Hospital vs. Real Life

Hi there, lovely people!

Well, it’s been a while, guys. As some of you might have seen on my Facebook account, I had what they called “a really really bad pneumonia”.. quite a cool medical term In other words, pneumonia + F.D. = not cool… more on this later. I was in the hospital for eight days, six in the ICU and two in the regular ward, and here’s what I have to say… wow, just wow. I still can’t believe all that happened, I think it’s still sinking in. Honestly, even just processing everything enough to write this post took a long time. Warning: I’m about to sound like a therapist. My stay at the hospital was quite the journey, and I actually started off being disappointed in myself. You see, I thought that after doing so well for over two years, I had basically “fallen off the wagon” by having another crisis / hospital visit. After a ton of people telling me otherwise and doing a lot of soul searching, I realized that this is not exactly how this works. Turns out, I still am actually doing really well, because having pneumonia ain’t my fault, yo

Anyways! It was over a week of a lot of events and feelings, some good, some bad, and some even worse. There are even some life adjustments that are happening after the fact. All that being said, there may be a few more posts where this came from. The first one: what I think the main differences are between staying at the hospital and living in the real world.

Hospital vs. Real Life!

Control – I usually try my best not to use the first letter to describe that actual word, but well I thought this could be an exception type of post. Long rant short, when you’re staying at the hospital, you can forget about making any decisions. When to eat, when to sleep, where to sit… basically all your daily plans are decided by someone else. My opinion? Having practically no control over your life is super hard and even frustrating at times, BUT I do have to say that the break from adulting can actually be pretty relaxing. Confession? I even miss this from time to time. Shh, don’t tell. 

Observed – Every few hours, there is a nurse or a doctor coming in to check on you. Privacy, not really a thing at the hospital. 

Needy – Okay, so this one is a little similar to the last point I made, but bear with me When lying in that bed, you are basically dependent on your nurses, doctors, and all other professionals involved in your care. You need to pee? Call the nurse! You feeling hungry? Call the nurse! Do you want an extra blanket? Oh yes, call that nurse of yours! I have never felt that needy for that long before… yoikes! It takes some getting used to. 

Time – When you spend time in a hospital room, time does not exist. Time in the hospital just kinda flows, you always forget what time of day it is, actually you even forget what day it is. Your nurses try to remind you every morning by quizzing you on these facts, but you quickly just forget and go back to living in a timeless world.

Reassuring – One positive thing I can say about my stay at the hospital, is how safe I felt. Night or day, weird feeling, sick feeling, whatever happened, I knew there would be at least one medical professional around to help. Ah, comforting!

Ouch! – Wow, some parts of this hospital stay were painful! I am what they call “a hard poke”, AKA it’s almost impossible to take blood from me or put an IV in. I have small veins, apparently. In other words, the nurses and doctors have to always poke me over and over and over again… like I said, ouch! I actually still have multiple bruises on my arms from all the poking. This time, they even had to put in a central line.. double ouch! Okay, I’m done venting

Lozenges – I just had to add this to my list. So, second day in the ICU, I was feeling super sick and frustrated. In came my nurse Karla, with a life altering idea for me. Throat lozenges! Who knew? These little gems made me feel 100% better. I am officially still hooked on lemon / honey Cepacol lozenges! 

Long story short, it was definitely an intense eight days.

Hope ya’ll enjoyed my hospital post, I tried not to be too depressing!

Thanks for reading, as always it really means a lot! I’ve missed you guys!