These are titled “Week One” because I wrote them during the first week. -M.
Waking up from anesthesia is a lot like being drunk. You think you’re fine, everyone else knows you’re not. Time is weird. Your voice sounds far away. You kind of want to vomit, pee, and are really hungry and thirsty all at once.
When I woke up, my head was wrapped in a series of bandages. My face and throat hurt. I couldn’t open my eyes, but then they were open, and then they were closed again and I’m sure I was in control of this, but it didn’t feel that way. There was muted white light coming through the gauze.
“Do you want W?” Someone asked me.
“Sure,” I said.
“She’s asking for you,” I heard someone tell him. Maybe they didn’t really. Maybe they did it far away and I shouldn’t have heard. I don’t really know.
I think he came in. I think he sat there. I think he had his laptop out. I went in and out of consciousness.
—
Doctors came in and took off some bandages. I was awake for a while. I looked around and it hurt. They shined things in my eyes and it hurt. They pulled tape off my face–tape that had been holding the loose ends of the stitches to my cheeks. W tells me that when I move my eyes, these black threads shift behind the eyeball, disappearing into the socket. He says it’s weird.
The doctors try to come back to get me to do something. I try. Instead, I fall asleep.
“I’ll come back in an hour and a half,” Dr. C says. “Try to look at things.”
—
Someone asks me how I’m doing.
“I’m very sharp,” I tell them. “I’m bored.”
“Do you want some juice?”
“I don’t like juice. I like tang.”
“I have orange juice.”
“I don’t like orange juice.”
“I have cranberry and apple.”
“I like cranberry.”
She gives me cranberry juice. I sip at it. Someone puts a quarter of a cracker in my mouth.
“This is the fancy stuff,” someone says. “Whole wheat.”
—
Dr. C says something to try and get me going.
“I’m bored,” I say. “I’m very sharp.”
“Let’s adjust those sutures. We can get you home.”
“My body is very good at trauma,” I tell him.
“Tell me about that,” he says.
“When I had mu IUD put in…”
“Woah,” he stops me. “Woah.”
“You’re a medical professional,” I say. “I should be able to talk about a medical procedure.”
Someone else objects.
“You’re all medical professionals. You’ve asked me like twenty times today if I am on birth control or could be pregnant or when my last menstrual cycle was. I’m allowed to say I got an IUD put in if you expressly ask me if I have had sex since my last period.”
“She’s got a point,” someone says.
“My point,” I say, “is that I rode my bike that evening.”
“Not everyone is that lucky,” a woman says. “I wasn’t.”
I think I smile.
—
“You need to leave for this,” someone says to W. He does.
They pull the bandages off again and scold me for sleeping. For not looking at things. I’ve been struggling to stay awake. I know that. It’s hard. I wake up, ready to go, and then give up a few minutes later. False starts.
They put some drops in my eye and shine lights at me. They congratulate each other for how close they got the alignment. They congratulate me, as though I was doing anything during the procedure other than be unconscious. I liked that part. I don’t like the part where the forceps come close to my eye. They move the sutures. I feel a tugging. It doesn’t hurt, but it’s annoying. It’s an eyelash in my eye, except it’s a piece of string and it won’t go away.
They put more drops in my eye.
The medical student stands near me. Pre-op, he came and introduced himself. I asked him how he felt about neuro-ophthalmology, and he told me he was going to be an ophthalmologist. I wanted to make a joke about him being cute, but it felt cheesy and weird. And creepy. I didn’t ask him how old he was, but I did tell him that the average age of matriculation into medical school is 24. “I don’t know the median,” said. I explained that when I’m nervous, I tell people facts. I like facts. He told me not to worry. He told me that in 2014, there were 412 more medical school graduates than residencies available.
“Do you need more drops?” Someone asks me. I try to shake my head but I can’t.
“I’m fine,” I say.
They have me look and they shine lights. They pull at things. They tell me to keep my eyes straight. I don’t like the pressure and ask for more drops. I hate needing the drops, but I do. I need two drops of liquid to fall on my eye and numb it. It’s dry. It’s irritated. More drops.
“Over use can burn corneas,” someone explains to the medical student.
“Why are you telling him that when I can hear you?” I ask. “Now I don’t want them.”
More drops.
The medical student holds my hand as they work on the last of the sutures. Adjusting and tightening them.
“Don’t squeeze him too hard,” Dr. C says. “He’s going to be a surgeon.”
“An ophthalmologist,” I say.
“It’s fine,” the medical student says. “She’s fine. I’m fine.”
—
They put ointment on my eyes.
“It softens the stitches,” someone says to me.
My eyes hurt. My throat hurts. My head hurts. I have to pee. I really, really, really have to pee.
“I need to pee,” I say.
They tell me we’ll be ready in a minute, but they need to explain after care to me. “No,” I said. “I need to pee.”
They hand me a bag with my clothes in it and usher me to the bathroom. I come back out in my normal clothes. I put the little green hospital slipper socks into the bag I get to keep.
—
Someone explains when to use the steroid eye drops and the stitches softening ointment. I tell W to tell the receptionist to call the valet. He says we can get the car when we get down there. The nurse tells him that they’ll have it waiting for us, so I don’t have to wait.
I want to puke.
They put me in a wheel chair. I think someone is pushing it, but I try to wheel myself around. I make a hard turn into an elevator, spinning the right wheel forward and the left one backwards. I’m pretty sure I look cool.
I get into the car. It’s R and R’s car. They lent it to us. It’s red. I know it’s ours because it’s red and has a hatchback and a Mass Audubon sticker. Mostly I know it’s ours because it’s bright red.
The whole world is very bright.
W takes me home. The car is too hot. I’m tired. I fall asleep. The ride takes too long and I’m too hot and now I want to puke again. I try to open a window, but I fall asleep before I can do it.
He helps me out of the car and into the house. Or someone does. I don’t know. I think I take my shoes off at the door. I don’t know. I get to my room and lie down.
“I’m going to park the car,” W says. “Will you be okay?”
I go to sleep.
—
W is gone when I wake up and it seems like it must be later and he’s not there and I don’t like it. Opening my eyes hurts. There is too much dried biological, organismic gook on them. I force them open with my hands. I’m thirsty. I think there’s water near me or maybe I get it from the bathroom. Moving makes me want to puke. I don’t like moving.
I fall asleep.
—
W comes home. I think it’s dark. It might now be. He picked up my medical from MIT Medical. The pharmacy where it’s $10 and my insurance is on file. “I had to tell them when your birthday is,” he says. “You don’t know when my birthday is,” I say.
“Do you want a vicodin?”
“No,” I say. I fall asleep.
—
I’m sitting in the living room with my roommates. I don’t know how I got there. They’re talking and I’m talking. I think it’s Friday night. Maybe it’s not. I don’t think I eat anything. Maybe I do. Crackers? I like crackers. We don’t have any, so maybe I don’t eat anything. We use too much spice in everything we cook. I don’t like spice. I like crackers.
I have to open my eyes periodically, using my hands to pry the lids apart. Someone got gauze, which I use to brush the crust off. I use an ice pack–five minutes on, five minutes off, to reduce swelling, and ingest IB prophen every four hours. I drink water and tang. I go to sleep.
Life On M 