Do Not Touch
I try not to be grumpy, but I can indeed come off as a grump-a-lump. Especially when I am in distress. I’m having major trouble with my feeding tube over the course of the past.. ::Counts on fingers:: Oh, as long as it has been implanted. One of my doctors said it kind of reminds her of an organ constantly being rejected. I mean. Make of that what you will. They’re not supposed to be this finicky. They’re supposed to just stay in and not suck so much. At the same time, I have also been told that feeding tubes are harder to keep in place if you have gastroparesis. So. I mean.. I do have gastroparesis. That’s an annoying thing that I do have.
Recently, I was at home when I felt my feeding tube dislodge. It’s a thing I can feel. The balloon will usually pop and then the tube will slowly start pushing out of me. Some times are more comfortable than others but over time it will get worse and the only thing for it is to go in and have them fix it. Yep. I gotta go all the way in to Interventional Radiology. I do not like.
I called up the scheduler and unfortunately they couldn’t get me in before my surgery. They tried to get it so that I would only need anesthesia once, by getting my tube fixed at the same time as my surgery but that didn’t work out. The scheduler told me to just go in and they would be able to do it while I was in the hospital.
Guess what? That was a lie. >.>
On top of that, once I woke up from my hernia surgery, it was apparent to me that someone had fiddled with my feeding tube because it was both 1) tighter and 2) more of it was coming out of my body. I didn’t give permission for any human to touch my feeding tube and I am so tired of people just tightening it on me and calling it a day. Tightening the bumper only causes pain and makes the tube hurt me. They think I won’t notice this because I am sleeping but I do notice it of course. There’s a happy medium between too tight and too loose that the bumper needs to be and any tighter causes problems and any looser causes significant pain. I was not pleased to wake up having seen someone tampered with my tube again. Sigh. In this vein, you never know who is going to do what to you or who is going to touch you where when you have general anesthesia. It’s that fucking annoying.
Because of this, and because I had a row of staples that I didn’t want to have tampered with in any way. (I go to a teaching hospital, and I didn’t want to deal with anyone touching, gawking at, fiddling with, calling people over for, fondling while I was out etc etc…) the staples and since I can’t trust any of the people taking care of me not to touch based on my word and signing a paper alone I did THIS:
Now, normally at home I don’t bandage it up like that. There’s just a piece of gauze over the top of it so that the stitches don’t rub against the binder, but I didn’t want to deal with any human at all fiddling with the stitches while I was unconscious so. We bound that fucker up in a transparent dressing and then Master Pravus wrote “Do Not Remove!” on it. I just didn’t wanna take any risks. All that being said: when I got to the Interventional Radiology department and they wanted to see my tummy to look at the tube before taking me back, the person looking laughed out LOUD and walked away. Didn’t even bother with my feeding tube.
GOOD. It WORKED.
Harumph. Grump-a-lump Kitty got what she needed, I guess, because nobody messed around with my staples. (Important).
And here I am all dressed up and ready to leave the hospital a little later after they put in a fresh tube. Huzzah! Woot.