This is a continuation of a previous post. If you have not read part one, you can find it here. Part two can be found here.
My husband and I were not originally planning on spending our last weekend in Malaysia in a private hospital. We had rushed off in that first taxi with minimal documentation and identification. Once I was transferred to a private room off of the A&E floor, my husband made a taxi run back to our home to gather an overnight bag.
This was my husband's first time making an official hospital run with me. After many years of practice, my mom and I had a pretty good routine down. We know what to bring. We prepare in advance. If you have not done so yet, create a "grab and go" hospital bag that contains letters from your doctor detailing your diagnosis and emergency treatment, lists of all your current medication, ID cards, insurance cards, good snacks, and even maybe a card game or two. That way you don't find yourself arguing with a dishonest Malay cab driver around 3AM because you had to run home for critical items. My poor husband.
The next morning, I was shocked when my endocrinologist walked into my room to pay me a visit. She was notified of my crisis less than seven hours before, and yet here she was seeing me in person, early on a Sunday morning.
We retraced the events of the previous day and concluded that my Adrenal Crisis was triggered by questionable chicken at Central Market. I had gotten food poisoning that was made so much worse due to my adrenal insufficiency. She wanted to keep me in the hospital for a few days in order to ensure I was stable. After all, I was set to leave Malaysia at the end of that week. I thanked her again for caring for me over the past six months. I said goodbye to her, again, and she wished me luck as we would venture back to America later in the week.
Because it was food poisoning that triggered my crisis, I was put on the very restrictive "gastro sensitive" diet. No flavors. No spices. No oil. Oh, and no gluten. There was a bit of a disconnect with the snack cart, so every day they still brought me my afternoon snack of 100PLUS (the Malay version of Gatorade) and a piece of bread.
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| It was too difficult to explain to the staff why I could not eat bread. It was easier to just let the bread stack up and laugh at the situation. Photo from August 2014. |
I remember receiving my first meal in the hospital that wasn't bread. They brought in a covered food tray. When my husband lifted the cover, I didn't see anything on the plate. The bowl of rice noodles was blocking it. He saw a minuscule piece of fish which made him make a very audible sigh of disappointment. I honestly thought they had brought me an empty plate, and that was why my husband was so disappointed. When I realized I was actually getting food, I was ecstatic. Perspective is a very important thing.
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| They didn't bring me an empty plate! Photo from August 2014. |
