Into the ER

My magical face(meaning dark purple and distended) apparently was a quick ticket into the er and into a treatment room. We were attended to very quickly by a couple of nurses who tried to get some IV's put into my arms. They mosly failed. I could not understand this as my veins are usually very easy to get to. "I don't think he has any blood in his peripheral veins, they may all be locked down." said a nurse. That was the first time I thought this may be worse than I thought. I strained to look at my arms...they are dark purple and distended like pictures of the dead and bloated.
They wheeled me quickly into the traditional er room and began to place more IV's. They all looked worried. My er doc was a japanese woman who mostly took direction on how things work from the nurses which did concern a man looking up at the blue hatted people that have your life in their hands. She began to place a central line. ( I don't recommend one for fun). The thing is big a long and gets placed into the subclavian vein (which is just above the right atrium of the heart). The first couple of jolts to the heart let me know I should be afraid. I widened my eyes. "your arm hurts?" they asked....no, I sputtered, my heart isn't beating.... "Oh, they said, he has gone arhythmic." Great, I am thinking, poor Anita out in the other room and I die with paddles on in this one. (it was right about at this point I realized I was now fighting for my life. I had heard enough about sepsis and endotoxins and the state everyone was saying I was in and how far gone I was that life started to take a different look for me. I think I will always look back to right here, under the er lights that my life was in the balance and things and priorities needed to be sorted out. what is really important to me and what is all the hoo ha that gets in the way and clouds my mind.) She finally gets this sheath in place and begins to insert the line that goes into it and it won't fit. She cannot figure out why. No one has a clue......maybe it's the wrong kit, maybe it is bent maybe a new instrument....I have never used one of these before says the Doctor obviously making me feel much more secure in my ability to survive. Has anyone used this thing? Apparently nobody knew a thing. "Put some traction on it maybe" says the nurse. Yeah traction I am thinking....doesn't that just mean to try and jam it in? So she does.....it doesn't work. Finally a call to the internal medicine doc for help. He comes down all calm and sits down. Get me a mac 7 kit.
he says.
That is a mac 7 Er Doc says.
No it is not...get rid of these things. I need to pull all of this out. And he does.
He calmly placed a new central line stitched it in cleaned up and was done....I never saw DR. ER again....thank you.
Tony showed up a couple of minutes after they had placed the Foley catheter. That also is no fun, but not really worrisome. I thought I peed a bunch in there, but only a bit of brown sludge....not a good kidney sign.
"not much there," said Todd, the nurse.
"and the wrong color" said tony.
finally after a couple of bags of saline there was a small trickle. Bag after bag of saline was being hung on all five ports as far as I could tell. The bags were being pumped into me. My mouth still was parched. No saliva.
"that's a better color" tony said.
Todd looked over... "sweet" he replied.
Tony face showed plenty of worry as had his arm around Anita. I could see tears in his eyes.
We waited for a long time in the er for a room up in the ICU to get ready. Tony and Anita thought it was cold there, I was still hot and parched. They just looked down on my purple distended face and body with much concern. I just wanted more saline.
Finally the call came and we could go to ICU.
Off to ICU