Things I can and cannot do

I recently spent a great deal of time in the hospital. No internet. I was in for pancreatitis and malnourishment and then found out I had a 'superbug' called MRSA that put me in isolation. I wrote a few things to get them out of my head. This is one of those things.

Things that are true

1. You are not the center of the universe. Sometimes it will take a little longer for the nurses to answer your call. They might be changing the dressings of someone who is covered in burns or wiping someone’s butt, but they are with someone else and will come when they can.
2. You can throw up nothing. Sometimes it’s green and called bile. Try not to do that very often. As an extension of that, it’s possible to have not eaten anything and spend the morning on the toilet with diarrhea and vomiting. Try not to do that very often either.
3. There are worse things than missing your son’s birthday because you’re in the hospital. There are worse things than missing your son’s first Easter egg hunt because you’re in the hospital. Keep repeating that to yourself when you’re having the party in the cafeteria and you feel like crap.
4. Running out of books and visitors at the same time makes a huge vacuum in time for what you can do. Plan well.
5. Just because you can fix your problem yourself doesn’t mean you’re allowed to. There are rules and liability laws in place and you have your own place within them. So, even though you know that you just need to press the green button to make your iv stop beeping and that it just started beeping because you bent your arm, you need to wait until the nurse shows up to press that button.
6. Buy insurances for the possibility that you might run out of sick leave. You never know.
7. My little pink gerbera blooms at night and wilts in the day. Sometimes, you need to have a different approach to life.
8. Somedays, kicking ass at a game of freecell is as good as it gets.

Things I cannot do (but sometimes try to do)

1. Get ice. Either I or my little green jug will kill you.
2. Press the little green button to make my iv stop beeping.
3. Get my medications myself when I need them.
4. Get through a day without crying.
5. Cry around the nurses.
6. Leave.