THE POWER OF THE MIND
Freda arrived the day after Lisa left. She was in to have her hip replacement replaced, which is called a revision. She had fallen down the stairs and cracked one of the components so needed new parts. She came into the hospital a couple of days early to have some tests run prior to the surgery.
The Chinese lady in the bed next to Freda was released the day she arrived, and the following day, Elizabeth, a woman in her early 70s, was admitted. Elisabeth had a small tumor on the bottom of her lung and was in for testing to determine the composition of the tumor. She had recently lost her husband and was still grieving his loss.
A man was admitted to the bed beside me and none of us in the room learned who he was. He kept the curtains drawn around his bed the entire time.
Freda was a boisterous woman, full of piss and vinegar as they say, and quickly became the Queen of the room.
Nearly every day, the fire alarm would sound. The doors to the rooms would be closed until the fire department had completed their check of the building. There was never any fire, it was always someone smoking in the bathroom setting off the alarm, and if it wasn’t someone at Mr. Sinai smoking in their bathroom, then it was someone in one of the other hospitals close by. Hearing fire alarms became a normal part of our day and that wasn’t a good thing. Not only was the fire department kept busy with false alarms in this two-block radius, but both patients and staff became complacent when the alarm would sound.
Freda was given the green light for surgery, but because she had a history of blood clots, she was scheduled to have an inferior vena cava (IVC) inserted in her femoral artery the day before her hip surgery. The IVC would ensure any blood clots that formed would be caught in the filter preventing a pulmonary embolism. Freda was very nervous about this procedure and despite assurances from her surgeon, the nurses, and her daughter that this was a routine surgery, she couldn’t calm herself down.
Freda was so wound up that her blood pressure had risen quite dramatically. The nurse sat with her for several minutes trying again to calm her fears but quickly realized it was going to take more than words to get Freda calmed down. She decided to ask the resident on the floor for a prescription for sedation so that Freda could sleep. It was granted and the nurse returned with the sedative. Freda took the sedative and fell asleep soon after.
Somewhere around 2 am, I heard Freda breathing quite heavily. I turned on my light and found Freda sitting up in her bed, her face flushed, and visibly afraid.
“Freda, are you ok?” I asked already knowing that she wasn’t.
“Oh Penny,” she said, “I’m really scared about this surgery tomorrow. I don’t want it to affect my hip surgery!”
“What do you mean?” I queried.
“I’ve waited so long to get in to get my hip fixed, I don’t want anything bad to happen that will cancel the surgery,” she explained.
“But this filter will ensure that your surgery will go ahead,” I said.
“I don’t know what they’re going to do to me,” she said.
“Oh Freda! You don’t need to be scared, it’s just like a big IV only they put it in that big artery in your leg.” I said.
“I know!” she replied, “but I’m so scared, I can’t stop thinking about it!”
“Maybe you should come and sit over here with me,” I said.
“Are you sure?”
“Of course!”
Freda got out of bed, came over, and sat in the chair beside my bed. I reached for her hand and she quickly held on. Her hands were clammy, her face was beet red, and I could feel her pulse racing. I wondered what her blood pressure was.
“Honey, honestly, please calm down. Everything will be ok. Let’s take some deep breaths together, ok?”
“Ok,” she said, and we began breathing deeply together.
“In through your nose,” I said, “and out through your mouth, slowly.”
Holding her hand, I managed to get her to slow her breath down. I kept reassuring her that everything would be ok, that this procedure is done all the time and is no big deal. After about an hour, she was calm enough that she thought she could go back to sleep. She thanked me for staying up with her and went back to bed. A few hours later the porter came in to get her. Once again I reassured her that everything would be ok.
“I’ll see you in an hour or so,” I said.
“Ok!” she replied, and they were on their way.
A few hours later, Freda’s daughter arrived in the room.
“Where’s mom?” she asked.
“She’s gone to radiology to have her filter put in,” I said.
“Wasn’t she supposed to go first thing?”
“Yeah. She should be back any time now.” I said.
The whole time I’m saying those words to Freda’s daughter, I’m thinking the exact opposite. I strongly suspected that something had gone drastically wrong because Freda should have been back in the room long ago. An hour later, the nurse came into the room to gather Freda’s things and take them up to ICU. She had worried herself into a cardiovascular event during her IVC procedure and ended up in ICU.
Elizabeth was also thinking herself into a similar situation. Her grief for the loss of her husband was full-on depression. She was barely eating or drinking and had convinced herself that the small tumor, no bigger than a loonie, was going to kill her. Her thoracic specialist had told her over and over that the tumor was not going to take her life but the truth was, Elizabeth was so depressed, she wanted to die.
Every mealtime I would nag her until I watched her drink and have something to eat. Elizabeth would chuckle at me and tell me I needn’t worry, but I knew she needed to hear that someone cared about her. I could see that she was failing. She was basically starving herself to death.
The following day, Elizabeth asked if she could be baptized. We all knew what that meant. Our RN asked for a psych eval and several hours later, a doctor came into the room to speak with her. They warned her that if she didn’t start eating, they would feed her by tube, so she picked at her food but continued to fail. The surprising thing to me though, was they agreed to let her be baptized. In my mind, I felt they had given up on her, and even though she wanted me to come to the baptism, I refused. Several nurses tried talking me into supporting Elizabeth, but I was adamant. I was not going to contribute to something that would absolutely allow her to give up. The psychiatrist even came over to try to convince me how important it was to Elizabeth that I attend her baptism. I looked him in the eye and asked him why he would arrange it knowing full well that it was because she wanted to die. He told me his hope was that the ceremony might give her hope. Again, I looked him in the eye and told him he was a liar. I said that the ceremony would give her resolve – not hope. He smiled at me and then asked me to carefully consider my decision. I agreed that I would.
Ten days had passed relatively quickly, and I was eager to get out of bed and even more eager to go outside for a cigarette. It never occurred to me to utilize the 14 days I hadn’t smoked as an opportunity to quit. I enjoyed smoking and I was looking forward to getting that wheelchair and going outside. Two nurses and the physiotherapist were in the room to get me out of bed and sitting. They had decided to have me sit for a few days before having me try hopping again.
Elizabeth’s baptism was scheduled for Friday afternoon. There was an empty private room that they would use for the ceremony and every day the nurses pleaded with me to attend. I was wheeling around pretty well by Thursday afternoon, and I had given it quite a lot of thought. Ironically, I ended up smoking with the nurses and Elizabeth’s thoracic specialist every single day that week and by talking with them, I had decided I would attend.
Friday rolled around and, in the morning, the psychiatrist that had been seeing Elizabeth all week again stopped by my bed.
“Will you attend the baptism today?” he asked.
“Yes. I’ll be there,” I said.
Elizabeth’s health had deteriorated to the point where she had to be taken to her baptism in a wheelchair.
I was the last to go into the room. The nurses had taken the time to get baptism balloons and flowers which made Elizabeth quite happy. She was really happy that I was there too and insisted I move to the front so that I could see better and be closer to her. I obliged. The entire ceremony took maybe 20 minutes. As soon as it was over, everyone congratulated Elizabeth and then returned to their duties. I took the elevator to the main floor, bought a coffee from the cart, and went outside. I wondered how long it would take before Elizabeth passed.
The following morning, I couldn’t get a response from Elizabeth and there was something really odd about the way she was lying there. The nurse insisted that she was just sleeping, but I was adamant that something was wrong and told her to try to rouse her.
Nothing.
Elizabeth had a stroke sometime during the night. Three days later she was moved into a private room, and the day after that, she died.
Thanks for taking the time to read my story. Please feel free to leave comments.