I have had several surgeries in my lifetime. And while nobody really loves being sick or injured, looking back I have to say that I have enjoyed the experience of having had these operations. Every one of them improved me in some way, either in quality of life or, in saving my life itself.
I should probably qualify that by saying first off, I am not a doctor. But I have been a patient on numerous occasions so hospitals do not scare me. Now in my mid-late 40s, looking back apart from the usual angst of operations, I have warm feelings about the people striving to make my life better through surgery. There is something ennobling about lending your trust to someone else, if even for a short while, to do their very best to make you better. Be it a doctor, a surgeon or other professional staff whose main mission is, -you!
One of my first operations was when I was about four years old. I had just started kindergarten and was ‘acting strangely’ I guess would be the best descriptor. Supposedly, I was doing things like falling asleep deeply and at inappropriate times (during school lessons, during play dates, etc) and upon waking hours later, I would resume whatever activity I had been doing, exactly where I had left off. So I was told.
I do remember quite a bit from this period in my youth, being diagnosed by several family doctors with the dismissive “oh, it’s just ‘school nerves’”. YES, -several doctors told this to my parents that their son had ‘…school nerves’ whatever this was supposed to mean. And that yes, it would pass. This is crap. It is like having ‘growing pains’. –No such animal.
It was my Aunt that tried to intervene, sought and encouraged continuance in the pursuit of finding out what was wrong with me. Her father (my grandfather) supposedly chastised her ‘for meddling…’ and insisted that ‘…there is nothing wrong with the child!’
My mom however, decided that there WAS something wrong, and pleaded with my aunt to ‘continue to intervene’, and she did. My auntie got on the phone and starting making calls to everyone she knew, her church group, her friends, anyone, about whom to enlist to aid this quest.
A good doctor in a nearby town was recommended, and he checked me over. -A “Dr. Cummings” as I recall, and HE too, thought something was indeed wrong.
Well, I could write another article itself about \\\’after the surgery\\\’. It was more-or-less expected, first off, that I would now survive at that point, but be mentally retarded or at least, unable to walk. Therefore, I was left in the semi-private room unattended.
I awoke, climbed out of bed and in my flannel zip-up onesie sleeper (I was only four years old), shuffled out the door, past the nurses\\\’ station and into a public washroom that I saw men walking into/out of. I needed to urinate. Not being able to reach the urinal, I waited for a stranger to lift me up so I could \\\’go\\\’, and then he held me up in front of the sink so I could wash my hands, and he let me continue when I was done. Okay, -\\\’Guardian Angel\\\’ maybe?? Anyway…
-Out the door, back past the nurses\\\’ station and I still went unnoticed, and on to the playroom at the end of the hall. I wanted to watch TV. The TV was bolted to the ceiling high in a corner, with vinyl-covered padded chair beneath it. Stacking wooden boxes (toys, I suppose) on that chair, I climbed up high enough to reach the TV and turn it on, changed channels to find something I wanted to watch. I remember watching an episode of \\\”Little Rascals\\\” (they made pancakes but used Plaster of Paris instead of flour so they were coming out as flat cement-cakes!) I was on a bouncy-horsie going nuts bouncing up & down and happy when I heard a blood-curdling scream \\\”OH MY GOD HE\\\’S GONE!!!\\\”
I stopped bouncing and leaned forward a bit on the horsie so I could see down the long hall, I saw about a dozen nurses running towards me with a wheelchair in front of them almost skidding sideways they came towards me so fast(!) They snatched me off of the bouncy-horse the way King Kong grabbed Faye Wray, threw me into the wheelchair and ran my little butt down to X-ray to check bandaged head! The called the surgeon \\\’to come inspect\\\’ me, etc. By then of course they had me bawling and crying in fear… I remember being sternly chastised by at least a dozen people over the next day or three about NOT climbing out of bed again or wandering off…
Anyway, -didn\\\’t mean to babble adu myself again (the article did it enough as it was.)
Glad you read it, hope it means something to everyone whom reads it. Oh, -I remember being told that that \\\’burning tyre smell\\\’ was the \\\’deep sedative gas\\\’ they give. They are supposed to start off with something \\\’soft\\\’ like ether or whatever, to \\\’lightly knock the patient out\\\’ like they do in dentist\\\’s offices, and THEN switch-over to the \\\’deep, strong\\\’ stuff that knocks you out for hours… they had jumped ahead a little bit and started the strong gas too soon… I was \\\’still awake\\\’..
The more I read/reread this article, the MORE specifics I recall.. I really remember i, ALL, vividly and explicitly. And even something that I did when I got home… I was carefully itching a scratchie spot on the top of my scalp and plucked up a 3-sided \\\’wedge\\\’ (like a 3-sided pyramid) out of my scalp out and examined it, I tried to replace it but could not get it to sit right, so I secretly flushed it down the upstairs toilet and never told anyone (not mom or dad, especially!!), ever (except for my wife and that was just recently!)
This \\\’3-sided wedge\\\’ was probably for a \\\’scope to view the space between the hemispheres to guide the other tools, inserted through the larger hole nearer the base of my skull/neck.
This \\\’wedge\\\’ was not stitched in place, but merely \\\’plugged back in\\\’. In it\\\’s absence, the \\\’hole\\\’ scabbed-over, healed, and all I have for it now is a \\\’bald bump\\\’ about the size of my pinkie-fingernail in it\\\’s place… -Like I said, I could write a BOOK from these weird but all-true memories! 
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