randomly sleeping all the time) I felt like I was going to die. I tried to Google it.
Obviously the only other people on the planet who have been addicted to Percocet are hardcore addicts. I'm talking, "I-would-trade-my-own-child-for-a-30-day-supply" addicts. If you innocently Google "Percocet withdrawal" you will only get support sites for the people your parents warned you about and intensely traumatic horror stories.
Scary shit.
I ended up decreasing my dosage over the course of a few weeks. Google be damned.
Fun medical equipment: I have two Dynasplints that force my arm to either bend or straighten. They look like robot parts and I have to wear each one for 6 - 8 hours a day, preferably while not moving. This is incredibly inconvenient.
My doctor ordered me a TENs unit as well. A TENs unit is like electroshock therapy in a cute little, portable package. It's a small gray box with controls that hooks to a belt loop and wires that attach the box to stickers that go on my arm. I can adjust the wavelength and frequency according to pain and how often my entire arm goes numb for no reason. It feels kinda like a very localized part of my arm went to sleep.
It's fun to stick the stickers to other people at random and see how they react.
In case you were wondering - my arm is still crooked. In time, I may or may not get it all the way back.
