My Day

Drinking coffee in the evening is a bad idea for me. It was 4:00 this morning before I was able to unwind enough to even think about going to sleep. I was absolutely wired. And I had drank the coffee at 7:00 in the evening. It was awful.

I got up at 8:30 this morning planning to go to church, get a little work done, and then go visit mom in the hospital. After church Donny called me and asked me to come home before doing my work. When I got here he let me know that Bob, a friend of my parents, had fallen off a ladder and had to be taken to the hospital in an ambulance. He then had me call my sister-in-law, Terry, who told me not to drive all the way into town, to take a day and rest. So I went to work with the idea that afterward I'd go home and relax for the rest of the day.

The only problem with my plan was that my mom was at the hospital with Bob, and I was worried about her. I couldn't stop fretting about the fact that she might not be taking care of herself. I was finally able to talk to her and I convinced her that she needed me so that I had an excuse to go watch over her. But that meant that I was off to the hospital.

I took some food with me, since neither my mom nor Bob had eaten since breakfast. Bob was astounded when I pulled some tuna salad and a loaf of bread out of my backpack. Then came the fresh fruit, followed by some bottles of water. I also had my cross-stitching and a book with me. They both laughed about my level of preparedness for the ER, but they were grateful to get something to eat.

It turns out that Bob tore the ligament behind his knee, or something like that. He has to have surgery tomorrow to get the damage repaired. Then he'll be in the hospital for a few more days. Since they were admittiong Bob we decided that we should stay with him until he got settled in his room. The only bad thing is that he's at a different hospital than what Donny and his mom use, so I wasn't able to go check on mom while we waited.

At shift change the nurses hurried up and got Bob moved, to simplify giving report. As he was being wheeled into his room a nurse was passing by and she stopped, looked at me, and then came over and gave me a big hug. She asked if the patient was my dad, so I explained that he was just a friend of the family. She told me that she would be on until 11:00 and Bob would be one of her patients. After she walked away my mom asked me who she was and I had to admit that I didn't kbnow her name, just that she had been Donny's nurse previously. (He stayed in that hospital 1 time and decided that he likes the other one better.) My mom just laughed at the fact that every hospital that she goes to with me I wind up running into a nurse that remembers me and/or Donny.

****DISCLAIMER****
I feel the need to add that the reason that this nurse remebers us is actually a good one. (For a change.) When Donny was staying at that hospital he had a very difficult roommate. The day that Donny went home his roommate got upset at breakfast time. He threw his tray hard enough that his cup dented the floor. The nurse that I ran into tonight came in and was trying to take care of this man and he started hitting and kicking her. Now, this kind of behavior is never okay, but this lady is only a few years from retirement, so it really got to Donny. Although the nurse hollared for help, no one came in. That's when Donny got up and helped this lady get away from the patient so that he couldn't hurt her. For that reason she absolutely loves Donny, and by extension, me. She's probably the only nurse in the area that actually likes Donny, but at least one does.