I worked in emergency rooms at two different local hospitals for years and one of the things I loved about working in such a hectic environment was that I never knew what any shift might hold. Surprises always popped up and no two shifts were ever the same.
When I came in to work that night I never expected to be involved in a love triangle but that is exactly what happened.
We had a moderately busy afternoon and things were moving along pretty well. No disasters yet, “so far so good”, are the words that were bouncing around in my head.
There was a pretty woman about 35 years old that was in one of our chest pain beds in the ER that evening. Her name was Mandy and it reminded me of a sweet friend of mine, named Mandy, from elementary school that was one of the kindest souls I had ever known. I found myself thinking of those times so many years before with my friend.
I noticed that our patient Mandy had a male visitor. He seemed so attentive that I had decided he must be her husband. As I worked I glanced up now and then and saw them chatting and laughing like someone attending an afternoon picnic. She did not look anything like the others we had in the chest pain rooms who were pale, weak and had the look of doom as they were in fear. Heart problems can make a person stop and think of the finality of life, but not so with our patient Mandy.
One of the phone lines at my desk began to ring and I never expected who would be on this line. I answered, “Springhill Emergency Room, how can I help you?” It was a well spoken young man who said he was calling to inquire about his wife who was a patient of ours. He said her name was Mandy. I advised him that the only thing we could tell anyone over the phone was whether the patient was stable or not. I confirmed that Mandy was stable. He said, “Well I am in the waiting room, can I come back to see her or do I need to wait?” I assured him I would come out there and get him when she could have a visitor.
I immediately walked to Mandy’s room and told her that her husband was outside and he wanted to come back to see her. She casually said, “Wait, I need you to hide my boyfriend first.” She said her boyfriend and husband knew each other and big problems could happen if her husband saw the boyfriend. I quickly escorted the boyfriend down a back hallway and asked him to wait there until I came back to get him. I did not feel good about it, but I did not want there to be an altercation in our ER.
Then I went to the waiting area and escorted Mandy’s husband to her bedside. Her husband looked so worried and concerned about his wife, who by then had a completely different demeanor. She was not laughing and freely chatting while her husband was there, she had the appearance of being in pain and weak as she lay there.
After about 20 minutes, the husband stepped to my desk and said that he was going home at his wife’s insistence. He explained that he had pulled a double shift at the paper mill and needed to bathe and rest, then he would return. He added "Mandy is so sweet, she wants me to go home and rest." He smiled as he said for me to take good care of his wife. I smiled back and nodded.
Once the husband was gone, I retrieved the boyfriend from the back hallway.
A couple of hours passed and the lab work results came back to reveal that Mandy's problem was not cardiac related at all. She was constipated. She looked embarrassed a little but I am sure she must have been relieved to know it was not a heart problem. She and her boyfriend continued their visit and moments later, Mandy’s husband returned. He said he felt that he needed to be with her, dirty or not, because she was an ER patient with heart related issues and his place was with her. He had gotten down the road a bit and decided to return because he loved her and needed to be with her. Again I asked him to wait a moment and advised I would come out and get him soon.
I walked into Mandy’s room once more. I told her and her boyfriend, this juggling act was not going to continue. I was not going to shift these two men back and forth anymore. I suggested the boyfriend leave the building via that back hallway and I advised I was going to let the husband back in a matter of minutes.
The boyfriend left, and I escorted the husband back to Mandy’s room. As I was leaving her room, I heard her say to her husband “they found some issues with my heart and they are going to discharge me anyway”.
He came to my desk and asked could he speak to the doctor who was seeing his wife as he was very concerned that she was being discharged like this. He appeared to be angry. I called back to the ER physician who was handling Mandy’s case, I gave him an earful of what had been going on and he came out immediately to speak with Mandy and her husband.
Our physician told the husband straight forward that Mandy did not have a heart problem at all, her diagnosis was constipation. Furthermore, she had already been informed of these details. Mandy laid there in silence and the husband apologized for getting upset.
She was prescribed a laxative and released back out into the world. I have no clue where her boyfriend went but I felt sure she would see him again soon. It was the tangled web of a love triangle that Mandy had weaved for herself. For me, there was no surprise that her problem was not her heart, I wasn't sure she had one.
No comments:
Post a Comment