Necessary Violations

A year ago yesterday was one of the hardest days of my life. I'd been bleeding for so long and so badly that I finally knew I needed to go to the ER. I did as much as I could to insure I was protected and then had my roommate drive me over there.

The trip seemed to take forever. I was very dizzy and weak. I remember telling him that I was thankful for our friendship. I wasn't trying to be dramatic. I was pretty sure I was going to die. Once we were finally there, I spent some time waiting for them to get me a fatsized wheelchair and then I was taken to a room.

I didn't know it at the time, but several firsts were happening for me. The first time in a hospital that year. The first needles being poked into me. The first of a series of having people stick things inside my vagina. The first of a series of times of people looking at my nakedness. At the moment, I didn't care. I just wanted help. I needed help. I didn't exactly get a lot.

I spent quite a few hours at the ER. During my exam, for some insane reason, my body had decided to STOP spurting out gore. An hour or so later, it began again, with a vengeance this time. I really feel sorry for whatever person had to clean up that room. I left blood all over the place.

By the time we got home, it was worse. Horrible clots shot out of my body. My roommate was trying to help me back into bed and he had to witness some of this. He took it in stride though. By the time I was able to lay down, I knew I wouldn't be able to handle the rest of the evening. I just slept, only getting up when I needed to clean myself from the blood spillage.

I felt horrible that day. I was embarrassed. I didn't think I would ever get any real help. I was exhausted from the blood loss. I felt like I would never really be clean again. I felt like I would never be in a clean room again, just.....always a messy one, with things soaked in pools of blood. I just didn't know if things could get better. And even more so than in the car trip over there, I thought I was going to die from this.

It's not a day I want to repeat. I've been trying to look for the good in all of the stuff that happened last year, but ER day is still hard on me. There were good things. My roommate was wonderful. The nurses treated me very well. My brother, who is also a nurse, came and sat with me. He was wonderful and kept me informed of what was going on. Things could have been a lot worse.

Maybe the good of this day is the fact that it was the start of me getting used to being in hospitals and dealing with the myriad of necessary violations that happen there. The last time I'd deal with hospitals had been in my 20s. Last year was the Year of Hospital Stays for me and the trip to the ER was the start of that.

Even as I write this, thinking about that day still fills me with a lot of trauma. I am no where near ready to make peace with it yet. If anything, I'm just glad I'm sitting here in my house, in reasonably clean circumstances, and with a rather strong sense of self. I didn't have to let anyone see me naked today. Yay.