Back to the ER

We were at the ER until 3 a.m. on Tuesday night. I woke up the next morning with a vague feeling that something had happened, a suspicion confirmed by the bling (hospital bracelet) still adorning my wrist. Following a chat with my husband, the filler-in-of-seizure-gaps, I still have only spotty first-hand recollections of our latest medical adventure, all from the hour or so before we went home. So what got me there in the first place? As Andrew informed me, he heard suspicious clunking noises from the bedroom and found me having a tonic-clonic seizure. Shortly after it ended but before I regained consciousness, another began. The same pattern repeated itself, and he called 911.

While I generally dislike the whole paramedic/ambulance deal because I find the idea embarrassing (even if I’m normally too out of it to know what’s going on, I always worry about it later), I’ll concede that things are certainly safer and move faster when you arrive at the hospital this way: indeed, we waited fifteen minutes for a bed, ten or so to see a nurse, and forty-five to see a doctor, and since there were no complications, they kept me for observation for a few hours then let me leave. (Originally the doctor [a super nice but slightly flustered resident] said that we needed to hang around until the rest of my blood work came back so that she could confirm that my AED levels were within the therapeutic range, but when we asked how long that might take, she looked into it and came back to deliver the answer: five business days. Glad we checked.)

Though I was disappointed when I had that tonic-clonic seizure over the weekend, it was easier to take than these were because I was hanging on to the belief that my hospital days were more or less over. Grateful as I am that I live with someone who loves me and knows what to know in such situations, that it didn’t end up being more serious, that we don’t need to handle massive bills, etc., now that the ordeal’s over, it’s hard not to feel like I can’t catch a break. Plus I’m kind of annoyed that I was wearing my oldest tank top and running shorts, or, as I like to refer to the wardrobe dregs that I dig out when I’ve put off doing laundry for a horribly unrespectable amount of time, “desperation clothes.” One of those scattered memories of Tuesday’s trauma is of some rather attractive nurses; talk about humiliation.