HCH4

Since I have such an awesome job and everyone is jealous of all the gross things I have to do there, I decided that I should share some stories so that you feel like you are there.

You know you want to keep reading...

So this month was a strange one, but I guess its always a strange month on Huntsman 4th Floor.

Two people died unexpectedly in the same day. One was an older man who had been out on a walk with his wife. She was showing him around the patio and all the areas of the hospital when he just slumped over in his wheelchair inside the physical therapy room. The other was a thirty-something-year-old Romanian lady who just stopped breathing in the middle of the night.

One young girl who had been on our floor for almost a month contracted bacterial meningitis. The really contagious kind that almost always kills the infected person. (The same infection that killed that girl from East in high school. remember?) Well, this girl was my patient 4 days in a row before they found out what was wrong... What if I had gotten it from her!? While I had a few days off, she coded and last I heard, she was sent to the ICU. Scary. I liked her.

One particularly bad morning, I stepped in HUMAN poop and got it in the little crevices of my shoe. Yeah, it's a lot like dog poop but without the grass... and no, I don't ever wear those shoes inside my house.

That same day, I took care of a lady who had such a bad bowel obstruction that she was literally throwing up her poo. Dark, thick, and SO smelly. As disgusting as that was, I really felt bad for her. I mean, could you imagine??? Throwing up is bad enough as it is!

But in the midst of all the crap I deal with at work (pun intended), there are those people or those days that really make my job worth it. Like the time when I ordered 15 root beer floats for the family who wanted to toast to their father who had just passed away; or the time when a patient announced to us that she had named her tumor "Tina Tumor"; or the many times when patients who have gone into remission stop by to say hello and show us their new hair.

This week I met an adorable couple in their 60's. They are from Missouri but have been in Salt Lake since February, living with relatives while the husband gets his cancer treatment. He has stage 4 Melanoma that has spread throughout his body. They know he'll die soon, but they are so determined to make the rest of their life together perfect. They are that model couple that you hope to grow up to be. The wife loved to talk, but in her case, I actually enjoyed it. We chatted about sewing and family and Missouri and school. She told me how scared she was to become a widow, and to lose the man who has protected her for 45 years.

We see a lot of people die and many times we don't even think twice about it. But when someone lets you into their life and you can really connect with them, that's when death seems so awful--almost unfair.

Despite what I might say about my job on most days, I do actually love the work that I do. It makes me appreciate my life and my health and my beliefs. I just hope that I never get cancer.

Cancer really sucks.