The World’s Longest Day

The last 36 hours absolutely sucked.

It started with me over-sleeping when I was supposed to be on call and in the hospital at 6AM.  Apparently the power went out in our house overnight, and my alarm went off-line.  Sabotage!  Thankfully I awoke at 6:30 on my own.  I should have known then that it was going to be a bad day at that point and just called in sick…

I get to the hospital and the work is already piled up.  And then around noon, all of the other surgical interns start signing out to me.  I am all alone covering the floor for every surgical patient in Grady Hospital.  Say a prayer!  Weekends in the hospital are the hardest because every patient’s random family member shows up, and invariably, their doctor (who actually has a clue about what is going on with their loved one) is off that day.  And they all just want to see a doctor to know whats going on.  But lots of families were irritated because I was just the covering doctor and I didn’t know the whole plan for their Aunt Edna.  Give me strength.  And then there was the 45 minute discussion with a patient who had a bowel obstruction but wanted to leave the hospital and “take a break from this for a few days”.  It took a lot of convincing to get her to realize that that you can’t take a break from being sick. 

Did I mention that I am sick myself?  Oh yes, the nasty cold that sent Bryson back to the hospital with pneumonia has been reeking havoc on my respiratory system as well.  I feel like a big sniffily ball of phlegm.  Yummy.

So I press on with my day.  And then a fellow intern (the one who is coming on for the night shift) offers to bring me dinner.  And not just any dinner…CHIPOTLE!  Sweet.  So somewhere around 9PM I get a break and I am happily chowing down on my burrito bowl (with guacamole) between sniffles.  I have about 5 bites left to go in my fabulous Mexican feast, and low-and-behold, I find the world’s largest most disgusting FLY (as in the six legged, germ infested insect that we all freak out about when it lands near your food).  Excuse me while I barf.

But no time for that, I have to run down to the trauma bay, to tend to a man who has been shot in the groin.  Doh!  I am not sure who you have to anger in order to get shot in the genitals, but this guy must have really ticked them off.  3 hours later, we finish in the operating room, putting everything back together. 

So its 12-midnight, and normally I would be going strong.  but I am sick and sleep has been hard to come by with all my coughing and carrying on at night.  So I go crawling up to my assigned call-room only to find that both of the beds in my room have already been slept in.  Yuck.  By this point, my head is pounding and I have developed a toothache.  But I go back to the security office to request another key, where they proceed to make me talk to 3 different people before someone comes out and tells me that it is “against policy” to give a resident a different room after they have been assigned a room, even if the room is dirty.  Instead, it is my responsibility to call house keeping to come and change the sheets.  Right.  And pigs will fly.  So I ask for my own set of sheets to change the bed.  But that is against policy also.  I guess residents have been stealing the fabulous 100 thread count Grady bedding??  So I go back up to my dirty room, and flip the sheets over (its sort of like switching your underwear around, right?) and crash for a few precious hours. 

By 5AM I am up again, doing my thing.  However, my “toothache” is unbearable now and I can’t stop dripping snot.  I see an attending in the hallway, and she takes one looks at me and tells me that I am dismissed and I am to leave the hospital immediately.  I am not to return until I am well.  Umm, what?  Surely she is joking.  She is quite serious though, and literally escorts me out of the building. 

By 10:15, I am sitting in the dentist chair, fully prepared to be told I have a horrible cavity that will need a bridge or something awful.  But no.  Instead she smirks and tells me that I have a sinus infection and what I need is an antibiotic, not a dentist.  Great.

So now both Bryson and I are taking antibiotics.  And what a pitiful pair we are.  I just hope I don’t get the horrible diarrhea that he has been suffering from courtesy of his medication.  Seriously, his butt is indistinguishable from a strawberry right now.  <sigh>