Surely I was never this stubborn???

I first met Shaun at seven o'clock the morning after his surgery. It was a Saturday and the ward was quiet, it looked like it was going to be a nice shift. When I saw Shaun he looked to be in pretty good shape as he was nibbling at something light for breakfast and keen to get moving. He seemed to have had no lasting side affects from his anaesthetic, in particular any nausea, and his pain seemed under control. This was a good sign, it's always good to get patients moving early, but I did warn Shaun to take it easy.

“Take it easy? The sooner I get out of here the better.” Shaun was determined to get out this damn place because it was “full of depressing old people.” I couldn’t do much about the fact that he was sharing a room with three older men, but it wasn’t so bad. Sure one of them had a touch of night time dementia and kept getting up during the night calling out for his long dead wife, but at least he wasn’t in the women’s room. Any time anyone walked into the women’s room Mrs Stewart, the 85 year old nun on prescribed bed-rest because of leg ulcers, kept on calling for us to stop touching her in naughty places.

The first thing that Shaun wanted to do that morning was to have a shower. “No problem Shaun” I told him, “but are you sure you are up to it? Why don’t you wait until a bit later in the day, you’ve only just come out of theatre.” Shaun was not going to wait. I then suggested that he use the large shower room that has a chair in it that he can use, but he would have to wait half an hour as other patients were booked in first. Of course Shaun was not willing to wait; he was determined to use the normal size shower with no seat inside. I suggested to Shaun that this was perhaps not the best idea as the shower is hot, steamy, cramped and with no ventilation, he would probably pass out. Shaun seemed to think that he knew what was best for his body and ignored my advice, he was oblivious to reason.

From past experience I knew to wait outside Shaun's shower cubicle. Five minutes later I heard a ‘thump’ followed by a squealing sound that comes when skin rubs against wet plastic. These were the sounds of Shaun first hitting the wall and then sliding down the wall to lie in a tangled heap on the shower floor. As I helped bring him round I conveniently happened to have a bowl in my hand which Shaun promptly threw up into. I popped him in a shower chair and wheeled him back to bed. He was so pale that he would have made a ghost look tanned and he had broken out into a cold sweat.

As awful as Shaun looked it was nothing serious although I made sure he hadn’t done any damage to his would. Thankfully he hadn’t but he was in quite a bit of pain, what a surprise. I didn’t even pretend to feel sympathy for him but did give him some paracetamol.

Even though an appendectomy is quite a minor operation, it still takes a toll on the body. Not only have you been sliced open and had some innards taken out, the effects of a general anaesthetic can take its own toll on the body, even if you feel well. I have not had this problem with older men or woman of any age as they seem to listen to advice.