Off to hospital, again

[elfs]

Hah. I wrote 1035 words today. I have no idea where I found the time to write them, but I did. Unfortunately, looking back, I think they're either too much or too little-- they don't advance the plot, they're just boring exposition that doesn't forward the plot, and the points made are made again in the story ''Apple and Serpent'' (which is currently lingering because I can't come up with an erotic subplot anywhere).

Got home with Yamaarashi-chan. Omaha was still feeling down, so I made dinner. It's amazing what you can cook when you feel like you have nothing in the house. A can of chicken bullion, a container of aborio rice: risotto! We had these really scrawny carrots, so I diced them and some celery and some scallions that had a few easily excised bad spots, and with a little saffron tossed into the bullion dinner was ready. There was some prosciutto in the fridge, but it was of questionable age and I just tossed it out; no meat in this meal. We didn't have any Parmesean cheese, but I grated some Romano from the 'fridge for a topping. The kids made it disappear.

I cleaned up in the kitchen while the kids played and Omaha continued to rest. She even tried a little of the risotto. I kowtow'd before the dishwasher packing goddess and she agreed to do that: she's never happy with the way I pack the dishwasher, and she seems to find four-dimensional spaces in which to place things.

I started the kids on their bedtime ritual, got them to brush their teeth, and Omaha read to them. About halfway through the reading her chest pains came back, bad. Bad enough she couldn't continue reading, and we called the community nurse who told us to get her to the hospital quickly.

We told shaterri that we were heading out and he was to call us if the kids got out of bet. We put them in and turned out the lights, then headed over to the ER. She was in enough obvious pain that they quickly moved her to the head of the line, gave her a room, and proceeded with the EKG, "a mix of drugs" in radioactive green that made her tongue numb enough to make it hard for her to talk, a blood draw, an X-ray.

There is nothing worse than watching a loved one going through such suffering and knowning there's nothing you can do about it. I was pacing and clenching my fist. I couldn't do anything. I ended up sitting next to her, and Omaha kept trying to reassure me that she was going to be okay, and that I should "just read my book" (I had a copy of Bujold's Cetaganda in my pocket).

Eventually, they just sent us home with some Vicodan and a pharmacy receipt for more. The doctor said there was nothing they could find: nothing funny on the EKG, none of the GI tract drugs they'd given us had the desired reaction, nothing immediately obvious on the X-ray, nothing wrong with her gall bladder or liver on the bloodwork.

The vicodan worked, naturally, well enough that Omaha was capable of getting to sleep, as did I. But it's so frustrating, not knowing what's wrong with her.

Comments

Creepy

[(Anonymous)]

Wow, that's weird... I spent my afternoon today (when I was supposed to be working, no less) taking my mother to the hospital, for the exact same reason, to get the exact same attempts at a diagnosis, with the same complete lack of a clue as to the nature of the problem, only no vicodan for her. ...if it helps any, those tests DO tend to indicate that whatever IS wrong is not likely to be life-threatening. Or so I gather.
-- Rydia (who doesn't think all of your stories require erotic subplots)