Monday, January 14, 2013

On Hospitals

Life sure does take the craziest paths sometimes.

For instance, I've only been admitted to the hospital twice--and both were avoidable occurrences (the births of my children.) I actually hate hospitals. When I was having my son, I remember vividly telling my doctor that I just wanted to go home--that's how much I hate hospitals. My words were met with a laugh by all in the room, but I was dead serious.

So, you can imagine my consternation with the amount of time I've had to spend IN hospitals in the last two years. Yes, I understand they're necessary. Yes, I understand that it's been for the best that my son is there periodically, and that most of his doctors are based at hospitals.

Doesn't stop my slight germaphobia.

I'm pondering this aspect of my personality more as the day gets closer that we'll be taking our son out to Seattle for a bone marrow transplant. While we won't be inpatient for 4 - 6 months, he and I will be in hospitals several times a week. How will that work, especially since I get a bit of anxiety when I'm in the hospital for a long time (i.e. more than two days)?

Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center, Seattle, Washington
I have decided that there are a few things I'm going to do while I'm in Seattle. Right now, since I'm mostly writer blocked (hence no blog posts for the last two months!) all of these are reading and crafty. I figure I'll have a lot of downtime. Currently, my list of things includes: learning to knit socks, learning Tunisian-style crochet, possibly learning to hand quilt, reading all of the James Bond novels by Ian Fleming, and reading all of the Sherlock Holmes stories by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (there was a freebie on Amazon.com a while back and I've already started it.) I'm hoping these activities, possibly coupled with writing some short or novel-length stories, will keep some of my anxiety at bay... and keep me from going bananas while being surrounded by doctors, nurses, and germs.


Until next time,

3 comments:

Giles Hash said...

I understand where you're coming from. Hospitals are just FILLED with sick people. I hate germs, and every time I've been in the hospital, it's either been because I needed to go to the ER, or someone I cared about was in the ER. It's stressful :P.

But I pray the anxiety doesn't get to you. And that your son receives some much-needed healing! :D

Unknown said...

I'm with you on hating hospitals. I get tense every time I have to visit someone in one. Will be praying for you as well as Xander.

Unknown said...

Thank you both for the kind words! Still so much to do, so little time to do it, and not really sure where to start!

We should know in the next couple weeks when we'll be heading out. The NOT knowing is a little frustrating!

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