The morning the nurse said to her, "Have you noticed you don't have your feeding tube?"
The Scottish Dreamer hadn't noticed. "Wow," she said. "Where did it go...and when?"
"You don't remember? You really don't remember?"
The Scottish Dreamer shook her head.
"Well," said the nurse, getting all chatty as if she had juice gossip to tell. "Last night they found you wandering the halls. You had taken the feeding tube out." (The feeding tube goes in her nose and ALL the way to her small intestines. She really had to pull some to get it out.)
The Scottish Dreamer's eyes got that wild eyed look people get when they just can't believe something. She looked down at her hospital gown.
"Yup," the nurse said. "That Ambien, it does strange things to people. You told everyone you were going home."
"I did?" said the Scottish Dreamer.
"Yup," said the nurse. She looked at the gown too. (You know the kind of gown I'm talking about. They tie at the neck...in the back!)
"Yup," she said again, "said you was goin' home," and then she smiled and left The Scottish Dreamer to wonder how much of her backside she had paraded up and down the halls. "Oh, Lynne," she said, with a shy smile. "I'll have to go talk to the Bishop!"
We had a good laugh. I didn't think much more of it until today, when I was gowned, same type of gown, tying in the front! On the Scottish Dreamer, who weighs maybe 100 pounds, the gown was probably adequate but on me, it didn't close quite so easily. I had nothing on--from the waist up. (I was getting an echo cardiogram--to rule something or other out, I'm not sure what, since my incident last Thursday. My retina doctor ordered this test plus a ultrasound on my carotid arteries.)
The technician had said, "When you're ready just open the door a little." So, I'm gowned, with the gown clutched in my sweaty little hand--I didn't bother to tie it. I opened the door with my gown-closing hand and of course, it flops open, for anyone in the hall to see. (The word, "flops" is kind of appropriate here.)
So, The Scottish Dreamer and I...well, we've either lost all our inhibitions or, we're voyeurs and really better have that talk with the Bishop.
