Surgery in a Foreign Country

Saturday May 24th I was at a barbeque with all of my church friends. The hamburger and hotdogs were amazing. I was getting bored so I decided to get on the trampoline with the young girls. We were playing a game where you had to copy the trick the previous person did, so when it was my turn I was a little nervous but I went for the tricks so that I wouldn’t be out. I jumped really high, then landed on my knees, and finished with a head stand. I landed on my right arm funny and I heard three distinct pops. My arm went limp, so I got off the trampoline and acted like I was fine. As time passed the pain increased, I put some ice on it and held it across my chest. I could no longer move or bump it without a shooting pain up my arm.

         Our friends, the Wood Family, took us to their home and then drove Nick to Changnyeong to get my insurance card. When they got back we ate dinner and then went to the Emergency Room at Fatima Hospital.

         In the ER they gave me some pain medication and then x-rayed my arm. Come to find out I had two fractures one on the radial head, and one on the coronoid process and possibly a third one on the humerus. They mentioned that I may need surgery, and that I needed to see their specialist but he is only there Tuesdays and Thursdays. They wanted to admit me into the hospital, but I didn't want to stay. They wrapped my arm in a splint, gave me some pain medications and sent me on my way with a Tuesday appointment.
         Richard and Suzie were super kind to drive me to the hospital Tuesday morning. I brought some things with me just in case I had to stay. We met with the Doctor and he said I needed surgery on the radial head. He would use two screws to put it back into place. He could do the surgery Wednesday, so they went ahead and admitted me to the hospital. They told me I would recover in the hospital for six days after my surgery. Richard and Suzie were a lot of help. They got me set up in a cheaper room with Koreans and Korean meals.  If I wanted an international room and American food it would cost more money.  I was a little nervous at first because Richard told all of the ladies, ajimas, in my room that I don’t speak Korean well but I do understand it. I got settled into my little place and they left.

I felt so loved! You will find my name in Hangul on line E.

Some students made these get well posters for me. 

Nick spent as much time as he could with me but he had to leave either at 10am or 2pm to get to work. Then Mr. Ha would drop him off at the bus station right after work at 9 pm. I didn't see Nick until 10:30 and we would talk about our day and sometimes we would walk around the hospital. We usually passed out around midnight wake up at 5 or 6, breakfast at 7 and another was gone. It seemed like Nick was never there when I really needed him to be and that made me sad.

My roommates weren't so bad, except for their never ending stinky gas. Ya you heard me GAS!!!! I was the lucky one because Nick slept on the floor next to the queen of flatulence! Nick’s words, one night right before bed she had the longest fart I have ever heard and the worst part was I felt “the wind.”

I have so many stories I could tell, but I will spare you some of them and only tell the most memorable ones.

I ate rice, seaweed soup, some questionable meat, and kimchi for EVERY MEAL!

My Proof:

I would post more pictures of food but they all look the same.

I sucked it up and ate as much as I could for each meal, but honestly who likes cooked cold fish with the scales still on it? Not me!

My room was occupied with two older women who broke their backs, one with two broken arms, one who had knee surgery, and a young girl who broke her leg. All of them turned out to be really sweet. The whole hospital floor was full of gimps that were recovering or getting ready for some kind of bone surgery.

In my room we had four caretakers, two during the day and two at night. The two during the day were curious about me and the English language. They shared all of their snacks with me and I shared mine with them in return. Pretty soon we had our own little way of communicating.  They would come over to me with a cup full of something and say ahhh. I opened my mouth said ahhh and they would just feed me. I never really liked what I was being fed but I figured that it would be rude not to accept.

I had lot of visitors who always seemed to come at the same time. I enjoyed each visit but I especially enjoyed trying to tell everyone who they were after they left. The women in my room would tell me that I was more beautiful than my visitors. They were hilarious!

The Poop story: The night before my surgery a young nurse who didn’t speak much English came to ask me if I had defecated today, I looked at her puzzled and confused and asked what??? She started laughing and just walked out. Another nurse came in with her this time both uncontrollably giggling and asked the same question. I was laughing so hard as they started to act out their question with hands gestures. They still didn’t feel like I understood them so they went and grabbed a Doctor in training. He came in with them and was direct and to the point with the question. They gave me 1 hour to poop or I had to have an enema to make me go.  I had no desire to add that to my list of foreign hospital experiences so I went to the bathroom and pushed extra hard.  When I had done the deed I just walked past the nurses’ station and gave them a thumbs up! We all laughed!

Last funny but serious story:

It happened the morning of my surgery. I was just given some kind of medicine that made me tired so I rolled over and took a nap. While I was sleeping I moved and one of the important tubes of my IV came out and (DON’T READ THIS IF YOU HAVE A WEAK STOMACHE) blood started going everywhere. I screamed for Nick to help and he panicked. He couldn't find the nurse call button. An Ajima (older woman, who was also a caretaker) RAN over and yelled at nick to get some tissue…….WE DIDN'T HAVE TISSUES…. He tried hard to communicate this to her and when she finally understood she grabbed them from her area and held them on my arm, NOT the tube that was squirting blood. Finally a nurse came and stopped it however everything was bloody. They had to change me, my bedding and mop the floor. As the nurse was taking care of me the Ajima was taking care of Nick. She yelled at him for not being prepared with tissues and made him go buy some. He came back with the wrong kind she yelled at him again and again he went out searching for the correct kind of tissues. He was really frazzled that day.

The whole experience was enlightening and educational…… Could you survive one week in a foreign hospital???

Follow up: I had my two week appointment this week and everything is healing really well. I can now take my splint off at home and I'm doing physical therapy on my own five times a day. I started going back to Taekwondo (can't keep me away) don't worry I'm not doing much and I'm being really careful.