Happy Birthday Burpy-Brain

8 years ago today, we met you, our wonderful daughter. Time sure has flown by and you're now marching on towards the teen years.

Wow.

(Burpy-Brain is the family nickname for DD...she can belch better than anyone I know)

Ok Folks,

Repeat after me:

The pharmacy closes at 9 pm. The CLOSEST 24 hour pharmacy is about 90 minutes away.

I am on call tonight. I had 5 pages between 20:55 and 21:05 for meds. Several from people DISCHARGED FROM THE FRICKEN HOSPITAL TODAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Who didn't bother to fill their pain meds and now are hurting.



aurgh!

The pain

As a mom, I don't think I could deal with this.

Do you think I could market this?

So after the umteenth vagitch of the day, I decided that Diflucan should be dispensed like candy. Pez candies was my inspiration...I could do a Diflucan Pez dispenser.

It needs to be anatomically correct...with the little pill coming out of the vagina. And to gulp it down, just push on the bladder for a squirt of water out of the urethra! Maybe I could put yellow food dye in there for complete accuracy...

Somehow, I don't think this would be a best-seller... ;)

Not what you want to hear

Rose was an old nurse. She had been working on L&D literally longer than I had been alive. You learned early on (if you were a smart intern) to do what she told you to do. It was just easier that way for all involved.

I'm back in the call room, relaxing. Easy call night so far, no major issues going on. I was even watching TV. Then my phone rang.

Rose knew where I was and that calling would be faster than paging. "I can't get heart tones on a 23 weeker who came in with abdominal pain."

That sentence ended that calm night. I walk the 30 yards to triage to find her, the patient and the patient's father there. I wheeled the ultrasound machine into the tiny space and plugged it in. Actually there was a heartbeat...but I couldn't quite get all of the fetus in view abdominally. The heart was basically on top of her pubic bone.

Mentally groaning, I go to check her cervix. Gloves are on and my left hand separates the labia to find...butt cheeks.

Fuck. Fuck. Fuckety-fuck-fuck. My resident and the in-house attending are going to love this. Did I mention the word FUCK went through my mind? Because it did.

Wheel her back to the delivery room and page my senior resident, the attending, and NICU for delivery. Wheel her out - 23 weeks even...not even an extra day. Aint nuthin good going to come out of this.

Quick history to NICU doctor: 23 weeks, butt on perineum. And we deliver the butt, the body.......................but no head is coming.

FUCK!

Eventually, we end up cutting the cervix to allow the head to finally deliver. A live (sorta) baby. Fortunately, she died the next day.

Even if there is nothing we can do, it still sucks.

Happy 0th Birthday

Hope Mary. May you live up to your name.

Bad equation

Nauseated doctor + ((obese patient^hygiene issues)*needs a pelvic exam) = not a pretty sight.