Okay, so, if you're new here, you should read
Tuesday's blog post first. That post covers, in detail, the incident of my crash on my bike, which turned out to be much more serious than I thought at first. Given how stunned, winded and traumatized I was in the moment, I probably should have just told those guys who immediately came to my aid to call 911. Instead, I called my doctor's office, then went to Urgent care, and
then went to the ER at Virginia Mason Medical Center. That was basically where that blog post left off, having had a CT scan at Virginia Mason but not yet having gotten the results.
Well, the results were the indicator that it was serious: I had internal bleeding of both the liver and the spleen. This meant I would need to be transferred over to Harborview Medical Center, which I later learned is not only the only trauma center in the State of Washington, but is a
regional trauma center serving five states: Washington, Alaska, Idaho, Montana, and even Wyoming! I later spoke at length with a nurse in the Harborview ER and she told me they see a lot of wild cases particularly from Alaska, largely because of both wildlife and guns.
I don't think it was long after they brought me back in the Virginia Mason ER, and thus not long after I nearly passed out, that Shobhit asked if I wanted him to take my picture. Of course I did! Even though I looked like shit. Laney later wrote
on Bluesky that "I'm not sure I've ever seen your face look so unhappy. I'm so sorry this happened and I hope they are taking really good care of you!"
It was a while after they told us I would need to be transferred to Harborview, that they actually did so. Shobhit was hungry and asked if it was okay if he went down to the cafeteria to look for something to eat, even though I was not allowed to eat (something that wound up lasting a solid 24 hours, but starting at 3:00 when I got my first CT scan at Virginia Mason, even though I had actually not eaten anything since my bowl of cereal at 5:45 that morning). Jonathan, the cool gay nurse with the sparkling nail polish, immediately went to asking to make sure I was okay with Shobhit eating in front of me when I could not eat. I said it was totally fine. I ate in front of him when he was in the hospital with his heart scare
back in March, after all; fair is far.
Anyway, I took the above picture while we were waiting for the transfer to happen, and Shobhit was down in the cafeteria. It struck me as rather amusing: what a great time to be told that "Animals are starving!"
I took this photo inside the ambulance that transferred me from Virginia Mason to Harborview at 4:21 on Tuesday, so that gives you an idea of when the transfer happened. Having the two AMR guys transfer me from the ER bed to their gurney was not the most comfortable in the world, especially as I went ahead and scooted myself from one to the other. (This turned out to be far from the most painful experience of the day; I'll get to
that later.) Shobhit was going to walk over to Harborview at first, as it's only 8 blocks from Virginia Mason—I didn't even do anything with Swedish Medical Center; there's a reason Seattle's First Hill has been long nicknamed "Pill Hill"—but in the end he wound up riding in the back of the ambulance with me and the younger, cuter AMR guy.
When we walked into the ER at Harborview Medical Center, I was truly struck by the difference from the Virginia Mason ER, which felt like a sleepaway camp by comparison. I had never been anywhere so actually like HBO's
The Pitt; I even asked a nurse later, "How often do people bring up
The Pitt when they come in here?" She said, "A lot." She then went on to talk about how real the show is, except that here they actually have effective teamwork.
One of the AMR guys related a bunch of my information to a check-in woman at the Harborview ER, where I had time to read these posters hanging in front of the desk she was at, asking questions like, "Are the front limbs of a dog arms or legs?" with hash marks under each answer to count which was more popular. My favorite was, "Would you rather be able to teleport or read minds?" Just as I was finally being pushed further back into the ER, I called back, "Mark me down for teleport!"
Here they actually had several people grab parts of the sheet I was on and pick me up to set me back down on the ER hospital bed, a much easier transition. What I was struck most by here was no fewer than
ten people, I
think most of them doctors (??), standing around my bed, anticipatory expressions on their faces. I looked around and said, "Is this a party?" One guy just replied, "Yeah it's a party." It turns out Harborview is also a teaching hospital, again just like
The Pitt. At one point one doctor was talking to another while they both looked at something on a monitor above my head to the right, and the one who must have held a more senior position pointed at it and said, "See, that's blood."
Over the next short while, I saw so many different doctors and nurses, it was truly nuts. I took to saying to each new doctor, "What are you, doctor number seven?" I think I stopped at, "I think you're doctor number ten." But there were more after that. I didn't count the nurses. One of the things Danielle often comments on is how doctors outnumber the nurses on
The Pitt and how unrealistic that is. Well, even though I also saw several nurses yesteday—including a very cool woman with a Southern accent who I talked about her job and work history for a good while—in my experience yesterday, the doctors actually did outnumber the nurses.
After a while, I was finally taken for my CT scan—another one. I guess Harborview wanted one of their own. This one was a lot more involved; I had been told at Virginia Mason that the contrast dye injection would make me feel warm all over, almost like I had just peed, but I never felt such a sensation there. It was a different story at Harborview. I can't say I felt like I had just peed exactly, but I knew what they meant. Oddly, the sensation I remember most was how my asshole had never felt so warm and cozy.
Anyway, I'm getting a bit ahead of myself. I was texting several people separately for much of the day already, including Gabby. I had already gotten a message from her, while we were still exchanging messages on Teams (using the app on my phone), that "I have a friend who works at Harborview. I'm going to let him know you're coming, if that's OK with you. He can keep an eye out for you." She then told me to log off Teams and said she would check up on me later over regular text.
The friend's name was Glenn, and either it was a coincidence that he played such a pivotal role in my Harborview CT scan, or he went out of his way to come take care of me for this part of my day's journey. He introduced himself to me when he came up to the side of my bed, said he was a friend of Gabby's, and that she had told him I was there. He said he was taking me to get my CT scan.
It's a good thing I don't make triggering associations with traumatic experiences, because otherwise Glenn would be fucked (in my mind, at least). He and another guy who came in to assist, after I was wheeled in my bed down to the CT scan room—where I looked at the lights passing overhead and said, "I feel like I'm in a movie"—transferred me from my bed to a hard, flat slab, which was then transferred over to the bench used for the scanner. Just lying on that flat slab alone was incredibly painful, creating random pangs of pain across my abdomen, sides, and back. On top of this, I had to basically hug a kind of half-cylinder pillow-like thing placed on my chest and belly, and hold my arms still like that, which only made the pain worse. It was horrible, and a recorded voice would say, "Breathe in. Hold breath." And I would hold my breath while I was mechanically slid through the arc of the scanner, until after maybe ten seconds it would say, "Breathe."
I must have been passed back and forth through that thing four times. Halfway through, Glenn came to pick up my phone, which was still on the sheet next to my hip. I don't know if that compromised the first two passes through or if I'd have passed through regardless. Anyway, it was a massive relief just to be picked up and placed back onto the hospital bed.
I felt better enough during the bed ride back to the ER room, though, that I took out my phone and took a six-second video of the lights passing overhead, just so I could text it to a few different people and add,
It's like I'm in the movies! I have no idea whether Glenn clocked what I was doing; it's not like I was being discreet, so he must have. Gabby was one of the people I texted the video to, and with her I added,
(I took this while Glenn was pushing me in my bed back to my room after the 2nd CT scan, I wonder if he’ll tell you about it lol. I sent to Gabriel and he said I was psycho haha). Gabby just replied,
Awwww 🥹 so glad Glenn has you! He’s a great guy. I also told her Glenn had told Shobhit and me how they became friends by bonding over their respective dogs of the same breed. I want to say Boston Terrier.
By the way, Gabriel's
full response to the video was:
You are a legitimate psycho. Akin to the person who films an avalanche coming toward them. I’m hoping this is a chill trip to a different room. Not any sort of emergency. I replied,
No no, that was on the way back from the CT scan. Totally chill. And he just replied,
Geez.
The funnier part though was Gabriel
and Alexia's independent responses to this video, because Alexia literally replied:
You are a psycho. I thought:
How the fuck is she seeing Gabriel's texts? This coincidence was either hilarious or creepy.
Okay, now let's talk about the neck brace. During one of my countless exams from countless doctors, I mentioned some new, minor pain behind my shoulders near my neck. This instantly triggered a very specific concern, and this doctor, a blonde woman if I recall correctly, said to put a neck brace on me.
I'm not sure how long I had it on, 45 minutes maybe? Then I was "cleared" once they were sure I did not have any neck injury. The timing of this clearance coincided with my really needing to pee. I was given a jug to pee in, but I am way too pee shy and there was far too much going on in that room for me to be able to go. Shobhit tried to come up with ways to help, like having me count backwards or whatever, but none of that made a difference. I thought maybe I could go if I stood up, so I carefully got out of the bed, and incidentally the pain significantly lessened when I was standing, but that didn't work either. Shobhit tried to get the attention of a nurse to see if I could be taken to an actual bathroom, but they were all busy with other patients at the moment.
A nurse happened to see that the bed was empty and was immediately concerned. She pulled back the curtain, saw me standing, and said, "You shouldn't be out of bed!" Apparently the concern was that I could wind up paralyzed, if I had a neck injury and I just got up out of bed—they needed the neck to be held still. At one point Laney texted me that I should be able to use a private bathroom if that's what I really need, but I had not provided this full context.
But, literally while this conversation was happening, one of the doctors came in and said I was cleared to move. The neck brace was taken off, and I was escorted to a private bathroom down the hall. I took the longest time trying to find the toilet paper in there, and found a wrapped roll in a sort of inset-shelf in the wall over on the other side of the sink. What the fuck? I opened that and used some of that toilet paper, then had to open the door to ask if all the things stuck to my fingers could be removed so I could wash my hands. It was when I finished washing my hands that I finally found the toilet paper by the toilet: it was also in a hole in the wall, rounded so the roll could fit in on its side, hole facing out. No wonder I couldn't find it; who would ever be looking for
that? Who the hell designed this place?
Anyway! Back to the neck brace. Shobhit became weirdly obsessed with it. He
really wanted to keep it. I thought he was being weird and ridiculous, but he wouldn't let it go. I honestly think that in his mind it might come in handy if either of us hurts our neck sometime, but the thing is, if we ever have that serious a neck injury then we'd be talking to a doctor already anyway. But the nurse who was there at the time as just like, "We're not going to use it again. You can have it!" I mentioned this later to Laney over text and she noted that it may come in handy one day if Shobhit gets cast in a part where he has to lay in a hospital bed. I suppose that's a fair point.
As for being pee shy, I had the same problem Tuesday night when I woke up in the middle of the night needing to pee, but by then I had been transferred to the ICU on the 9th floor and they were
very strict about "bed rest" for 24 hours: no getting up at all! I was given the pee jug and no other options. On the upside, I managed it far more easily than I expected, I think because it was quiet, it was dark, and no one was near me even on the other side of my curtains like down in the ER. In the end I think I used the pee jug four different times.
I had Shobhit take this photo of me in the bed I was in at the Harborview ER. After the shot he took at Virginia Mason, I decided I wanted a photo of me in every bed I used. This is important stuff! Anyway, I took a
photo of my Harborview wrist band at 7:19 p.m. Tuesday. It's got a series of small QR codes on it, apparently all the same; plus a more normal looking bar code on it. The nurse scans the wrist before scanning meds or whatever before they administer them. Yesterday I asked for more detailed explanation and now I can't remember what the difference was, except that the little QR codes are all the same and the bar code is for something different, a totally different scanner used for some purpose that hasn't been used for me while I've been here actually. The above photo Shobhit took of me in the ER bed was at 10:10 p.m. Tuesday.
When it was time to move me from the ER to the ICU on the 9th (top!) floor, where I stayed to be monitored just in case my stable condition changed and the need for surgery arose, I was pushed in that bed down hallways to a skybridge to a different building, and then up an elevator to the 9th floor.
It was here that the most excruciatingly painful thing happened. In retrospect, I should have asked if they could bring in more staff to pick me up in a sheet and drop me down onto the ICU bed like I had been transferred in the ER; I keep thinking about whether I should mentio this if I ever get a request to fill out a survey about my experience here. Should the onus be on me to think of this? Now, it was probably around 10:30 when the move upstairs happened, so probably they had a lot fewer staff around than earlier in the day. I don't know. I just know that these three women did not seem that concerned about the clearly significant amount of pain I was in, and they asked me to
scoot myself from one bed to the other.
I can't even describe how painful this was. The scoot I did for the CT scan was a similar deal, but my pain had gotten a lot worse by the end of the day, especially if I moved my body in certain ways—and, by the way, in ways that had been significantly exacerbated by the CT scan experience itself. I had been asked more than once to rate my pain on a scale of 1 to 10, and I typically would say that my resting pain was at about a 2 or 3, but if I moved it would shoot up to a 7. Well, during this bed transfer the pain was 9.5
at best, easily worse than the bike crash itself, which at least had the advantage of shock and adrenaline. Honestly, it's giving me anxiety just remembering the experience as I write this. I tried to lay still after I scooted onto the new bed, but these intense pangs of sharp pain shot sort of out of my sides, several times. I kind of yelped with each one. The three nurses were patient, I guess, and one noted that they would give me pain medication soon.
But first? They had to do some protocol having to do with preventing bed sores for the duration of my stay. This involved putting a long, foamy sticker along my spine, and even taking photos of the entire back side of my body—including pulling the back of my underwear down to take photos of my bare ass. All this, I was told. so they could make sure I looked the same when I was discharged. The thing is, they had to roll me on my side to do all this. And it was fucking painful! Nowhere near as painful as the scoot itself, but it certainly felt like adding insult to injury after that. It was a while before I could even remotely relax after all that shit.
I keep thinking about
this wipe board mounted on the wall of my room, which no one has used. It has several headers on it, including
We Care About Your Pain. Do you though? To be fair, most people really did; I was asked many times to rate my pain. Just not by any of those three nurses who had me scoot onto the ICU bed. Hell, maybe they weren't even nurses? I wonder if Danielle would know.
By the morning, I started to get mixed messages. I had been told that I would likely not be able to eat until a repeat CT scan at around 3:00 on Wednesday (yesterday). Now, I had already been warned that I would get woken up multiple times through the night for regular abdominal exams to see how I was doing. One doctor did this deep in the middle of the night; this was a different time I was woken up from when I woke up needing to pee. Otherwise, though, I slept surprisingly well that night, and would have slept even later than about 7:45 yesterday morning, except yet another doctor woke me up for an abdominal exam. Curiously, yet
another new doctor (all three of these doctors were women) examed me too, all of about five minutes after the one who woke me up! This one was blonde, I'm not sure if she was the same blonde as before. Probably not. Anyway, I was actually doing much better then; the pain had subsided and the blood labs were looking good. This doctor told me I'd probably be able to eat solid food for lunch! Hallelujah!
But, then that changed. Some blood work number came back lower than desired, and so they extended my "Clear Liquid Diet" through lunch. This itself was a change, at least; up until then, they wouldn't even let me drink water, as even that would be a hindrance to any sudden need for surgery. All they gave me up until this point was a tiny sponge on the end of a small stick that I could suck on after soaking it in a shallow cup of water. Come to think of it, I really should have taken a photo of one of those tiny-sponge lollipops, but I never did.
I was given this menu, though, and could only order from
the top section. The nurse had already brought me some black tea, some apple juice, and two packets of vegetable broth, which I ignored at first, thinkig I would get solid food for lunch. But, no such luck. They wouldn't even give me cream to put in my black tea because that's not "clear liquid." (But somehow black tea
is?) I was not super keen to drink straight black tea as it's not my preference, but as it turned out, after a solid 24 hours of no food or water, that black tea tasted more delicious than I thought black tea ever could.
I should also mention the phone calls I've had with my parents. The first one was when I called Dad's cell from Virginia Mason's ER Tuesday afternoon and Sherri answered; I started the conversation by saying, "I'm stable but I'm in the hospital." She said, "Well I'm glad you started with 'I'm stable!'" She indicated she had just read
my blog post from Tuesday afternoon, but she had yet to say anything about any of it to Dad, so she handed the phone to him. I filled him in up to that point, but Dad called me again yesterday morning at 9:47 and we spoke for 24 minutes.
I had been sending text updates to a bunch of different people, but Dad said during that phone call, "I wanted to hear how you sounded, not just in text." He noted that I sounded like I had kind of a dry throat, but otherwise I was okay. By this point I was doing much better anyway.
As for the texts, at first, after talking with Dad on the phone, I wrote up one update to send separately to Danielle, Gabriel, Barbara, Laney, and Alexia because we'd had movie plans Tuesday evening that clearly had to be canceled (I totally intended to cancel the booked seats too, which included $7.86 Alexia had already Venmoed me for her Tuesday-discount ticket price, but the whole excruciating-pain thing distracted me). Further updates were texted to all of them; to Gabby; and to an immediate-family group text consisting of Dad, Sherri, Angel, Gina, and Christopher. Dad had asked on Tuesday at 3:30 or so, "Did you let your sibs know?" and actually at that point the only people who knew were him and Sherri, Shobhit, Gabby, and Alexia. I asked him to let them know for me, but when I sent text updates later I created the family group text. And then, when both Lea (Gabriel's wife) and Beth (Gina's wife) texted me separately, clearly after reading texts I sent their spouses, I sent new updates to group texts with Gabriel and Lea together, and with Beth added to the immediate-family group text.
Part of why I mention all this is because I've thought a lot about how much more economical it would be just to send updates by posting to Facebook, which I have not done now in three weeks, with no intention of doing so anymore. But, as I noted to Gabriel, who jumped ship off all Meta platforms ages ago when they became far more permissive of anti-trans bullshit, just writing one update and copying and pasting into like six different texts isn’t really that hard. I’d get more comments than I really wanted on Facebook, and some people would just start texting me anyway, so sticking to just texts is actually
less taxing.
Shobhit did bring me back my electric toothbrush, and it clearly bothered him that I didn't use it yesterday morning, because this lady came around to all the patients handing out these one-time-use toothbrushes, and talking about how they were safer from germs flying around hospitals than regular toothbrushes, and so I took one. It took me a while to understand the directions, but eventually I got it.
Speaking of bed neighbors, I guess I'll mention a few of them here. I'll start with the cute one, the person who sounded like an older lady who was next door to me in this two-bed room in the ICU when I was first brought up here: she'd clearly spent a good amount of time chatting with her nurse—it was interesting to me that even though there were two beds in one room, each seems to have a separate nurse assigned to them. I heard the lady say to her nurse, “I’d really like to stay in touch with you after this.” The nurse said, “I’ll send you my email. We can check out a Rainiers game!” It was very sweet.
The next two examples aren't so sweet. These were in the room I had been taken to yesterday, in the Harborview ER. There must have been six beds in that one room. I was in the back corner bed; the one to my right had an older lady who was very confused, and kept shouting to her grown children who were with her, "Get me out get me out!" It was kind of heartbreaking. Her kids kept having to remind her where she was and that she needed to stay there. I even overheard one of them tell one of the hospital staff that their mother is usually totally with it, and that she worked as a real estate agent until the age of 83! I thought: holy shit. Also I wonder how old that means the lady is now?
And then there was the 41-year-old woman with a gunshot wound in her leg, who was diagonally across from me. She was clearly in a ton of pain, and was groaning loudly from it for quite some time. In both of these examples, I never saw any of these people; I could only hear them from the other side of drawn curtains. The confused old lady and the gunshot victim both were brought in, with kind of a swirl of chaos, while I was in the ER Tuesday night. By yesterday morning, Shobhit was texting me two different news stories related to the gunshot victim: "
Two people shot in Yesler Terrace neighborhood" from King 5; and "
Seattle shooting under investigation; no suspect in custody as victims remain hospitalized" from KOMO News. Shobhit's further comment after sending the first link was,
The two women from
Last night- one in your room in ER and the other in the corridor who probably was assigned your bed. But, when he sent the second link he added,
I think could be one man and one woman.
Yesler Terrace is not far from here at all, by the way; it's a small Seattle neighborhood directly bordering First Hill (where Harborview is located) to the south. The KOMO article mentions an "Atlantic" neighborhood, which I'm not sure I have even heard of but Google Maps identifies as directly south of Yesler Way, and thus just south of the Yesler Terrace neighborhood.
Less sad, I suppose, is the neighbor to my left as I write this; the sweet woman from before was transferred to a bed down in the regular hospital section—something that
had been the plan for me, but no beds became available and with the expectation that I will go home today, they're not bothering with the effort and just keeping me here in the ICU, even though as of yesterday my injuries were downgraded from "Level 3" to "Level 2" (out of 5) which meant less strict monitoring. Anyway, again I haven't seen the guys on the other side of the curtain to my left, but it sounds like a gay couple, one of whom had some kind of significant but planned surgery. The guy recovering clearly has something in his mouth or down his throat, as he is very muffled when he tries to talk to his partner or his doctor or nurse. This one sounds like a recovery deal, but being we're in the ICU perhaps it was something complicated. I'm dying to know the full story there but I'm leaving them alone.
Okay, now let's talk needles. That has nothing to do with the photo above; I took that because it amused me that the only way to charge my phone and still have it close and accessible to me was to have it literally hanging from several sockets
hanging from the ceiling above my bed.
Now that I've got that out of the way: back to the needles, which I did not take any photos of. I've been poked with either shots or IVs in no fewer than six spots since I've been here. I am not a fan! When I was first in the ER, the nurse had trouble getting an IV into my right arm. She used a very tiny IV and managed to get it in, but then could never get it to work. She still left it in, "just in case," which meant that more than once I had some new person start to fiddle with that and I had to be like, "Everyone has trouble with that and just uses the one on the left." They tried again on the left, using a slightly larger IV needle, and that one works, and has all along, for most of the blood draws they'd done for regular tests. In the middle of the night Tuesday night, though, a nurse had to draw blood from a vein on my right-hand wrist; she explained why she had to do it there at the time but I can't remember it now. And then my latest nurse, Theresa, drew blood this morning from my left-arm IV but the results had a concerning 3-point hemoglobin drop, and she thought maybe it was diluted from that particular spot and so she had to draw again, from a vein in the back of my right hand. Thankfully that test came back totally normal, indicating I should be able to go home today.
Side note: I texted Shobhit about the hemoglobin and at first I had a typo making it "homoglobin". Ha! That's gay hemoglobin. Homoglobin!
Anyway, I also had two
shots. The first one I got on Tuesday evening, a tetanus shot, which the triage nurse I spoke to at my doctor's office said would be recommended because I scraped my hand on the street in my bike crash, and apparently infections that cause tetanus come from soil; she said it doesn't really matter how minor the scrape is. If it's been less than five years since your last tetanus shot—and my last one was in 2021—and you get a cut or scrape like this, you should get an updated one. I spoke to Alexia about this yesterday and she was like, "Tetanus shots are really painful, too!" I said, "They are?" Either mine wasn't that bad—I mean, I still hyperventilated, as always with needles—or it was simply nothing compared to the excruciating pain I've had otherwise, especially on Tuesday.
The final one was a shot a doctor gave me in the belly yesterday, I forget what it was called except it was to prevent blood clots in my legs as I'm spending all this time laying down in bed. (That said, I am sitting in a chair next to my bed as I write this, another clear indicator of improvement.) That one didn't hurt so bad coming in, but ached a bit more, especially around the injection site, for a while after.
In any case, between the needles and the regular abdominal "does it hurt here?" exams, I've been poked and prodded so much the past couple of days I feel like Neo when he wakes up "connected" to
The Matrix.
Yesterday I ordered hot water to put the vegetable broth into for lunch, and had a very similar experience to the tea I'd had earlier: who knew vegetable broth could be so delicious? This was the closest thing I had gotten to actual food in a good 29 hours, and I didn't even need the salt packets I also ordered thinking it would be tasteless. Nope, that broth was plenty sodium-rich all on its own. Anyway, my lunch consisted of vegetable broth, black tea, and grape juice. Weirdly it was the most delicious meal of the entire day.
I did have multiple people ask if I wanted them to come and visit me—including Dad and Sherri, which I really did not think was necessary; I knew I would eventually be okay, and I didn't think it was worth them driving all the way up from Olympia. I think they would have come if I asked them to, but I didn't see the need to put them out like that. I had a very similar attitude about Gabriel making the same offer, although in his case on top of everything I would just be thinking about how much he detests driving through Seattle, something he takes every opportunity to tell me about every time he's here. He might not actually complain about it under these circumstances, but I am certain he would still hate it, and so that's still something I'd be thinking about. Dad and Sherri avoid driving in Seattle as much as they can anymore as well, so in both these cases it was just best for them all to stay home.
I did have two visitors yesterday, though, and I was happy with the ones who came, because in both cases they were friends I already had plans with that this stint in the hospital was otherwise pre-empting. I already noted that Alexia and I had to cancel movie plans Tuesday night, but almost immediately she basically just took it for granted that she'd come and visit me in the hospital, which was very sweet—she actually doesn't mind being in Seattle; she used to be our condo neighbor, after all. She'd be coming from Issaquah, and the only question was when would be a good time.
There was some uncertainty as to when and how many visitors I can actually have in the ICU, but eventually I was told I could have anyone visit whenever I wanted. Alexia had been thinking she should visit after I was transferred to a regular hospital bed, but as we've already covered, that never happened. I let Alexia know that she could visit if she wanted, and she was here a couple of hours later. Because I've got to be me, I asked for a group selfie before she left; that photo was taken at 3:06.
I can't remember exactly what time she arrived, but I would guess she was here at least an hour, maybe more. We talked a lot about Cassie, her cat, and a vet appointment she has tomorrow, and how since she's 14 she won't spend a ton of money if they find something seriously wrong with her. There was some talk of her plan to come for a double feature on Saturday, and how that
might make Shobhit more comfortable with going on his weekend trip to Portland that he already had planned. He's still thinking about canceling it, even though the travel he booked is nonrefundable. I think he should go, but we'll see how I'm feeling by tomorrow. Anyway, Alexia had said she was happy to stay all day if need be, but then said she would head out once the conversation petered out and I started processing photos. She did also know that by then there was a chance Karen would come visit me in the evening, and she didn't want to overwhelm me with visitations—something that had already been a concern of mine; two visitors was about all I figured I'd be able to take.
I got my first go-ahead to get up and walk around at about 3:45 yesterday, and my nurse,
Theresa, escorted me at first. When Shobhit went to hold my hand, she said I could hold onto him instead, just so long as I had someone to keep me steady.
I brought my phone to take pictures, naturally. Another nurse in the hallway saw us and immediately took action, taking my phone to take several photos of Shobhit and me together. I'm really glad Theresa thought to put another hospital gown over my back so my ass wasn't hanging out (I have been wearing underwear the whole time; I did get asked early on if I wanted them off and I said no). The nurse who took our picture said something along the lines of how I should have mooned the camera, but there are countless reasons
that wasn't happening, not least of which was how painful it would have been just to bend over!
That other nurse took several pictures of us, but I didn't keep them all. I did keep
four of them; I'm particularly amused by
this one because it looks like we're dancing. I was just in the middle of turning around for the picture. The nurse was so overzealous that her first shot was of us from behind.
Shobhit had already walked around the hospital and texted me photos of views through windows on multiple sides of the building; we're up on First Hill, after all, and we were on the top (9th) floor. This is a shot I got myself while walking around the floor, a view from floor-to-ceiling windows in the skybridge between the Norm Maleng Building (where I am) and
the East Hospital building. That building on the hill there is
Pacific Tower on Beacon Hill (1933, 239 ft, 16 floors), and was itself a hospital—U.S. Public Health Service Marine Hospital, to be specific—between 1933 and 1981, when it was converted to offices. It was Amazon Headquarters between 1999 (the year after I moved to Seattle) and 2010, when they moved to South Lake Union. I really love this shot, especially how Mt. Rainier looms in the distance.
I also took this shot during my first walk around the floor, taken from the skybridge and looking at the original
Harborview Building—it has a very similar art deco architectural style as Pacific Tower, and was built 2 years earlier, in 1931. It's still the tallest of the Harborview buildings, though Theresa told me it's mostly administrative offices now as the newer annexes were much easier to equip with the needed modern medical equipment. Anyway that tower is 218 feet tall and has 15 floors, so just one floor shorter than Pacific Tower.
I took several other photos of the views too, of course, including
this great shot of the Seattle skyline to the north.
4:16 p.m., Tuesday, May 27: I was able to get out of bed, so I actually sat in one of the chairs for a while—Shobhit had a second chair brought in while Alexia was visiting. And now while I was in the chair, Shobhit just went ahead and crawled onto my hospital bed.
Dinner time! Finally,
real food.
I guess the vegetable broth lunch had served as a sort of palate cleanser, because my dinner, while far more elaborate, could hardly have been more bland. Okay, I take that back: it was really the grilled cheese sandwich that was completely flavorless, which I might not have even noticed had I been able to pair it with the tomato bisque as originally desired, but these motherfuckers put beef broth in their tomato bisque! So, I got the Greek Salad instead—and, to be fair, that salad was actually pretty tasty. So was the chocolate mousse, though I could tell by the flavor that it was made with coconut milk. I also ordered a coffee for Shobhit, and a hot chocolate for myself—the tray was delivered with the cup of coffee and the Swiss Miss packet, but no separate cup of hot water. Did they expect that I was going to make mocha out of this, or what? When I told the nurse in the room at the time that there was no hot water for the hot chocolate, she quipped, "You're supposed to just pour the packet into your mouth and swish it around!"
Karen was one of the few people I never sent any texts to at first; I did not put her in the most critical circle of people to inform what was happening. The thing is, Karen and I usually have biweekly Zoom lunches while I am at work, and they are usually on Fridays. I took last Friday off to go to Lummi Island with Gabriel, and so Karen and I rescheduled for Wednesday this week, which is a day we don't normally do. Naturally I wasn't thinking about this at all while I was spending my time at the hospital, as I was neither looking at my calendar nor checking emails—she had sent the Zoom invite at about a quarter after 10 a.m. But, not getting any response, she texted me at 10:44,
Are we on for lunch today?
So, of course, I then had to update
her on what was going on. So: no lunch. But! After I sent her the same initial update I had sent several other friends, along with the link to Tuesday's blog post, she wrote,
Oh no, that sounds terrible! Would you like a visitor this evening? I am a great hospital visitor. Happy to sit with you and visit or be quiet, whatever you like. I said, maybe! But I would need to get back to her as at that point there was still the possibility I would get moved out of the ICU. She told me she would check in after her 4pm meeting.
I kept thinking that meant she would check in shortly after 4:00, but I realize now that, duh, a 4pm meeting probably did not end until 5:00. I sent several people this update around 4:30, and included her among the recipients:
Update! They finally downgraded me to "level 2" instead of "level 3" for my injuries, which means finally no more strict bed rest! (I've been stuck to the bed since I got here yesterday, so for pretty much a solid 24 hours.) It also means I was finally able to order solid food to eat, my first since the cereal I had for breakfast yesterday morning. Only a few minutes ago I got up to walk around the floor I'm on with Shobhit and Theresa the Nurse. Another nurse saw us and immediately rushed to take a picture of Shobhit and me together lol. The walk went well but for the pain in the injection site for the shot I got in my belly right beforehand, a thing to prevent blood clotting in the legs after all the bed rest. Also there are some very nice views from up here on the 9th floor of Harborview Medical Center. Currently they expect I will be released by midday tomorrow; they're continuing to keep me for monitoring to make sure finally eating something doesn't cause further complications. Other than that, since I otherwise remained stable and there was no need for any invasive procedure, what internal bleeding I had will just be left to reabsorb into my body. (The body is an amazing thing. Who knew I actually had an amazing body??)
I followed that with some photos of Shobhit and me walking, as well as some of the shots of views. When I sent that same thing to Gabriel and Lea, Gabriel responded,
You crack me up. You’re in a trauma center and your favorite part about it is the view. I said,
Of course! You think internal bleeding is going to keep me from staying on-brand?
Anyway, Karen was actually quite prompt when she texted me at 5:02,
Are you hoping for a visitor this evening? I replied,
My friend Alexia already visited. I’d be delighted to see you too but don’t feel obligated! I’m doing okay and Shobhit went home for a bit and is going to bring me back some chai 😋 She then responded at 5:31 that she would pop by for a short visit in about an hour. She also asked if I wanted any treat, but I noted that I had already had chocolate mousse and hot chocolate and Shobhit had gone home for a bit and was bringing me back chai with cashew cookies, so I didn't think I needed another "treat." Instead, when she arrived she brought a small pot of flowers, which Shobhit took with him when he went home for the evening.
Harborview ICU Walk, After Dark! This shot was taken at 11:17 last night.
I had been put under the impression that we would not be allowed to use the public restrooms that are over in the skybridge, and patients had to contend with pee jugs and bedpans even if they're capable of using a regular bathroom (and none of the ICU rooms have their own bathrooms). But then, after the shift changed and I had another new nurse, this one—whose name I forget; forgive me, I've literally been under the care of dozens of people—said the night shift people are willing to escort us to the bathroom. Once I had walked and she saw that I could do it, she even said I was welcome to walk over there myself should I need to use it again in the middle of the night, which I did not actually need to do.
Anyway, when I needed to pee before I went to bed, I asked to be escorted to the bathroom, and asked if I could walk to a window first, so that's what we did. I wanted some nighttime view pictures!
Shortly after I woke up this morning, quite early probably partly because of the chai I drank last night but also the nurse discussions with the patient next door kept me awake as well, I pressed the call button to get permission to go to the bathroom, as I wasn't sure if it made a difference that it was no longer nighttime. The same nurse was still on shift, though, and she escorted me to the bathroom, but left me to find my own way back. I responded to texts from Shobhit while walking the hallways back to my room, a lone guy in a hospital gown.
And now we're at Thursday breakfast, and I've got to say, with each successive actual-meal, they've been worse than the last. I was kind of excited about breakfast: a make-your-own omelette; vegan sausage patty; breakfast potatoes; sourdough toast; English breakfast tea.
All of it was cold by the time the tray was finally brought up to me, like it had been made and then let to sit for 40 minutes. The toast was not warm at all and was just short of rock hard; the water for my tea was barely lukewarm. Room service in this establishment sucks!
But anyway, that finally gets us all up to date. I had thought I might wait until I was actually home to post to my blog again, but I've decided to post this now. I had that blood work with the hemoglobin inconsistency that I already mentioned, but the latest is that everything looks great and I think now it's just a matter of waiting until I can see the social worker and then get discharged. Shobhit is on his way here now. I'm really looking forward to being home again, and at the very least getting a shower; I used the provided wet wipes all over my body this morning but I'm still feeling pretty gross.
I just got one final once-over by a doctor, kind of giving me the final go-ahead that I should be released today around noon probably. She recommended I work from home for at least a week, which will make Shobhit happy, and that I not ride my bike for six weeks, which I'm not thrilled about but will do what I need to. It's hardly the end of the world. The more I think about it the more I think I'll just continue my PTO through the week and not work tomorrow. Shobhit kept saying he didn't think I should go to the office and should work from home tomorrow, and he's right. Except I think maybe I won't work at all. Better to err on the side of caution, which is something I should regard as standard going forward. I should have told the people I talked to right after the accident to call 911 right then and there, and if anything like this happens again that's what I will do.
[posted 10:45am]
