Tuesday, March 1, 2016

Blood & Vomit

The title sums up the past 24 hours.  Period 3 nurse's duty was a steady stream of kids complaining of nausea - real or psychosomatic related to work not completed.  Then, I go to the oral surgeon to get the news I expected.  I need to have surgery.  My gums are receding - genetic, not poor dental situation - and I need to have a gum graft.  It has to be after my Spring vacation because I have to have the teeth bonded in the back to slow them from loosening anymore.  That has to be done by my dentist.  Then the gum graft.

I get home late, Millie eats super fast, and then, while doing paperwork upstairs....  I hear it.  The hurl.  The poor baby still doesn't know how to eat slowly.  Then everything calmed down.  All was running smoothly until after dinner.  I notice hubby is awfully quiet.  The downstairs bathroom door is closed slowly as I come into the kitchen.  Yup.  A nosebleed.  And this one is a gusher.  It's a good thing he just bought more tissues over the weekend.  Millie is concerned and trying to get in the bathroom.  I know to just offer help and be near enough in case he needs it, but be far enough to be out of his hair.  I can hear him gagging on the blood as it slides down his throat.  He hates the taste of blood.  I leave him be.

The flow slows and he goes up to the computer room to lay down.  Millie mills about, concerned.  I check on him.  He insists he will clean up the downstairs bathroom.  He already cleaned the blood off the walls and the floor.  Of course, I refuse to let him worry about the rest.  I learned from Sue and Mrs. Mariella that after a nosebleed, you can't make any sudden up and down movements.  So I go clean up.  Well, I never knew that blood had such a strong smell.  The bathroom is real tiny.  And he left the door shut.  Wow, it smells just like it tastes.  Another interesting thing.  The moment bleach makes contact with blood, the blood goes from red to brown.  Interesting.  And so I scrubbed.  Blood all over the sink and splashes on the toilet.  I was remembering cleaning my grandmother's blood off her walker and cane when we donated them after she passed away after a fall.

It all sounds so horrible, but these are the things you just have to do.

Then as I am reading after the bleeding has stopped, I start to feel warm, then cold, and kind of weak.  I have been fighting a sore throat for days.  I thought it was just all the talking in Photo I, but then I wonder if it is more.  And I start to worry because I cannot afford to take a day this week.

Fast forward to this morning.  Hubby must have had a nosebleed in the middle of the night.  There are bloody tissues in the garbage in the upstairs bathroom and some bloody remnants in the sink.  I scrub it as best as I can.   Hopefully he will take the day off.  He got embarrassed when he had a nosebleed at work...  And during breakfast Millie vomits again.  I might have to go back to massaging her back and soothing her as she eats to not have her wolf it down and then chuck it back up in minutes.

Blood & vomit.

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