In the wee hours of the morning on Friday October 31, 2014. I awoke with a start. Apparently my bladder had decided that it was dressing up as fish for Halloween, and would no longer allow me to sleep through the night before going to the restroom.

So imagine my surprise when I rolled out of bed and nearly collapsed, because in fact it wasn’t my bladder at all, but my back that had decided that it was going to take on the pain, I imagine, of someone who had gotten into a bar fight and had been kicked repeatedly in the kidneys, the right kidney to be accurate.

I had not, at least in my conscious knowledge, been in a bar and/or back alley fight in the last 24 hours.

In the five minutes it took me to pace my apartment, suffering the worst pain I’d ever felt, I decided 3 things. 1.) This was the worst pain I’ve ever experienced. 2.) Stretching was not helping. 3.) I could not wait the 3:30 more hours for urgent care to open. So I made the decision to throw on my sweats grab my wallet and car keys and head to the ER.

I made it to the hospital safely, (though I should note there were a lot of prayers being said to my guardian angel whilst driving) parked my car and walked into the ER. The person at the check-in desk took one look at me, turned to the nurse next to her and said, “get a wheelchair.” Answering the question that yes, I did look as bad as I felt.

As I was sitting down in the aforementioned wheelchair, the nurse said to me that I looked as white as a ghost, to which I responded, “Well, that will make dressing up for Halloween a lot easier.” She was not amused.

I mean c’mon, I am in the one in pain here and I couldn’t even get a pity laugh? It was clearly a quick witted joke, and a good one I might add. The pain was not hampering my quick wit, in fact there’s a good possibility it was sharpening it. Alas it fell on deaf ears.

They took my information, driver’s license and insurance card, gave me a fancy bracelet with my name and date of birth, in case I forgot who I was and got lost, and rolled me away. Hopefully towards relief.

I know that the bracelet was not for me. This was just something I thought to myself at the time and didn’t say out loud, afraid that the nurse would again not pick up on my humor and just think I was dumb…or in a lot of pain, which I was.

Upon arriving at the room, I was given my hospital gown (oh yeah, when you check-in to the ER you pretty much leave all sense of dignity/self-consciousness at the door, because those gowns don’t boost anyone’s self-esteem), told to change and a nurse would be right in. The nurse came, asked the questions typed the answers and left me to wait for the doctor. While I sat in bed waiting for the doctor, all I could do was stare at the giant clock in my face willing the time to move faster.

After about 15 minutes the doctor came in, did her thing, listened to my story, and decided on a course of action, that required a lot of pain medication. Which by the way, I was totally cool with.

You know how everyone talks about the pain chart, and your pain being on a scale of 1-10. When asked that questioned I stared at the chart, constantly thinking about the Brian Regan sketch that addresses this issue. I eventually landed on a 7.5, Doc however, said I was being generous and that I was probably an 8.

After the doc left to go put in my orders or whatever, another nurse came in with a blanket, and told me I was freezing and really clammy. I immediately kicked the blanket off, because to her what was freezing and clammy felt to me like I’d just finished a really intense hot yoga session. At that point I waited…and paced…and waited…and paced some more.

Self-reflective observation number two of the evening, when I am in pain and/or discomfort and can move I will. (The first observation was that my wit and sarcasm were at an all time high).

Why on earth do they insist on putting a giant clock in the room if they aren’t going to move quickly! (Observation number 3)

After about another 20 ish minutes of pacing, the nurse came in with syringes and drugs! I was going to get some relief.  After 3 failed tries to get the IV in both arms, it was time for what was called, “a hot glove,” a fancy medical term for a latex glove filled with hot water. This was to help my vein come to the surface, because I was so cold it was hiding in my arm…FYI the nurse said none of this to me, this was my own personal monologue to myself while all this was happening…except for the “hot glove” the nurse definitely said that.

Finally she hit gold and quickly took some samples and administered the nausea medication, then the liquid ibuprofen (that has a fancier name that I don’t know), then a valium, then last but certainly not least, the morphine.

Now this is where I take a minute to be infinitely grateful that there was no with me in the room (beside the nurse), I have never, to my knowledge, been given morphine. In what I am guesstimating is the 5-10 minutes it took for all of that to finally knock me unconscious, I have no idea what happened. I remember the morphine and the effect the nurse told me it would have, I remember her giving me some water, and then nothing. Until I was woken up to be given Percocet maybe about 40 minutes later. After the morphine, time got hazy. That clock didn’t seem to matter that much once the pain dissipated.

But at least there are no morphine videos of me hiding on someone’s phone! Win!

After the meds I was woken up every so often for a myriad of things, and every time the nurses were finished, they’d fix my blankets and hand me the TV remote, saying I could turn it on if I got bored. I only mention the remote thing, because they were weirdly pushy about me watching TV, almost as if they wanted me to watch it. I did not want to watch TV I just wanted to go back to sleep. Which is what I did.

At about 9 am I was woken up one last time by a new nurse (male) and was told that he was going to take me for a walk around the ER to assess my pain and dizziness. Cool. But I did have to keep my quip about being taken for a walk to myself, I got the sense this guy would NOT find it funny. I got out of bed, properly adjusting my gown, to maintain the last shred of privacy that I could, and then said, “let’s go.” He then said to me, “You can put your flip flops on if you want so you’re not walking on a dirty floor.”

My thoughts in this moment were laughable, I know I mentioned the hospital gown previously, but the back two ties that would keep the gown closed had been cut off, so the idea that I would need shoes so my feet wouldn’t get dirty was hysterical to me. Never mind the fact that this gown is little more than a bib, we wouldn’t want your feet to get dirty!

In the end I obliged him, we took our stroll, I felt no pain and wasn’t dizzy. When we got back to the room, he took my vitals again, confirmed my name and birthday again, then said it was pretty impressive that my pain had gone from an 8-0 andI made a comment about good drugs, WHICH HE ACTUALLY LAUGHED AT! Thank God for finally having someone with a sense of humor.

At this point I was on the downward stretch and was anxious to be sent home so I could sleep uninterrupted.

I will say this, for all the jokes and observations I had about being in the ER. I really am grateful for the help and care I received.

Though on the off chance that one of my nurses or doctors end up reading this, may I offer some advice? It really wouldn’t kill you to laugh at my jokes, even out of pity. It’s not so much about me being funny (which I am) but more about me knowing that you’re actually listening.

Thanks for all you do. Any chance that hospital bill could just disappear into the ether?