A chest tube?!?

Find part 1 of the story here

Time for a chest tube…

Clearly I don’t watch enough hospital tv drama. When they said chest tube, I’m thinking a tiny coffee stirrer type tube. OH NO!!! They pull out the kit to show/explain what they will do and I about lost it. The tube (more like super thick/long ice pick looking thing) was 2 feet long!!!! I looked right at him and said, ” I’m not that big! That things going to come out the other side of me!” He assured me they were using the smaller child size kit and that they wouldn’t use the entire length of it. Oooookkkkkayy…..i just keep telling myself I’m in the best place I can be.

I assume I’m going to an operating room and going at least under twilight anesthesia. I hadn’t eaten/drank all day so I was ready……Once again, small town Girl meets big city hospital culture shock. They take me back to the trauma area of the ER ED and pull the curtain to partition off the lady having a heart attack next to me. At this point I’m just in pure panic mode. I’m trying really hard to laugh and joke with everyone to get time through, but inside I was a scared mess. They tried to convince me to take some narcotics for pain, but they swore it was a super fast procedure and only hurt the initial stick. I hate narcotics. I had them when I gave birth to Andrew…I swore never again. Those things are awful. I don’t know how people become drug addicts. But anyway, I told him to double triple the lidocaine before the puncture and I would be okay. I was until they hit a nerve. Holy cow!!!! I’d rather give birth to a 12 pound baby with no epidural than have that pain. I think I broke Creg’s hand and the student doctor that was assisting. The tube insertion was super fast and they kept saying that the pain really should go away. My nerve must just be really agitated. Yeah, well. That pain didn’t go away. After about an hour they took me up to my room. Thank God for amazingly patient nurses because I was a hot mess of pain at this point. Pretty sure that ER never wants to see my true colors ever again. Hopefully they don’t have to.

Seventh Floor

Once upstairs they got me settled. They actually moved some people around so I could have a private room. Not sure if that was for me or the other patients, but I’m not complaining. The nurses talked me into some pain meds and muscle relaxer (super low dose) and I slept off and on about 10 minutes at a time. I’m not kidding, this pain was unreal. I felt better with the collapsed lung than with it back up!

So this is early morning Saturday. I’m under the impression that the tube will do it’s thing, they will remove it and I’ll be home Sunday night or at the latest Monday morning. My lung had other ideas. Numerous X-rays, getting my hopes up that I was healing and doing well, and then fail….. my lung started to collapse again Monday morning after they clamped the tube and my lung had to work on its own. Now surgery becomes more of a topic. If my lung doesn’t do it’s thing, they will have to do surgery to adhere it to the wall. They try and reassure me that my lung just needs another day to strengthen and they don’t really want to talk surgery just yet. Just wait. X-ray again this morning (Tuesday) and go from there.

So it’s a waiting game I don’t know anything. What if it’s good? What if it’s not? No clue. I just want to go home. I miss my babies and I want a shower. My mom is amazing and holding down the fort.

To be continued…..

Elizabeth Pierson

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