Hospitals and Jails

As John Lennon put it, "Life is what happens to you when you're busy making other plans." After staying the night in Cannon Beach Jessica woke up in the morning with lots of abdominal pains and nausea, vomiting and other unpleasant things. After a brief conversation she decided it was time to go to an urgent care clinic. You know Jessica is sick when she wants to go to the doctor. So we loaded up in the van with the dog to go to Seaside, OR to a Providence Medical clinic. The battery was dead in the van... Jessica sighed the kind of sigh that you only get when nothing is going your way, got out of the van and went back inside to lay down. Me, being the mechanic I am, figured I'd just track someone down to jump start the van, simple, right? I flagged someone down, had them pull up, hooked up, and nothing. Then I sighed the kind of sigh that you only sigh when nothing is going your way, smiled, thanked the fellow who lent his vehicle for my assistance and told him it was something a little more complicated but I appreciated his help. Now it was time to call Bill Trafton of Trafton's Foreign Auto. Bill is a jolly, gray-haired, lover of Volkswagen's who's been operating a VW shop in SE Portland for some 45 years. He knows the van, to say the least, and could probably walk me through disassembling the thing over the phone and rebuilding it. I explained the problem, he gave me some pointers of things to look at, clean, tighten, you know, old hippie van type fixes... Nothing... Call Bill back.

Bill, "Ok, I want you to run your jumper cable from the negative on you battery terminal, over the seat and bed (the battery in the van is behind the passenger seat and the engine is essentially in the trunk) and hook it anywhere on the engine, but make sure you keep it away from the belts, I don't want you to get it mixed up with those."
Me,"I can hook it to the transmission, will that work?"
Bill, "Yeah that should be fine. Now you need to find someone with another set of cables and try to jump it that way. See, it may be loosing ground and not charging so all we're doing is grounding it."
Me, "Are you sure this isn't going to blow something up?"
Bill, "Yeah, It'll be fine."

So now I need to find someone in the ritzyist beach town in Oregon to come and help me jump start my jerry-rigged hippy-bus and they have to have their own cables. Well, we found a neighbor with cables but no car and I was able to coax another car into my trap. The van started right up. Feeling like the king of the world because I wouldn't have to have my van towed Portland, yet, I thanked the kind lady in her brand new Subaru, who didn't know how to pop her hood, for her help. Starring into the whirring engine I thought I should call Bill back and get some pointers so this wouldn't happen again. "Don't turn the van off for at least a half hour, probably like an hour. Just go drive it and make sure you get a good charge on the battery." Well, I've got a sick Jessica and I don't want to leave her bent over in pain at the hospital by herself but I can't shut the van off? First things first, Jessica and Juno get back in the van and we're off to Seaside.

We find Providence Seaside no problem and I drop Jessica at the door, drive through the parking lot to find a parking space on a downhill slope and point the van downhill (anyone with an old manual transmission vehicle will understand why), roll the windows down for the dog, set the emergency brake, lock the van with the other set of keys and leave it idling in neutral and go to find Jessica inside. She had checked in to the walk in clinic and was off to donate some bodily fluids so they could hopefully find something simple like a bladder infection, give her some antibiotics and we'd be off. Not so fast. The initial tests came back with something precarious. Off to imaging for an ultrasound of her abdomen. We're now four hours into our visit, the van has been shut off for a few hours, Juno has explored the whole hospital parking lot and we're waiting for her ultrasound to be read. The very concerned doctor calls us into her office, sits us down and says she want a CT scan to see what's really going on inside of Jessica. The tears start to flow down Jessica's face thinking of the financial ramifications of all this medical care for a newly minted college graduate without a home, job or medical insurance (where's Obama-Care when you need it?). The doctor explained that Providence is a very charitable organization that offers great financial assistance to those that are in need and she will not do any more for her until she has more tests. We ask her for a few minutes to talk things over and she says that it was nice to meet us and reminded Jessica that, "your health is your wealth, you're free to leave, but if you want to stay and figure this out the ER is expecting you." We talked for upwards of ten minutes and decided to head down the hall to the ER.

Jessica was admitted, asked lots of questions to which they should have already had the answers to, given a gown and hooked up to an IV. Looks like we're in for the long haul... About a half hour later she gets wheeled out in a hospital bed to get her CT scan, I go out to the van to visit the poor neglected dog, call the families to let them know that Jessica is now officially in the hospital and it looks like she'll be staying the night. I get back to the ER the same time she gets wheeled back in and we wait for the images to be analyzed. We have a very nice English doctor who talks medicine, pandemic, World Cup, Crohn's Disease and a host of other entertaining topics with a great sense of humor. How'd this doc end up in Seaside?

The verdict is in, an enlarged colon, enlarged appendix, abdominal swelling and an infection in there somewhere. The diagnosis is a Crohn's flare to be treated with steroids and antibiotics through the IV, clear liquids only and if things look better in the morning she might be able to go home. Might? We could be stuck in Seaside for more than one day? "It's better than us having an ambulance drive you to Portland for care." Our English ER doc says in his British accent. "If I have to go to Portland can I ride in our van instead?" Jessica asks. "This is a hospital, not a jail," he says, "you can do what you want." Now we're off to the regular hospital to a room with a TV and to get set for the night, twelve hours after arriving at the walk in clinic.

Jessica meets her new doctor, a young guy from Chicago who's also very kind but not as quirky as the English gent in the ER, and her CNA for the night and presiding RN, both kind ladies who I trust will take great care of Jessica as she rests in preparation to leave the next day, hopefully... We agree that I should take the seriously neglected dog back to Cannon Beach and spend the night at the beach house while she gets some peace and quiet at the hospital alone. Juno is grateful to see me once again as I return to the van at dusk on the longest day of the year and as I get in the drivers seat one thought crosses my mind, "Please start." First try, we're headed back to Haystack Rock.

Back at the beach house I start to pack Jessica's things, call her family, play with Juno and try to decompress from my long day at the hospital and wishing Jessica was with me and not alone, still at the hospital hooked up to an IV with nurses checking in, measuring her fluid intake and outgo (if you know what I mean) and trying to get some rest. Around 1 a.m. I finally get to sleep.

The next morning I get up around 7 a.m. finish packing and cleaning, throw the tennis ball for Juno all the while, lock up the house and start the van before putting the bikes on the back in case it doesn't start and I need to get back at the engine. The van starts right up, I load the bikes and look around for Juno so we can go get Jessica and get on with our trip. Juno's gone. I'm guessing she ran down to the beach as she often does so I leave the van idling and walk down the drive to the stairs to the beach to look for the dog. She's no where in sight. I walk half way down the stairs where I can see for about a mile in either direction, nothing. Where'd she go? Who knows? I repeat this two or three more times, calling, whistling. Nothing. I call Jessica to let her know we're going to be late because Juno ran off and she says, "I guess this is her revenge for yesterday." I guess... As I hang up with Jessica a wet and sandy white dog comes panting up the driveway. It takes all I have not to strangle her after her half hour plus romp to who knows where while Jessica sits in a hospital gown in Seaside but at least we can be on our way now. My concern quickly turns to the gas gauge since the van has been idling for more than a half hour today and over an hour in the hospital parking lot yesterday. I cross my fingers and we make it back to Jessica.

As I get to her room the doctor is going over her discharge papers, yeah, we get to leave, and she has a great big smile on her face. I don't know if she was happier to see me or to leave. Probably to leave but I won't ask, I'll just assume she was happy to see me. "I've made an appointment with a Crohn's specialist in Portland for tomorrow." The doctor tells us, "He'll give you more information and let you know how to handle your Crohn's better so this doesn't happen again." Looks like our goodbyes were premature as we're back in Portland awaiting her appointment and hopefully a green light to proceed on our summer adventure.

Here's to hoping!