The harrowing recollection of my friend Sarah after heart surgery:
7 May 2011 (cont)
Havent got to the worst part......... the respirator was disconnected from the tube and an Ambu-bag connected instead. As the air was manually and forcefully pumped into the tube, it was like a plastic bag had been placed over my head and I was being suffocated to death. I kicked and I think I grabbed and pulled at one of the nurses several times. must have bruised her!! I was frustrated and desperate, I was crying but without sound, ( this is very frustrating because it doesnot achieve the desired goal). At that moment I realised that asking for paper would be my only way out. Onto the paper I wrote, "You are suffocating me!" I say wrote but am not sure that what I did on paper can exactly be called writing. I was very drowsy, I could barely make out the shapes of the nurses' heads. I had to think the letters of a word and place them on paper. It is undoubtful that some letters landed on top of others.
The story continues...........This situation went on for quite awhile. It got worse when my mouth was opened wider and a laryngoscope was pushed down my throat. They must have seen a great deal of 'stuff ' in the airway, because after that, a suction tube was also inserted. As one nurse pumped air into the tube, another would be suctioning. At this point, I reached out with one of my restrained hands and got hold of a drip stand which I banged again and again against the bed. I must have had a wild look in the eyes. Wonder if they thought I had gone mental from the pain. It was possible. Yet again, I asked to write something down(this was a plot to have my hand freed so I could pull out the damned thing),
"You are killing me!!!" Yes, that is what I wrote down.
In my dazed state I saw one nurse talking on the phone, after which she came and told me the doctor had said they could remove the tube. I sighed and thanked God that the ordeal was finally over. Oh, wait, these nurses were not done with me yet! In a last attempt to free me from my secretions, they pulled the ambubag vs. laryngoscope vs. suction stunts on my throat again. I do remember my legs going up into the air. My last desperate action to stay alive was to ask for pen and paper. I wrote down in very large letters,
"I can't Breathe!".
All my life I have been praying to God and still do, that I never get buried alive. That was me being buried alive, outside a coffin. Tell you what, death by suffocation must be the real deal (I mean, horrible!).
When she read the note, She said,
"I remove tube now, ok?"
I felt the tube being strapped off from the sides of my mouth and then being pulled out of my throat. I have never been more thankful to be alive, as when I exhaled my first unaided breath. I don't know how much phlegm came out with the tube, but I was told it was more than enough to drown me. The entire length of the tube must have been plugged with it.
An oxgyen mask took over the work of aiding me in breathing. Now that I could finally talk, I even got a little arrogant and refused it. Mbu, how about Oxygen prongs? They insisted on the mask, besides I was already exhausted and needed to rest, so I let it be.
There was no pethidine for me this time and the pain was coming on, fast. The doc had prescribed morphine, tramadol and some other thing. They were just not working for me. Meanwhile, lying on my back was becoming more and more painful. I started wondering why an incision that was supposed to be a lateral thoracotomy was causing me more pain in the back than on the side, so I ran my fingers over the dressing to find out why. Yes, the incision came short of the vertebral column at the back. About five ribs had been cracked and obviously my lung had featured in the operation. I started to cry at that moment, because I felt like my transition into Frankenstein 2.0 was complete.
Comments
Post a Comment