Wednesday, July 9, 2008

Picnic at Belfast City Hospital

The past two days have been hell and I haven't slept very much lately. On Monday, Craig went to a coworker's house to fix his computer. Fixing computers led to the pub, Craig calling me 6 times sounding really wasted, and him coming home in the taxi shit-faced drunk. Before you accuse him of being an alcoholic, Craig honestly does not drink that much (a few Guinness here and there) and he absolutely HATES people getting drunk. Never in my life have I ever seen him like this.

His coworker calls and send Craig in a taxi because he is drunk. The taxi pulls up across the street, I struggle to get to the other side because our street is heavy traffic area and I was afraid he would get run over. He stumbles out of the taxi and opens the trunk of the taxi. The taxi driver gets out and says, "Why are you opening my boot?!?". I search Craig's pockets for his wallet because I didn't have any cash to pay the driver. The driver was like, "Who are you?!?!?". "I'm his girlfriend! Did he pay you for the taxi?" The taxi driver said that man who put him in a taxi did. Oh ok! Phew!

I drag him to the house as we stopped traffic. It was so embarassing. All the while, I was furious yelling at him that he's so fucked when he gets sober, and wait until his mom hears about this! I tell him to sit down in the living room like a drill sargeant. He complies. His eyes were glassy and so far gone! And great timing too, our roommate Connie was moving the rest of her stuff in and this was the first time she's ever met Craig. Connie was like, "Is he ok?!?". I whispered, he's drunk as I was talking to his mom on the phone. What a great first impression he made Connie. No wonder she locks her door every minute of the day. His mom told me that he is behaving unusually. He never gets drunk. He either just goes for coffee, if he does go out to drink, he just goes to bed but is never drunk.

So I tell him to go upstairs and he was limping and stumbling, all the while I'm freaking out because I've never cared for a drunk person ever in my life. I was hoping he'd just go to bed and sleep. He was walking up the stairs and I feared he'd lose balance fall backwards and break his neck! I screamed when he slipped! "Goddamn you!", I screamed. But he made it. He sat on the edge of the bed and started crying. I held him and asked him what was wrong. He just kept crying. I told him to lay down so he did sobbing into a pillow. He then fell asleep. I was like, thank god. I get the trash can and set it next to him. I wanted to get a glass of water but I didn't want him to be walking down three flights of stairs. So I sat there watching him breathe and making sure he was getting the right number of breaths per minute and his lips and nails aren't blue, take his pulse. I took a first aid training course a long time ago in college and one of the workshops was determining signs and symptoms of alcohol poisoning. Everything is in check. Afterwhile, he starts hyperventilating, I freak out and try to jar him awake for response. He starts sobbing again and clenching his teeth and grabbing everything in sight, including me, he pulls on my leg real hard, and then my wrist and wouldn't let go. I finally free myself and he reaches for the bedside lamp. Luckily, I got to the lamp before he did and took it away. Since I've never seen him in this condition, I had no idea how he would react so I kept my distance and called his mom.

I tell her he's being rough with me and he somehow, he suddenly wakes up and calms down. He heard I was talking to his mom, so he sat there quietly like a schoolboy in trouble. His mom comes and tells him to go to bed, and shape up! He undresses and falls asleep. I was afraid to go into bed with him for there's not telling what he might do so I was awake until he was deep asleep which was at 3am. By 4am, he came to and was awfully sick. And from there I was nursing him, giving him water, helping him piss, fixing him food. He said his ankle hurt. It was swollen pretty badly. I pegged it as a bad sprain so I elevated and iced it periodically.

Tuesday Morning - I finally got some shuteye around 7am. He woke up again and started vomitting so I had to get up again and give him water. It just stunk so bad, I was about to puke myself. I'm not good dealing with other people's body fluid issues. Come to think of it, not even my own. I had to clear the bucket and wash it out and stuff. He went back to sleep and I decided to stay awake and sterilize the bathroom and kitchen. That was how utterly disgusted I was!

I was helping him down and up the stairs to the toilet. I was pretty exhausted by then and quite delirious but I kept pressing. Around 6pm, his foot didn't look any better and he was in real pain. I walked to a pharmacy that was close by!!! The next pharmacy was a 25 min walk away. Fuck! What is it with this place? Are people not allowed to get sick after 6pm? This is when it really hit me that I really missed home. I miss how you can get anything at your fingertips and the convenience of a pharmacy practically on every block in SF such as Walgreens open 24 hours where you can get ibuprofen and a wrapping bandage before 6pm!!!! When we finally went to sleep that night he told me whie I was in a sleepy daze, "You are a better person that me, especially having to put up with such a wanker!". I moaned rolled over and stole all the duvet.

This morning the ankle wasn't any better. I went to the pharmacy around 8:30. It was still closed. I asked the shop next door what time it would be open, they helpfully said they didn't know. OK? So I come back and make fluffy pancakes w/ REAL maple syrup. We call the pharmacy and it is OPEN! Alleluia, he finally gets ibuprofen and I wrap his ankle. So enough was enough. Craig kept putting off the hospital and I forced him to go. We take a taxi at Belfast City Hospital. The taxi stopped across the way and he had to hop over to the ER. A nurse who had finished with a wheelchair brushed passed us and I yelled if we can use the wheelchair. She looks at us and hides the wheelchair in the corner. A kind woman wheels it over and made comment about the nurse, "I can't believe she walked by you and didn't even leave you the wheelchair! Hectic!". I wheeled Craig frantically looking for Accident and Emergency. We passed through I food court and gift shops, and I was like WTF? are we at the airport? What an odd layout. If you're at an ER entrance shouldn't the ER be right there? And of course, we had a defective wheelchair and it had it's own mind to go somewhere else.

We wait for awhile. And in my experience with the NHS so far, I packed us some sandwiches and drinks. Picnic at Belfast City Hospital! Yay! It was strange being in the emergency room of a hospital twice in the past two months. This time I was in the waiting room and Craig was seeing the doctor. I luckily didn't wait as long as Craig did for me (when I catapulted off his bike at 90 mph six weeks ago). They took xrays and it so happened that Craig seriously fractured his foot. If he put any more weight on it, he would have to get surgery! He has to stay off his foot for 6-8 weeks. He can't work because he's on his feet 8 hours a day. I got to sit with him while they plastered his cast. I took pics of Craig since it's the first time he's ever broken any bones. It's a milestone. First cast. The nurse yelled at me not to take pics in the hospital. What the fuck? They don't have any problems back home. I remember when my brother broke his foot, I took pics and the nurse even smiled and signed his cast! Fuck her.

The happy bunny!


On the bright side, we get to spend even more quality time with each other while I draw pictures of cocks on his cast for being a COCK! On the downside, we were supposed to go to Glasgow for 2 days next week. I suppose that's out and I would have lost out on $450 (no refund). Oh well!

Tune in to see what Craig does next week for more exciting, assinine adventures!

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