My eyes are closed again.
I should be blogging from bed, you know, with my sidekick, but there are too many words waiting to come out. Too many words for the sidekick. These are laptop words, not sidekick, not tonight.
I'm thinking of the little girl who had the organ transplant two weeks ago, and something went terribly wrong, and she got organs that were type A blood; she was type O. Her body began rejecting the organs immediately and she has been critically ill since. I guess yesterday they found an appropriate donor heart and lung, and last I knew, last night, I'd link but my eyes are closed, she was having her second transplant--this time with the right organs.
I think how human the surgeon sounded in all I read. How he took full responsibility for not having a fail-proof pricess in place to proect against getting organs of the wrong blood type. He said that he was devastated. He didn't try to cover up, and neither did Duke--I think it was Duke. The were so human in the face of the very acceptable rage of the girls family.
It's a situation I've thought about a lot this last day--what I would do, how I would feel if that were my daughter, and such a grave mistake were made. Who would I want to kill--what would I do--would I be able to focus on step two (getting her back on track with the right organs) or be so consumed with anger that I would lose myself to that anger.
And I just don't know.
Kids aren't supposed to get that sick. How frail are we. We are so frail and so human.
My grandfather was killed as a result of a hospital mix up. Three weeks after my father died. He was in for what was a pretty routine treatment--he had bronchitis or pnemonia or some sugh thing, but he was scheduled to go home the next day--or maybe the day after. I saw him. I was in Illinois then, where my grandparents (mother's side) lived, apparently sent out of the disaray of my dad's funeral and burial to my grandparents. And with my grandpa in the hospital, well, I was already uneasy.
So when a nurse came in and administered medicine to my grandfather and failed to note it on his chart, and when the doctor came in and administered what was to be an overdose of that medicine, he went into cardiac arrest and died before they could get my grandmother out of his room. Gone in an instant.
That wasn't supposed to happen either.
And yet we are human. And it does. Damnit.
The difference is, in my grandfather's case, the hospital and the doctor knew they could appease my grandmother--It'll be best Polly if you just forget about this trauma and get on with your life--your daughter needs you--your grandchildren need you--there's nothing we can do to bring Frank back.
And that doctor retired, and he moved to Florida, and I think if I could find him I just might. I just might.
Because I'm human too.
