8 - Humour is a good healer

"Humour is a good healer"

I can't begin to tell you how true this statement is. Before I can fully explain this, I need to touch on what situation I was in before I was put through this living hell that had been laid at my door.

With a piece of chicken!

Sports were never my favourite but I was always a reasonably active individual. Some early mornings before work I went for a run down the road, in the summer it was a run after work. Weekends and after work, I lifted weights. Not for the purpose of building excessive muscle, just merely as a means to keeping in trim. My wife and I went for bike rides in the countryside occasionally, or walks around historic sites. Ironically, as my car collision hapened on the Monday evening, I had been on television the Friday before the weekend. The business I worked for had achieved recognition for taking on customers after the original company had gone into insolvency, so local television news had descended on our place of work and I was one of those filmed for the production. Pride before a fall? That Monday morning I remember getting congratulatory comments from colleagues for my 5 minutes of fame. My job itself was in an area I really enjoyed doing, having worked at it for so long in my career, so overall, my life was going reasonably well.

" ..shed a tear some nights as I went through what I could only describe as depressive thoughts.."

That was all put on dramatic hold. Without sounding 'un-manly', I would shed a tear some nights as I went through what I could only describe as depressive thoughts and overwhelming grief at the life I had led compared to the one I was forced into now by a careless, unthinking imbecile. At this moment in my recovery, I would lie awake at night and look at the photos my wife had selotaped to my bedside to keep familiar visions fresh in my mind: pictures of our wedding the year before, images of our reception and our cat that used to sleep on me every night. I can't say I wasn't racked with anger that drove me onward, feelings of intense rage that fuelled my aggression further. I began to realise that my placid nature pre-collision had been repressed somewhat.

Before, I was one of those 'laid back' individuals. It used to take a great deal to annoy me, situations that perpetuated for days, weeks, months before I would get motivated enough to act. Now? My approach to life had been altered considerably. I had evolved a short temper, an amplified sarcasm and synical nature that I drew upon for almost every situation. The phsychological impact for me had shaped a new attitude, applied a new stress that had developed a negative outlook in my approach to life. Being limited to only thoughts without speech for so long, the pain of my injuries and the aggression, all had changed my behaviour.

Since the physios had managed to get me upright, it had shattered my belief that my life would be nothing short of a horizontal stasis, going from 'active to inactive' in one failing swoop. They had given me something to strive for, to re-instate, a hopeful aim to shoot for. Somehow, through that one event, my original querky humour returned to the fore. And it was lucky it did, I needed it for one of the night shifts!

".. I immediately raised the alarm.."

The usual nurse changeover happened at 7:00pm. During the course of the day I would be shuffling in bed to alleviate pressure, and, as a consequence, I had slipped down the bed a little with my feet pointing south-west and my head north-east. The senior nurse-in-charge (Helen) had noted my awkward angle and mentioned that I was to be moved later once everyone had been attended to (catheter bags emptied, moved in the bed, urine bottles replenished). The team began to finish up the round and lights began to go out in the ward without having attended to my positional issue. I immediately raised the alarm and pressed the call button.

Developing the back story slightly, wards would have student nurses from many different countries performing shifts to gain experience. Training on the ward gave them the relevent skills they needed that a classroom didn't give them. Unfortunately, as a result, there were language issues between patient and nurse.

So, having pressed the call button for assistance to help move me to a more comfortable position, a nurse arrived. She was a nice, young, petite nurse from India but I could instantly see we were going to have communication issues.

"..a psychopathic grin smeared on her face.."

"Can I help you?", she asked inquisitively.
"Thank you, I'm due to be moved."
A perplexed look met my eyes, confusing silence drifting to me from the bed curtain.
"Sorry?" She exclaimed.
"I'm due ... to be moved?" I pressed.
After a few passing seconds, a visage of distress descended on her face as she repeated what she thought she heard, "You want your toes removed?"
Instantly, I had nightmarish visions of her reaching into her uniform, a psychopathic grin smeared on her face and, extracting a pair of garden secateurs from their resting place, she starts clipping the toes from my feet!
"NO! No! I'm due to be moved! ... In the bed!"
She turned, took a pace to the curtain and spun on her heel, "What shall I do?"
I let out a laugh and remarked, "Fetch Helen!"

It was moments like this that will stay in my memory. Laughing about such events kept me focussed, driven to succeed and resume some normal life again no matter how distant it appeared to me.

The Trauma Ward I was on wasn't the last place I would reside in this hospital for a new building had just been built and was rapidly approaching occupancy. I had the distinct honour of being one of the first patients to be taken to the new wards and, speaking with many people, that might have not been a great idea!!!