Emergency Room (ER)

We drove from Trussville 9.7 miles (I looked this up) to St. Vincent's East, previously known in Birmingham as Medical Center East. I later found out that my brother-in-law's kids were born at this hospital. We were met in the ER drive-thru with a wheel chair even though the hospital didn't know we were coming. I thought that was nice of them. This was a Tuesday in the middle of the day so I was admitted very quickly. The waiting room was pretty empty. When the first assistant wanted to weigh me, I just told her I weighed roughly 135 pounds and asked if that was close enough. I didn't want to hobble out of the wheel chair and onto the scales. She was happy to write that down. Then we went into my ER room.

Some nurse-types saw me first and removed the t-shirt wrapped around my foot for initial investigation. They cleaned up my foot a bit before the ER doctor came to visit. He sent me for x-rays. He was an Asian guy and didn't say a whole lot. I'm not sure what his name was but I can probably get it from my BC/BS records. I was taken down the hallway on a stretcher to have the foot x-rayed, three different views of the foot. I said to the technician, "My foot's broken, isn't it?" She said she couldn't tell me. I understood but what I was seeing was where the metatarsals and toe bones meet so I thought it was broken all the way across. Heck, I don't know how to read an x-ray but have since learned a little bit more. The orthopedic doctor, Dr. B., must have been on call that day because he's the doc that saw me next. He had a pretty good bedside manner. I honestly don't remember too much about what he said that day. I found out later he was with Alabama Orthopedic, Spine and Sports Associates. At some point he must have told me what he actually saw from the x-ray but I don't think I really knew this until the next day.

They put me in a hospital gown to get ready for surgery. At some point, Dr. B marked my foot for surgery by putting JB on my big right toe. I gave my wedding ring to hubby to safely hold. He put it in his pocket and we still haven't been able to find it. We're hoping it's in his Dad's truck somewhere. I was asked if I was pregnant and even though I said no, they had to give me a test to be sure which means they had to put in a catheter. They had problems with that and finally came back with this straight tube thingy to withdrew some pee for the pregnancy test. They eventually came back with a size 14 mm catheter and inserted with success. They did other stuff to get me ready for surgery. I'm not sure when they started giving me any kind of pain killer but all this process seemed like it took forever. At some point I went to a pre-operation room.

There were lots of pre-op techs attending to me; all scurrying around. I don't remember seeing Dr. B again in this room but I may have. It seems these techs looked around for something to signify which foot was to be operated on, even though that was obvious, then they'd snicker at JB on the big toe and check off that box on their sheet or make a mental note. Honestly, I don't know all their job functions. This pre-op process went by pretty fast. The last thing I remember is that I would kind of be aware during the surgery because I wouldn't be put out completely; just numb "down there". Also, Dr. B said he might have to put in wires, pins, screws, but wasn't sure. Well, I don't remember a thing from surgery and I eventually woke up. Must have been a few hours later.

The post-op waiting seemed like it took forever. I heard someone say the hospital was full and they were waiting for a room. Wow! There were two stretchers side by side in this holding area and my nurse would pop in every once in a while. The lady in the other stretcher was old, and I could here her moan from time to time. I guessed she may have had hip surgery but really had no clue. I was numb from the waist down and felt really groggy. Finally I got moved to a private room. By now it was around 5 o'clock. My wonderful, calm, spouse would probably know better how much time it took because he waited around in the waiting room all that time. My son stayed back in Trussville and got to ride some that day.