No more monkeys jumping on the bed!
One little Iman jumping on the bed She fell off and bumped her head! Momma called the doctor and the doctor said: Take her to the ER, she might need stitches. As life imitates art (or vice-versa?) Iman smashed her head against the corner of a dressing table while jumping on Momma’s bed and initiated herself into the world of the Mortal Wound. And what a dramatic initiation it was- twenty minutes of crying and bleeding profusely and refusing to hold still, blood on her clothes and on her face as she tried to make the pain go away by vigorously rubbing at it. (Note: this doesn’t work) We did eventually get the bleeding to stop, and then packed her into the car and off to the emergency room in Abu Dhabi. We were seen right away, Alhamdulillah, and were asked only once- “So ma’am, what is the prob- oh. Richard, dressing for the baby please!” Iman was in a fairly good mood, the pain having subsided, and we even went through a few rounds of ‘Five little monkeys jumping on the bed,’ to the amusement of the ER staff. Iman bobbed up and down and tapped on her own head for emphasis, and appropriately shook her head and held out a very stern finger at the final line. But then the fun was over because it was time to actually do something about the hole in her forehead. In case you’ve ever wondered what the Iman:Normal Human ratio of intensity is, I think it’s three to one. That’s how many people it takes to hold her down so that one nurse can push the edges of the wound together while another paints it with glue, fans it dry, paints it again, fans some more, and then lays down steri-strips, and then clear plastic bandage to background shrieking of “No! Wait! All Done! No No No! Mommaa!” When it was all done and Iman’s hands were finally freed, she made an angry grab at the bandages on her forehead. Ouch! she cried out in genuine surprise. She frowned, sniffled, thought for a moment, and then tried again. Ouch! *pout*. Cindy and I were trying desperately to not laugh out loud, and we waited to see whether she would do it again. She did. Ouch! *pout* We gave her a glass of water and some tic-tacs, and with both hands full, she stopped taking swipes at herself. She fell asleep in the car on the way home, woke up in the morning happy, and seems to have forgotten about last night’s trauma. Today Cindy and I moved the furniture around in the bedroom, and the new arrangement is awkward, but at least there is nothing forehead puncturing in the vicinity of the bed. Alhamdulillah, we were blessed that Iman did not get the corner of the dresser in her eye, and I’m not going to risk it. No more monkeys jumping on the bed! Labels: Medical Misadventures, Mortal Wounds
There's a monster under my bed, but don't worry, I think it's just me.
For the most part, I consider myself a fairly well put together person. Alhamdulillah, I’m not easily given to panic or woe-is-me-ism. Lately though, I find myself being ambushed by sudden, overwhelming feelings of hopelessness and futility. Am I depressed? Not nearly as much as I was last month or so. I think I’m just emotionally vulnerable. And here I am blogging about it, because sometimes the only way to conquer the monster under your bed is to put your head under there with a flashlight and see that it’s only an old pair of bunny slippers. I haven’t been able to drag the monster out of the dark yet (and to date, I’ve never owned a pair of bunny slippers) but the first step towards a solution is admitting that there is a problem. So I am. And here it is. I, Abez, deliberate Muslim and earnest (if not part-time) seeker of The Straight Path, suddenly find myself face-down in a pot hole when I thought I had been doing a jaunty two-step on the road to spiritual completion and peace. We all hit speed-bumps, but sometimes I feel like someone has laid out a trip wire. And thumb tacks. Yes, I know, the straight path is bumpy and uphill. It’s supposed to be that way. The easy path is the wrong one. It’s the one with the smooth, fluid, downhill descent into the pleasure of distraction. I could read books all day, I could numb reality with non-stop nonsense, I could fall face-first into the gooey decadence of self-indulgence and then I wouldn’t have to think about anything that stressed me out, because I wouldn’t have to *think*. And if I didn’t think, I wouldn’t worry. It would seem that I worry a lot. I worry about Khalid, his future, his teeth, that funny rash on his back, whether his pants are too tight, his shoes too small, his hair too long... And Iman- SubhanAllah- I spend hours worrying about her, but not as a mutually exclusive activity. I worry about her while doing other things- like when brushing her hair- how can I teach her to do hijab with passion and eagerness and the certainty that you can only have when the decision comes from both the mind and the heart? Will she be intelligent? Will she be a compassionate person? If she’s not, how can I teach her? Will she pray? Will she resent me for trying to make her? And then I worry about random people. I only have to step into the waiting room of my doctor’s office to have my mind suddenly awash with hopelessness- all these people waiting around me are worried too, they all need help, they all have something wrong, some things major, some things minor, all of them painful, many of them debilitating. Will they find purpose through their trials? Or will they think they were ok until they hit a speed bump, stepped on a thumb tack and then fell face first into a pot hole, where they then rolled over and found me laying next to them? On a side-note, the view from the pot hole can be amazing. If you just turn over, you can see the stars. But maybe this isn’t the side-note, maybe this is the whole point. Maybe I lose track of the destination while plodding along, staring at nothing but my feet. Maybe I need to get knocked to the ground so I can turn to the sky. I don’t know if this is entirely true, but I do know that I am never closer to Allah than I am when in pain, in fear, and in need. And in the closeness is a sweetness that you can’t find anywhere else, and that closeness is the direct result of desperation. I know I am suppose to stand up, thank Allah for the lesson, and keep on climbing, but sometimes I feel like my legs are giving out on me, or that there’s no way I’ll ever make it to the top. I lose hope, though Alhamdulillah, I have yet to lose purpose. Correction: I refuse to lose purpose. I will not lose purpose. Even if I’m laying in the dirt without the will to get up again, I will still know why I’m there and what direction I’m going to go in once I can find my feet. I need to remember, and God, please help me remember, that if fate gives me a black eye it’s because Allah ordered it. And there is good in it, provided I am willing to see it and that I am humble enough to admit that I deserved it, and Lord knows I have enough sins to warrant some expiation. God give me the strength to admit that Allah knows best, and that losing hope in anything good ever lasting for too long is losing hope in Allah’s Mercy, His divine will, and His greater purpose in all things. I can’t blame anyone but myself, even though sometimes my fits of hopelessness feel almost out of my control. One minute I’m ok, next minute I’m thinking about how hard all the day-laborers and construction workers have it, how they don’t see their families for years at a time and earn less money a year than most people earn in a month. And I’m thinking that it’s just not fair. Aha! I lose hope because it’s not fair. To them. Or to me. Oh boy. I didn’t know my spiritual angst was still a teenager. I bet if my discord had tiny feet, it would be stomping them right now. I’m pretty sure I haven’t whined ‘It’s not fair!’ since I was a baby-faced teenager arguing over how my brother got to stay out late on the weekends but I always had to be home before dinner. At some point I grew up and learned things like: - God is just, but people can be cruel and small
- This world is just a big board game with live pieces
- Allah will even out all the imbalances on the Day of Judgment, so all ‘unfairness’ is just temporary
- Setbacks, handicaps, physical flaws, mental deficiencies are a function of the hand you are dealt in a game we all play. And no one has all the aces anyway
And I also learned things like: - Allah has promised to not test anyone more than they can bear
- All pain, worry, illness, stress, etc- when handled with patience and faith, simply erase previous sins in addition to make you stronger
- Allah has promised refuge to those who seek refuge in Him
- And if you go to Him walking, He comes to you at speed
So now I need to add some new lessons. And it may be a statement of the obvious, but I think it helps round off the previous lessons nicely. Here it is: - Trying to be righteous is hard work
- When they said uphill, they really meant it
- Spiritual struggle can be quite a ... struggle
By Abez, The End. Labels: Autism, Islam, Medical Misadventures
InshaAllah
A heart so torn will bleed, and bleeding so congeals That a darkened outer covering will block the touch that heals A heart then stripped will bleed, and with bleeding fingers I Begin to mend again a heart that otherwise would die Because Allah has set no limit on how often I be broken And no promise, no oath, has yet to me been spoken To guarantee that strands of pain, twisted to a filament Won’t lacerate the tender heart around which they are bent But this guarantee, this oath, clearly has been made: My Guardian Lord has promised me gardens in the shade And promised me no burden greater than I may bear So with this thread of hope, I make my small repairs For a heart so torn will bleed, but mended so, no longer And the wounds that made me bleed, only make me stronger. Labels: Autism, Medical Misadventures, Mortal Wounds, Poetry
You would think the hospital would give us a group discount...
Had HF's family over for dinner. Made chicken kabobs. And gave every last person food poisoning, in varying degrees, with seven requiring the hospital. Myself included.
SubhanAllah. 2010 has been an interesting year already, no? Labels: Medical Misadventures, Mortal Wounds
The believer is not broken by sorrow Any more than a mountain is leveled by wind And neither are battered, but shaped By the force of storms they would weather Labels: Autism, Medical Misadventures, Mortal Wounds, Poetry
SubhanAllah
One of the great things about not updating your blog regularly is that no one really visits it anymore. So you can write whatever you want to. Like this:
Lab Technician: Ah, a BHCG test, expecting a baby?
Me: No, having a miscarriage.
LT: Oh, uh- I'm sorry.
Me: It's ok.-Pained silence-Once upon a time I was in the US for Owlie’s wedding, and two days after arriving, I found out I was pregnant. And then, after four days of baby shopping, and quietly thinking of names, and imagining sweet little faces with HF’s big brown eyes, I found out I was having a miscarriage. And then I was on the next flight home, a week after I had arrived and a week before my original return. And here I am today. Blogging. Because it would seem that my blog fulfills many roles, one of which is catharsis. And I’m an extremely logical person, but my own brain is baffled by how deeply you can mourn something that was never yours and was never meant for you to begin with. I can’t say that I’ve lost a baby, because the baby was never mine. If Allah had willed that child for me, the entire world could not have withheld it from me. But He did not, and so the entire world can not grant it to me. And the miscarriage was not my fault, and could not have been caused by anything I did or by any medicine I could have taken. The doctor very kindly said so. Which was nice, because up until that point I had been mentally crucifying myself for taking my daily migraine medication. Never mind that I had no idea I was pregnant until three days before I miscarried. I’m a mom, I blame myself for things. The flip side of taking responsibility for your children is that you blame yourself when something happens to any of them, even an embryo that was never meant to be born. And you cry, and you cry, and you cry. And when no one is looking, and Abu Dhabi is flying past you at 155 kph with the highway roaring and the nasheed blasting, you cry when you remember what you’ve been trying so desperately to drown out. A few people know, and they ask about me because they care, not because they’re trying to stick their fingers into the gaping, bleeding, hole in my heart. I have to pull myself together and be polite, and patient, and coherent, and talk about things in terms of BHCG levels and non-viability and natural termination. I have managed to not cry in front of anyone but HF and the speed radars on the Abu Dhabi/Dubai highway, not because I’m being Stoic, but because I don’t want anyone’s pity, especially my own. I’m healthy, I’m ok, I am free from permanent physical effects of what was an early and natural miscarriage that required no medical intervention, chemical or surgical. I have two beautiful, amazing children and no reason to believe that I cannot have more, InshaAllah. I have the most loving, supportive, water-proof husband in the entire world, who not only knows what to do with a wife who is crying so hard she’s incoherent, but also to make her stop, and eventually, even smile. Allah hasn’t wronged me. He never has. And faith says that He never will. Healing is just a matter of time and patience. And being content with God’s will does not mean that I cannot allow myself to grieve. SubhanAllah, may Allah bless those who preserved the life and sunnah of the Prophet, so that fourteen hundred years after the death of Prophet Muhammad, we know what he said upon the death of Ibrahim, his 18 month old son. “"O Ibrahim, against the judgment of God, we cannot avail you a thing."
His son died in his lap, and when he passed away, the Prophet, with tears in his eyes, said “"O Ibrahim, were the truth not certain that the last of us will join the first, we would have mourned you even more than we do now." A moment later he said: "The eyes send their tears and the heart is saddened, but we do not say anything except that which pleases our Lord. Indeed, O Ibrahim, we are bereaved by your departure from us."
May the peace and blessings of Allah be upon him.Logic and emotion are both part of human nature, and insane, frantic, overwhelming love for your children is part of a parent’s nature. I am allowed to be sad, but I am also required to fight through the blinding storm of grief and find the knowledge that Allah doesn’t test anyone more than they can bear, and all that’s required of me to pass this test is to keep faith and be patient. Verily we are God’s, and to Him we return. Inna lillahi wa inna ileihi rajioon Labels: Islam, Medical Misadventures, Mortal Wounds
The knee bone's connected to the- head bone!
So my surgery happened successfully on Saturday morning, and had some interesting highlites.
Dr. Anesthetist: How are you feeling? Me: Cold, your OR feels like a refrigerator. Dr. : I'll fix that. I will give you a cocktail. (Holding up a syringe) Me: What flavor is it? Dr: You will like it, it is warm.
And it was warm. Warm and fuzzy. At some point, between the warmness and the fuzzification, I looked up and saw a familiar white meniscus on the TV screen hovering above me, and realized that my orthopedic surgeon had already begun the arthroscopy without me even having felt it.
I tried to look over the blue sheet that concealed the actual gore from me and asked my Dr. Ortho, "Hey, did he give me the spinal anesthetic?"
Dr. Ortho nodded and went on with his work. I turned my head and located Dr. Anesthetist.
"Hey, did you give me the spinal?"
"Of course!"
"When?"
"A few minutes ago."
"Oh."
I missed it. I have no memory of being turned over or poked in the spine. The one thing that was seriously freaking me out about my surgery I totally missed. Hooray! I figure perhaps I zonked out immediately after I received the 'cocktail,' because I am fairly sure that I maintained consciousness all the way until the point where the Ortho said that my meniscus had a huge tear in it, the edge was too frayed to repair, and that he would try to remove the most damaged parts and save what he could.
And I said, "That's annoying," and then I woke up in the recovery room with my teeth chattering. And for some reason, my skin itching as well. I'm a bit fuzzy on the details, but at some point I stopped itching and fell asleep again, and woke up in the my room with Mona somewhere vaguely nearby. And she had cookies. :)
And then I woke up four hours later wondering if I really had seen Mona, and it turns out that if she had been a dream then at least the cookies were real. As were the Doritos, the water, the box of tissues and the M&M's. Thank you Mona, the munchies produced by your ethereal presence saved me from starvation. :) And we need to get together sometime ago when I'm slightly more conscious, but you're still awesome. :)
I didn't really and truly wake up until around eight in the evening. I did have several phone conversations before then, but I'm not really sure what I told people, hah. It was established, however, that Owlie had mis-read her return ticket, and was returning imminently instead of the next day, and so by around 10 that night Hemlock and TFL brought me Owl and some lovely rich chocolate cake direct from the airport :)
I was discharged from the hospital the next day, and my Momma picked me up, and then we went to pick Khalid up from OT. (Occupational Therapy) He hadn't seen me for about 36 hours, and when I walked into the room and sat down (and accidentally dropped my crutches on the floor) he began fawning all over me and hugging me. And giggling. Which was lovely. :)
And then we drove home and met up with Iman, who hugged me, and then hit me, and then hugged me, and then both of the kids fought over my crutches. (Khalid won. He's decided that they are 'tick! [stick]) and believe it or not- Iman began limping. There is no doubt about it, and it was hysterical and very weird- she was following me around and limping, and periodically looking up at me to make sure she was doing it right. She's amazing, and so tremendously silly.
Within an hour it was time to go again, because as it turns out, Owlie was having a severe wisdom tooth infection, and my dentist had agreed to see her that very afternoon, but she had never seen him before and didn't know where his office was. So we sped off to Abu Dhabi, having just been in Dubai less than two hours ago, and my dentist (the same one who tried to get me to dislocate my own jaw, good times!) removed Owlie's tooth right then and there. Or what was left of it, rather. It had been partially impacted, and broken too.
And by then I ran out of steam, fell asleep in the car, and upon arriving back home, stumbled out of the car and into bed for another two hours. I woke up at 9 pm feeling much improved, and with icecream in my lap and a bag of frozen corn on my knee, I proceeded to defeat both of my parents in Scrabble.
The moral of this story? I am not a post-op superman. Today is the end of post-op Day Two, and although I've been able to put the crutches aside for hobbling around the house, I'm still very, very tired and physically exhausted. I'm not in a tremendous amount of pain, I'd say about a five on a scale of one to ten- not enough to make you cry, but just enough to give you a perpetual wince.
Hf is coming home in umm... 68 hours! Here's hoping I'm recovered enough to actually be able to pick him up from the airport!
Labels: Medical Misadventures
Hooray for free Wifi! Blogging from the hospital
For my next trick, I will post a two minute review of the hospital before the nurse comes in and starts poking me with things.
The room is nice. Like five-star nice. Hotel nice. With mini fridge and huge flat screen TV, and and vanity kit and lotion and mosaic tiles and luxury bathroom fitting, etc etc. And there's a pool and spa, but that's just for the VIP patients. Which I am obviously not, but I think if I were here longer I would try and see how strictly they enforce their entrance policy :p
I was actually here three days ago, and that time in the ER. I had food poisoning, which is why my surgery was postponed, and I have to say their ER staff was so ridiculously nice. They even picked me up off the floor when I passed out in radiology.
The nurse on duty just came in and introduced herself. Her name is Pumula, and she is a tall, black South African woman who name means 'To Rest.' Culturally, this is what a mother names her youngest child. I asked her how the mother knows this one will be the last, and she answered "You know, it's interesting because in those days there was no birth control, so I suppose if a mother named their last child Pumula then the husband just knew he was supposed to go away." Haha!
The City Hospital gets a positive review on their nursing staff as well.
So far so good. My surgery is set to begin in an hour, and I'm not sure how much earlier they plan on taking me in to the OR. So I should wrap up and unpack my stuff because I won't be able to do so later. I'll be having spinal anesthesia instead of general, so I'll be awake for the procedure but won't be able to walk four two hours afterwards, or so they say.
Off we go!
Labels: Medical Misadventures
Hats off to Dr. Balooshi
For being my more interesting Orthopedic Surgeon. And since I told him about my blog (because I was looking for the video of my previous knee arthroscopy and knew I had posted here a while back) I am now obliged to wave at him. *waves* Hi Doc!
Dr. Belooshi is cool. Not only because once, when I visited, he had a kilo of Belgian chocolates on his desk, but because he hooked me up with some painkillers after my tonsillectomy when my ENT let me down with a pat on the back and a 'take two aspirin and call me in the morning' approach to recovery.
(I've learned, btw, that the reason why I wasn't prescribed post-tonsillectomy Codeine as per standard practice, is because in the UAE it's a controlled substance)
But I digress. My knee is malfunctioning again- clicking and swelling and aching from the moment I wake up to the moment I fall asleep, so we're going for another MRI and then possibly another arthroscopy. This time, I'll be awake for when they poke the hole and then the camera inside. I'm feeling slightly weirded out by this. I'm ok with the sight of gore as long as it's someone else's. And on TV. I'm not sure what the point of keeping me awake will be if I'm just going to lie there with my eyes closed, gnawing on a corner of the blanket, hehe.
Labels: Medical Misadventures
To paraphrase David Allen-
There are some days when the only thing you're good for is filling the stapler. On those days, the most productive thing you can do is fill the stapler. There is no point in trying to answer your email or put together a proposal or talk to an important client on the phone. You haven't the brainpower for it, so just be content to fill the stapler.
Today is a day for filling staplers. But not too many of them, because they look heavy and complicated.
I'm sitting in corner of Khalid's therapy center with the laptop on my knees and a cup of black coffee by my side, I've also consumed copius amounts of decongestant, paracetemol, and herb tea. I'm feeling like Ms.Pestilience 2009- and I probably look the part too. I'm the lump in the corner with the hacking cough, blocked nose, and miserable looking eyes. I got me some bad germs. -koff-
I've been staring at my computer, dutifully composing and recomposing the same email for the last forty minutes. I finally picked out the last of the typos, fragments, and goobledygook that working under the influence of germs tends to produce and mailed it. Now I need a break. There's a coffee shop downstairs and I hope they have chicken soup. Labels: Medical Misadventures
Let's talk tonsils.
So, tonsils. They're these things that don't apparently do much. I say apparently because they must be there for a reason, it's just not apparent to us what it is yet. The sole purpose of mine seemed to be the harbouring of illegal rabble-rousing bacteria who contributed to regular throat infections. Pharyngitis, laryngitis, you name it, and I've had an -itis in it, and it probably meant antibiotics and losing my voice, or worse- finding my voice sounding like a chain-smoking truck driver, one that HF affectionately named Frank.
So about my tonsils. They're gone now. But they are making darn sure I won't forget them. SubhanAllah for your health, Alhamdulillah- the ability to do something as simple as swallow is a blessing that you don't appreciate until unable to, you end up spitting blood into tissues while your body convulses in pain. I am not being dramatic. I am being honest. Alhamdulillah, I think the worst may be over, but that could be because my orthopedic surgeon (who had nothing to do with the tonsillectomy) saw me this afternoon for a follow-up and graciously prescribed me a shot of painkillers. He's a Good. Person.
Around half an hour after the shot, I was able to see the world a little more optimistically, as well as swallow my own spit, and once the warm numbness spread throughout the rest of my throat, HF and I hightailed it to Tony Roma's, where I had my first meal in three days. I washed it down with three huge glasses of iced tea. That was four hours ago. The pain killers will be wearing off soon, and I'm guessing that my outlook on this whole tonsillectomy thing will get much bleaker when it does, but for the moment, I think I'm ok. Iman is sitting on my desk eating cheerios and laughing just a few inches away from the keyboard. Khalid and HF are out dropping off Ruth- it's her day off, and she's worked hard juggling both kids while I've been out of commission, and she really needs the break.
My brain feels a bit fuzzy, and I'm pretty sure that this blog entry will make less sense later than it does now. Also, thank God for spellcheck.
The End. Labels: Medical Misadventures
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Abez Is... 
