EARTHQUAKE - Chapter 14

Beginning Tuesday, Mary’s days were so full that she was glad when the night time came. During the day, every time that she was turned, someone was soon there to teach her some exercise to do in that position. When the nurse removed the bandage on her stump, she told Mary to bathe it. The nurse was Ilene,

“I’m sorry Mrs. Cusak, that isn’t good enough. Be glad Wanda isn’t here. Now bathe it again like you used to tell your child to wash behind their ears.”

When she had bathed it satisfactorily, Ilene put a gauze bandage on the bottom of the stump, then she said, “Now it is time to learn to wrap the stump with elastic bandage. Here in Intensive Care Unit we use a new elastic bandage every time. When you go to a room, you will be taught how to wash these bandages, and how to lay them out to dry so they don’t lose their elasticity.”

Mary had to try several times before Ilene was satisfied with the way she wrapped it. Later in the morning it was unwrapped. Dr. Kubicki came in. Wanda was with him. He barely glanced at the stump, then at my chart, and he was gone. Mary had to wrap the stump under Wanda’s scrutiny.

At lunch Ilene told her, “You are going to start eating your meals while sitting on the side of the bed. I want you to use the trapeze handle to pull yourself up. Hold onto it while you turn to the side. Use your arms, not your legs or hips to turn around. It will be awkward until you build up strength in your arms. Get it fixed in your mind that from now on your arms are going to have to do a lot of the work your leg used to do.”

Mary pulled herself up, held onto the trapeze handle with one hand and pulled herself around with the other. Ilene wanted to help her, but she was only there to keep Mary from falling. By the time Mary was sitting on the edge of the bed, her face was red and she was out of breath. After she finished eating, she had exercises to do before she lay down. When the dialysis nurse came, it was a welcome reprieve from exercises. Mary’s days became as busy as they had been as housewife and mother but with entirely different activities.

After several days sitting on the edge of the bed, Shawnda informed Mary that it was time to learn to move herself safely from the bed to the wheelchair, roll over to the table and eat her meal at the table.

“Next week, whether you are still here or in a room, you will learn to get out of bed, into a wheelchair, roll over to the toilet, and move from the wheelchair onto the toilet. Get those arms strong because you are going to be using them more than you ever did before.”

On Friday Dr, Kubicki came in while she was sitting at the table eating lunch.

“Wonderful, I am so proud of you. I know how hard you must be working to be at this point in only two weeks. You are a model patient. Your stump has healed nicely. The elastic bandages now are shaping it to fit a prosthesis. I am happy to report that your kidneys have started functioning again. That doesn’t happen often. They are still not functioning fully but they are on their way. We will keep you on dialysis for another week.

On another subject, Your husband called today and wanted to talk to you. I explained to him that there are no telephones patients can use in ICU because we can’t sterilize a telephone. However, I told him that we are moving you to a room on Monday. When you are moved to a room, he can call you on the phone or come visit you. Isn’t that a good reward for all the hard work that you have been doing?

“Oh, I almost forgot. He said he loves you.”

“Dr. Kubicki, thank you so much for all that you have done for me.”

Knowing that she would be moved to a room on Monday and that Karl was going to call made the rest of the day and Saturday and Sunday drag along as though they would last forever.

On Monday, when they moved her down to a room, she had to move herself into the wheelchair. In the room they set her at a table while some men set up the bars to which the trapeze handle is attached.

A nurse with fiery red hair, a crisp white uniform, a cap with green stripes, and a somewhat military bearing came in to see Mary.

“Welcome to our ward, Mrs. Cusak. My name is Catherine O’Doule. I want to explain some differences between being in a room and being in ICU. The biggest difference is that each of my nurses has seven or eight patients versus one, two, or three in ICU. Most of the time you will have to call for a nurse.

“Having said that, we don’t want you to try to sit on the edge of the bed, or get into a wheelchair, or try to sit on the toilet without a nurse being there to catch you if you fall. One fall can set back all the healing in your stump and might cause them to have to redo the amputation. Your stump is very fragile right now.

“Do you have any questions?”

“My husband tried to call me on Friday, but I was in ICU so I couldn’t talk to him. They told him that I would be in a room on Monday and he could call then. I don’t see any phone in this room.”

“I’ll call Maintenance and tell them to bring a phone to this room. If your husband should happen to call before they install it, we will take you in your wheelchair down to the nurses’ station and you can use the phone there.

“Speaking of wheelchairs – once a day, at least, while you are in the wheelchair, I expect you to go the entire length of this hallway and back in the wheelchair, under your own power.”

Mary was sitting on the side of her bed, waiting for lunch, when Karl called her.

“Karl, it is so good to hear your voice. Have you seen Dana?”

“Yes, I saw her at your father’s funeral on Thursday. Then we had Sunday dinner together at a restaurant. How are you doing?”

“I guess that you know that my right leg had to be amputated below the knee. I was in the beauty salon in Luxora when the earthquake occurred. The building collapsed. I was crawling out – I almost made it out – when the ceiling crashed down and trapped my legs. I was there all that day and night. It wasn’t until the next afternoon that they rescued me. My right leg had a crush fracture. That is why they had to amputate it.”

“We will get through this, Mary. You are alive, Dana is alive, I am alive. We’ll all be together again soon. I am on my way to Monroe now. Is that all right?”

“I can’t wait to see you, Karl. Will Dana be with you?”

“No, I want to look around while I’m down there to see if I can find a job. If I can find a job, then I can get a place for Dana and I to live so that we can see you often.”

“That would be ideal because I imagine that I will have quite a bit of physical therapy once that start putting on an artificial leg.”

“I’ll see you later this afternoon.”

“I love you Karl.”

After he hung up, Karl broke out in a cold sweat. He had to sit for a while before he was able to start driving. Hearing Mary describe having a building collapse on her and a ceiling fall, trapping her, reminded him of the persons that they had rescued. Then it reminded him of all the collapsed buildings and fallen ceilings he had lifted with the blade of his dozer so that the soldiers could pull out dead bodies. The smell of death came pouring into his memory. “Thank you Lord, for the ones we rescued. Thank you that there were people who rescued Mary.”

After her dialysis treatment, Karl came into the room. She called for the nurse so that she could get into the wheelchair. Then they sat across from each other. Time just flew as they asked each other over and over in many different ways – Are you really here? Are you really okay?  I love you. When supper time came, Karl had to leave.

That evening after supper, while she was in the wheelchair Mary decided to roll herself down the hallway. It felt good to gain one more small amount of independence. She rolled down the hallway, occasionally smiling at a patient who was looking out the doorway or sitting in a chair eating their supper. When she reached the last room, a brassy voice that sounded familiar called out of the room,

“Hey, don’t I know you from someplace?”

Mary looked into the room and saw a woman with both legs in a cast and the legs were suspended in traction.

“Come on in here so we can talk.”

Just then a nurse walked by and said,

“You can talk from the doorway, but you have to stay in the hallway where we can watch you.”

“No, you can’t do this; no, you can’t do that. That is all they know how to say around here,” said the woman in traction.

“You said that you thought that you knew me. I doubt that you do. I am from Victoria, Arkansas.”

“And you were in a beauty shop in Luxora when the earthquake happened.”

“Are you Miss Helen Brumstel?”

“None other, although the way I am bummed up, I wonder if I’ll ever be the same. I sure couldn’t get a man looking like this.”

Mary almost giggled. With Miss Brumstel’s abrasive and critical attitude she was no “catch” before the quake. Instead she said,

“Well, I thought that you and Sissy were killed when the building collapsed.”

“Sissy was killed almost immediately. A flying shard of glass cut her neck and throat. The roof remained propped up for a while on the corner of the building where we were. There was a huge hole in the rear. I started walking toward it but I got my foot caught and as I fell, I broke my leg. I think the men who rescued me broke the other leg. Clumsy oafs! Do you know how they got me to the hangar? They found a door lying on the ground, somehow hooked a rope to it, laid me on the door, and pulled it behind their ATV. It reminded me of those things the Indians used to rig up with two poles and a buffalo skin to drag a sick person with their horse.”

“At least they got you out of the building and to someplace where you could be taken to a hospital.”

“Yeah, but look at the hospital they sent me to. Louisiana. You know what we say about Louisianans in Arkansas? ‘They eat the heads off crawfish. If they didn’t do that, they wouldn’t have any brains at all.’”

“Well, I had better be getting back to my room.”

When Mary was back in her room, Nurse O’Doule came into the room to watch as she maneuvered out of the wheelchair and onto the bed, and then turned to lie on her left side.

“Is that woman, Helen Brumstel, your friend?”

“No, ma’am. She was in the same beauty salon with me when the earthquake occurred. I thought that both she and the hairdresser were killed. Evidently she was rescued before me.”

“Has she always been so critical or is it just since the quake?”

“The hairdresser said that she could never do anything to please her and that she talked constantly about other people, criticizing or making fun of them.”

“I wish that I could feel sorry for her, but I don’t. She has driven us crazy. If she ever said, ‘Thank you.’ I would have to be given smelling salts.”

That night Mary was really tired. She had to wrap her stump three times before it satisfied the nurse that came on duty for the night shift.

Maybe it was all the excitement and activity of the day, but the strangest thing happened. The foot and ankle and lower part of her right leg had such pain she could hardly stand it. Mary called for the nurse. An older woman with grey hair and a tired looking face answered the call. Her name was Jeanette LaBeaux. Her voice was warm and kind.

“What do you need, Sugar?”

“I’m almost embarrassed to tell you. The part of my leg, the ankle, and the foot that were amputated have sharp pains in them. The pain is so bad that I can hardly stand it.”

“Honey, that is a very common occurrence in amputations, and especially at this point in the healing. Now, the doctor can order pain medicine and if that doesn’t work he can go in there and cut some nerves, but I am going to tell you what usually works if you will do it. Forget about the amputation. Pretend that you still have that foot. Flex it, turn it side to side. Most of the time a vigorous workout of the missing parts will make the pain go away.”

Mary tried with all her might to imagine that the missing parts were still there. Then she started moving them. The more that she moved them, the pain subsided and went away.