anaesthetic

2 general anaesthetics in the space of 48hrs fucks you up.

An obvious statement I know, but to actually experience the crazy things that rattle around in your brain while "spaced off one's pickle" can be both beautiful and harrowing.

If you've been fortunate enough to avoid this experience, here's a run down of what happens:

1. Your head swims, your balance is stuffed, you can fall over or faint anytime.


2. When someone is talking to you, you are awake. If they stop for more than 20 sec onds you're out like a light.


3. Images flash in your mind like a flick book. They might be your memories but none of them felt like they belonged to me - it was like being inside someone elses head.


4. You can't form a sentence without extreme effort. (I asked for a pen and paper as writing was easier than trying to talk)


5. You are irritable and get angry very quickly for no real reason - though it could be the frustration of not being able to communicate accurately.


6. All the noise of the hospital clatters around your head like metal cutlery in a tumble dryer, you need someone to hold you and some way of spiritually being somewhere else - the iPod is the greatest escape.


7. No real rest as your blood pressure, temperature, pulse and pain levels are checked every hour.


8. Peristaltic action halts, digestion slows and for days after your operation the muscles that control your bodily functions don't remember their purpose. i.e. You've forgotten how to urinate and defeacate

Coming out of the first anaesthetic was the worst. Nausea sat like a lead block just below my sternum - strangely I visualised it as black and rectangular shaped.

Though you are in the recovery room, people think you are asleep so talk about the most inappropriate things over you - about other patients, their dislike of the doctors etc.

(hospitals are a war zone where everyone seems to hate everyone else - admin staff hate nurses, nurses hate consultants, consultants hate surgeons, orderlies hate everyone. Its all paperwork and politics. Not very pleasant, really.)

I was returned to the ward and I lay for a while enduring the above listed afflictions. Because the surgery, I was required to fast from 11pm the night before. It was now 5pm. Tracey arrived and shortly after so did dinner. Both extremely welcome.

Hospital dinner for post-ops was eggs (scrambled), potato (mashed) and kumara (pulped). Tracey fed me small forkfulls. My tastebuds sang and my stomach gave thanks. The eggs were best thing I've ever tasted. I was ravenous but was berated by a particularly spiky male nurse, "No, no, you shouldn't be eating so soon. Don't eat any more." My dear, what delightful bedside manner you have. What compassion, what tenderness. Now get f*cked I'm eating.

The next day I was visited by the consultant. When his opening sentence was "You're going to think I'm an idiot...", I knew something was wrong.

Turns out the surgeon doing my operation was Canadian and they do things a little differently in Canada (and by different I mean not to the Kiwi consultant's standard) so the consultant is sitting in front of me and no matter which words he chooses to describe the issue, he's basically saying: we fucked up big time and we have to do your operation all over again.

At first I'm shocked and later I'm furious. I'm baffled because they must operate on 50 broken arms a week, so why has this difference in international working practices only just come to light? Isn't the consultant responsible for thoroughly checking the surgical credentials (and standards) of his team. Is this really the first time this has happened?

So the risks of infection, nerve damage, reaction to the anaesthetic etc are now multipled. I feel awful and Tracey is even more concerned about me returning to surgery. But to heal properly I have no real choice but to agree to this repeat procedure.

Surgery is scheduled for the following day. I'm so angry I feel like writing "get it right this time" on my arm in black marker.

I'll be making an official complaint.