Waffle

There's a descriptions in "The Provinical Lady Goes to War" by E.M. Delafield where the hospitals are trying to keep beds cleared for any soldiers or bombed civilians that need them, despite WWII still being in its long opening phase where everyone's sitting around. We're told of them insisting a man was healthy enough to be discharged until he died on them.

That was from about 1940. Today, I learned things haven't changed much.

I got a severe case of food poisoning with enough pain that I wished for death. I eventually passed out from it and the exhaustion of all the vomiting. The hospital refused to give me painkillers until I was being checked out, then insisted I walk out immediately, instead of agreeing to get a wheelchair or give them time to kick in, or they'd call security on me. Because I was able to walk a few feet before the ambulance ride that was a half hour of shaking and severe pain, and of course my pain can't have changed.

I have never felt so helpless and uncared for in my life.

(N.B. Still pretty bad, but hurrah for codeine! Making life actually bearable!)

This entry was posted on Saturday, May 19th, 2007 at 4:12 am and is filed under Life. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.