Unexpected dinner date at RPH
*Don’t worry. Jac is OK for the timebeing.
I got a call from my mum-in-law yesterday afternoon while I was at work – Jac had gone to hospital. She’d gotten a workmate to take her to Royal Perth Hospital Emergency because of chest pains and feeling faint. Jac’s mum and I decided since she was coming from an entirely different direction it would be best if we each made our own way to the hospital. I left instructions with workmates regarding a couple of things I’d been working on, and took off.
Jac’s mum arrived at the hospital before me. I had to endure a ride to the city on one of the rail replacement buses (they’ve shut down the train line I ride to work for the entire week while they do testing and hook up the new Mandural train line to the rest of the rail network), and so took a little longer to get there. It didn’t help that we kept getting red traffic lights, and that the driver took the bus up the wrong street by mistake. I was pretty stressed out by the time I got to the hospital. I couldn’t stop my mind thinking about the worst case scenarios. But Jac’s mum was with her – I was grateful for that. At least she wasn’t alone. As they only allow one visitor at a time for patients in the Emergency Department, I waited until Jac’s mum came out so we could swap spots.
Jac looked pretty normal when I saw her – apart from being hooked up to a monitor and wearing a hospital robe, which always reminds me of a pillow case. She said she still had a little discomfort – she rated the pain about 3 out of 10, and it was coming and going. There was nothing to do but wait until all the tests came back. We just held hands and talked, trying not to worry. It’s hard not to though, in a hospital.
Around quarter past 5, an orderly appeared and asked if Jac would like dinner. Since we didn’t know how long we’d have to be there, and she hadn’t been told she wasn’t allowed to eat, we thought it was a good idea. As we waited for it to arrive, I said, “Do you know what I’m going to ask you now?” to which Jac replied, “Yes, you can take a photo.”
Jac’s dinner was sweet and sour pork with steamed carrot, zucchini and mashed potato, a couple of slices of white bread (no butter though!) and a bowl of pea and ham soup. For dessert she had some fruit salad and a tub of vanilla ice cream. To drink, she had orange juice and a cup of hot water with which to make tea or coffee, though she wasn’t keen on having any caffeine.
The pork was actually really tasty, and the mashed potato was delicious (Jac insisted I try some of her dinner, and of course I didn’t refuse).
The bit of paper there with the “FT” actually said “SOFT”. I think the meal was “soft” as opposed to the other choice, which we found out was schnitzel, which I guess would be “hard” due to the crumbed coating? *shrug*
As the orderly who’d delivered Jac’s dinner passed by, he saw me nibbling on a piece of Jac’s bread. He asked me if I’d like some sandwiches. And so I got to have a tray of food too: ham and salad sandwiches, fruit salad and crackers with tasty cheese. I had stuff to make a cuppa with too.
They were lovely sandwiches, with a generous serving of ham. I liked how they were made with both white and brown bread. That and the colours of the salad and ham made for a visually appealing meal. I must admit I was in a strange place between hunger and stress, so I didn’t actually enjoy them as much as I normally would’ve. Nothing wrong with them, other than the place I was to eat them. Not the sandwiches’ fault. :)
As we were finishing up, the doctor came to talk to us. The short of it is – they didn’t know what caused the pains. They ran blood tests to check for a number of things, including damage to the heart (none) and thyroid issues (none) – in fact, all the tests came back negative. The doctor said although he understood how frustrating it must be to not have a definite answer, the good thing is that they’d ruled out all the worst heart-related things that it could’ve been. We’ll be following up with a visit to our GP and will request a referral to a cardiologist and see where that leads, but it is possible that this latest incident isn’t a heart-related thing at all (this being a separate issue to the SVT, which she did not have on this occasion). While we waited on the very last test to come back, I went out to the waiting area and gave Jac’s mum an update. We were able to leave very shortly after that. The staff who dealt with us were all great. I was pleased we got to say good bye and thanks to the orderly who fed us, on our way out. When we got home, Pixel was waiting impatiently at the window with her “I want my dinner!” indignance. Billy Lee was waiting at the door.
Well, Jac is asleep right now. I need to jump into the shower and get ready for work. I’m running late this morning. I offered to stay home with Jac today, but she’s insisted I go to work. I’ll call her and check how she is throughout the day, and I know her mum will too.
This post has definitely been written in a hurry, but I wanted to just let you know how things are. There’ve been a number of other issues which have been keeping me from blogging lately, but I am hopeful I will have them resolved after this weekend. Thank you to everyone for all your emails and comments of support and encouragement.
PS. You all know, of course, if the situation had been different – grave – I wouldn’t have even thought about the camera or photos.