Pain Clinic

Earlier in the week, Monday, I took Dianne to the Pain Clinic for a surgical procedure. I took off the entire morning to accomplish this. I discussed this only briefly in my Monday posting. Dianne is feeling better in fact had still another procedure yesterday and has come away from the procedure with a bunch of X-rays of her kidneys and such. Dianne is much more brave then I am and often chooses exploratory and medical intervention to rule out possible medical issues. I will just wait till I am either in so much pain or so debilitated that I cannot prevent my caretaker or loved one from taking me to the physician or emergency . Yes, I know Dianne is the more adult of the to of us..

So as usual Dianne and I are running late when we get to the clinic, which is in the basement of a good sized hospital in a neighborhood in our part of town. She parks the van and sprints to the Pain Clinic (PC). I take my time down loading my self from the van and wandering round the hospital till I get to the clinic. The cafeteria was not long longer serving breakfast and the time was too early for lunch so I ended going to the pharmacy and bought chips and candy. For some reason I have always loved hospital candy especially Nibs and Starbursts. I finally reach the clinic. The waiting room is large enough if the staff had not stuffed the place with chairs. There is nowhere for a wheelchair person to really sit and be out of the way. So. I ended up pacing outside of the waiting room.

I swear all the folks sitting in those chairs at the pain clinic were the same people who call me day in and day out. Wanting a wheelchair, or designated disabled parking plate or wanting me or someone (who they believe has power) to write a note to their boss or Social Security Administration so they can get some sort of benefit. Grumpy people who are having to del with pain everyday of their lives. Pain so great that they have been forced to find a medical solution. I am blessed in that I have never known that kind of pain. I broke my neck, sure, but the event knocked me out and by the time I came to I was drugged to infinity or my spinal cord was so damaged that I would never experience pain, as I knew pain again, at least below my lesion level. There wee kids who were there not for their issues but their parents were there for the parent’s pain. Management. These kids were wild, screaming rolling round on the floor and just being out of control. The rest of the pain folk just looked on. I left the room. That room was way too crazy for me.

We got to the clinic about 9:30 am and we did not leave till about 11:45 am. Since Dianne went in by herself and was being seen by the Doc by the time I got there, a bit later, no one knew who I was with. People came got
seen and left all in the time I was in the waiting room or out side the door pacing. Kids got yanked and swatted by parents, one women so needed to be acknowledged by a physician who had seen her once she literally shouted “Hey Doctor! Doctor! So loud the young medic had to turn round just to see who m was making the noise. He smiled and waved at the women frantically smiling and waving to him—the doctor had that “who me?’ look in his eye, waved back and got back to the examine room as swift as he could. Dianne finally merged from her ablation and I wisked her to the van as fast as I could. I had had enough of the pain clinic for one day.