A Not Great Easter

I’d never heard of viral arthritis, until I got it. It makes all of your joints ache terribly and I wound up being hospitalized for it.

I was only 8 years old, so I was placed in the children’s ward, which was just one big room with multiple beds. As far as I was concerned, I had the best spot there, right by a fish tank built into the wall. Not only could I watch the fish, but I could look through the tank and into the corridor to spy on the nurses’ station.

When that failed to entertain, there was a TV on the other end of the room. I wasn’t minding that. It felt like an adventure, albeit a forced one. No parents were allowed to stay past visiting hours though, and that was a little unsettling. In retrospect, I’m sure the separation was worse for them than it was for me. In fact, I know it was worse for them, because my diagnosis took a few days to determine, and some of the possibilities on the list were pretty grim. My folks went above and beyond to protect me from that fact; I was a full-grown adult before they told me.

I was in a strange bed, in a strange place, and not feeling great, but told to get a good night’s sleep. Except nighttime is when the nurses came into our room to watch that TV. Specifically, The Bobby Vinton Show. I wish I could explain how or why I can remember lying uncomfortably awake listening to Blue Velvet, but all I can say is there are snippets of memories so vivid from this time that I recall them more clearly than yesterday.

After being up late with the TV, and sleeping fitfully due to strange and loud hospital noises all night, not to mention being sick, I was pretty groggy the next morning when they woke us all up. That’s why I thought maybe I was misunderstanding the nurse when she denied me breakfast because I needed an empty stomach for the operation I was about to have. Say what now? Again, she insisted I was having surgery later that morning. That scared me. The adults I usually had to protect me weren’t allowed in yet, and the adult in front of me was now the bad guy. I mounted as strong of a case as I could for a third grader, “I’m really sure my mom would have told me if I was having an operation.” I did think I was speaking the truth, and surely if Mom didn’t want to tell me a doctor would have, but then I wondered, what if this is how it’s done? They spring it on you so you don’t worry. Well, mission failed. I was worried.

Eventually, a doctor came into the room, walked to another bed, and soon after started yelling. He was furious. He discovered the nurses had confused me with another little girl and she was the one scheduled for surgery. Because they gave her my breakfast she couldn’t have her procedure. While I was very grateful to have hung on to my perfectly healthy appendix, my confidence in the medical profession was dealt a severe blow. Also, I was hungry.

Not having a patient advocate, this 8-year-old had to fight for her breakfast. By the time all the surgery drama had settled down, and I got a nurse’s attention to ask for my previously denied eggs, I was told the meal service was over. So now I’m Oliver, begging for food. That’s really the ticket to successful kiddom, when all else fails, look pitiful and the likelihood of getting your way goes way up.

The make-up breakfast they finally dropped off for me consisted of a little carton of milk, a tiny box of cereal, a hard-boiled egg, and a banana; all things impossible to open with arthritic fingers. I had to wait for the mom of another patient, who happened to be the first visitor to arrive that morning, to ask her to please help me get into everything.

This all happened right around Easter. I only remember that because someone dressed as the Easter Bunny came through the ward and gave all of us little gifts and a dyed egg. Well, the gift was cool, but what do I want with another egg I can’t open? I gave it to my mom when she next visited and she put it in her purse. Later, when she got home, she made a series of unpleasant discoveries: it had been a raw egg, it had broken, and it was all over the contents of her bag. Who dyes raw eggs? And gives them to sick, hospitalized children? That’s just wrong. And yet, hearing my dad tell me about it that night was probably the hardest we all laughed during those stressful days.

I was released after four days and immediately upon getting home took the most epic nap of my life. My bed had never felt more comfortable, and my room had never seemed so quiet. And I had an egg salad sandwich made from a dyed hard-boiled egg, like normal people do.