Over the next days has been nothing short of a struggle. I have ended up getting my voice. To some degree I am amused in a way by this. Kind of makes me feel like the little mermaid. Except in this fairy tale I am getting my blood sugars checked 5 or so times a day and insulin shot in my stomach after each time I'm poked. I keep getting told that I will get use to it. But spoiler alert I didn't. I still to the day will not be getting poked if I don't have to.
With every passing day I am seeing a gurney being wheeled past my door with something under a white sheet on it. I know what is under that white sheet. Knowing what just happened to me and how I just got out of it and seeing dead bodies wheeled past my door sometimes three times a day makes me so scared that I may be the next one under those sheets. What if this is some kind of hospital that experiments with their patients? And if someone tried to hurt me in any way, what can I do? I can't fight anything off. I can't even pick up the phone to call my husband or family. And even if I could do that there is no way in hell that they could do anything either.
After getting my voice I ended up shedding some tears because I want water so badly. The nurse the day prior made it sound like as soon as I did get my voice that I would be seeing the speech therapist and after I got the voice, I am told that I have to wait till the next day to see them. I told them anything I think I could pass off. The nurse tries to tell me that it is for my own good. She explains that I have not been eating or drinking anything for so long I could cause some serious damage by doing so now. So, in my eyes that is a big no for me to get any water again. When is it ever going to be time that I could get water? This has to be some kind of violation to my human rights. I tell the nurse that I use to have an eating disorder that I have had to fight just to work through and that doing things like this I fear may put me in a place that I don't want to be anymore. To some degree I am telling the truth with half of that. I did have an eating disorder that I did have to fight hard to get to where I am today. And even today I often will still skip meals all of the time. Whatever I said must have worked because I was able to see the speech therapist and they ran some swallowing tests on me. They put me on a thickened diet. They said to do that for the next week or two and we will talk after that to lift those orders.
I can honestly say that I really didn't feel that I won any kind of battle. A thickened diet sucks. It's like I am a baby again coupled with the fact that every liquid I got was ruined with the thickening crap that had to be put in it. And a little shout out to the nurses who forgot to put it in there. I know you all didn't do it on purpose, but you all made it a lot more barrable. And now that I have my voice, they want me to wear it for most of the day. After some time, it feels hard to breathe when I have it on, so I only wear it for an hour or so at a time. They have also started feeding me slop. I know that it has to be good for me and all but the looks of it reminds me of being fed some type of slop. At this point I am kind of glad that they think that I can take off that tape with my other hand because I am not pushed to eat anything. I'm not hungry anyway.
Every day I ask the nurses about my husband. Asking when is he going to be there. Asking if they spoke to him that day. I would also ask these questions not just every day I would ask every nurse I seen that day. I thought maybe one nurse may know more than the rest. I was finally told that my husband would be coming to see me the next day. The nurse that told me went and picked up a tablet and placed it on my chest. She encouraged me to talk to my husband through facetime. She said that he dropped off our tablet for me to be able to talk on facetime. This didn't make any sense to me. Not that we never had a tablet but the last one that we had our daughter broke prior to me getting sick. So, this tablet is someone else's they they think is mine. But I don't say anything. I try to turn the tablet on. I am able to get it on after some time of trying but that is about all I can do. I am starting to be able to move my arms a little now. Nothing big at all. I am able to lift my hands on my lap or my chest depending how I am positioned. But I cannot pick the device up, so I stop trying. Maybe when my husband comes, he will be able to make more sense than all of these people.
YOU ARE READING
Covid Almost Killed Me
Non-FictionI seemed to have it all. A loving husband, children, a job that I am good at, and my first home. But in a year time all of that is put through the ultimate test as covid tries to crush me and everything I have.
