Classy, I know.

So my nephew– he was admitted to the hospital on Saturday morning, after having spent the entire day in the ER on Friday and then being sent home. They did all kinds of tests, ultrasounds, etc. etc. on him and couldn’t find anything. They figured he was constipated and sent him home yesterday (Monday) with orders to take milk of magnesium twice a day. Funny thing is that he had diarrhea like, half the day on Friday, but whatever– he feels better now.
Now I don’t want to say that hospitals in Canada are fucked up, because we have some of the best hospitals in the world– but this particular hospital… isn’t great. And that’s all I’m going to say.

All the constipation talk reminds me of a funny story about… well, me. Please don’t read on if you know me in real life, because you will never be able to look at me the same. We’ll see each other, and you’ll look away, feeling ever so ashamed that you know this about me. You’ll have nightmares. There might be weeping. I’m serious.

I was in the hospital alot as a child. I’m not sure why, but it seems like I was admitted at least twice a year. Plenty of these times were for asthma-related things (I’d say the majority were) but there were other reasons as well.
When I was about 7 years old, I got a major kidney infection and had to be admitted to hospital. They put IVs in both my arms and I was in for about 2 weeks. I enjoyed it because it was near Christmas time so we got little gifts EVERY NIGHT from the nurses. Mainly candy. And this one lady came in and painted Christmas decorations with us.

My only problem with the whole experience was that in my 7-year-old opinion, the day nurse was very nosy. And embarassing. Every day, at around 10 am, the day nurse would come in to see me. She’d take my temperature, blood pressure, pulse, and all that. Then she would ask me a very invasive question. “Louise, have you pooped this morning?”

I was mortified and horribly disgusted that an ADULT would be asking this kind of question. Especially a seemingly 90-year-old adult with a big bushy mustache. And, since I only pooped at night (back then, I would poop once a day, at around 8 or 9 pm. You needed to know that), I would tell her, truthfully, “No, I have not”.

Because I hadn’t pooped that morning.

For about four days, every day, she came in, did all her stuff, and then asked “Have you pooped this morning?”
And I would answer “No.”

On the fifth day, when I told her “No” for the fifth time, she got this evil look in her eye. She left, and came back… and gave me a SUPPOSITORY! I was like “Hey, what’s going on. You’re not supposed to be touching me there… WHOA!!!” What the HELL????

Later on when the doctors told my mom that according to the nurses, along with my kidney problems I was also possibly experiencing some kind of bowel obstruction, she was like “What? Oh no!” and she came to see me to explain that since I hadn’t been pooping, the doctors were going to be doing an ultrasound or an xray or something on me to see if I had a blockage somewhere. I said “I have TOO been pooping!” and the whole thing got straightened out… but not before I had to suffer the humiliation of the suppository. Never again, folks. Never. Again.

Oh, and after that the nurse would come in and say “Louise when was the last time you pooped”. (I was a very literal child).

And also from then on EVERY SINGLE TIME I pooped I would run to the nurses’ station and no matter who was there, I would yell “I JUST POOPED!” and they would look at me like “Uh… okay”.

How many times does the word “poop” appear in this post? Holy crap!