Read Online Travels by Michael Crichton - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Michael Crichton
Ads: Link
married women, were strapped down in rubber beds, swearing like sailors, screaming their heads off.
It didn’t make any sense to me. The people who were being punished were having the best experience. The people who were being indulged were having the worst experience.
I saw my first delivery. It was, on the one hand, just like what I expected. And, on the other hand, to see the little head appear, and then the little body, immediately transported you to some other reality. It wasn’t a medical procedure; it was a miracle. I walked around in a daze. I saw several more deliveries. I couldn’t get used to the feeling. I was floating.
I went back to the room with the girls from the Home. It was still peaceful; the girls still panting, alone. Debbie was gone. I checked the other rooms; I couldn’t find her.
I found the resident scrubbing outside a delivery room.
“Say, did that girl from the Home deliver?”
“What girl?”
“Debbie.”
“Don’t know her.”
“Sure you do. Cute girl, red hair. Debbie.”
“I never look at the faces,” the resident said.
I grew to despise the Boston Lying In Hospital. I stopped showing up for my duty hours.
Of course, childbirth has changed greatly since then. You let a husband in the delivery room and he won’t permit his wife to be tied down screaming like an animal, even if the doctors and nurses see nothing wrong with it. And the negative consequences of delivering narcotized babies have come to be more clearly acknowledged. Natural childbirth was a rarity in Boston in the late 1960s. The few doctors who did it were considered outlandish kooks. Now natural childbirth is quite unexceptional. In fact, except for the recent enthusiasm for cesarean sections, childbirth practices represent one of the areas where medicine has changed for the better. And the Boston Lying In Hospital has long since been torn down.
Lousy on Admission
Emily was a sixty-six-year-old woman who lived alone in a small apartment. On a routine visit by a social worker, she was found lying unconscious on the floor, and was rushed to the hospital.
In the emergency ward, she was noted to be semicomatose for unknown reasons. Her clothes were filthy and unkempt. She was also infested with lice. She was cleaned up, deloused, and admitted to the medical floor.
When I first saw her, Emily was a tall, gray-haired, sharp-featured woman, sleepy and unresponsive. If you tried to wake her, she would grunt and push you away. Nobody knew what was wrong with her, how long she had been lying on the floor of her apartment, or why she was stuporous, but lab tests showed her chemistries were severely unbalanced.
My resident, Tim, reviewed her chart. “Lousy on admission,” he sniffed. “Obviously a lot of neglect here, probably some senility. God knows how long she was lying on the floor.”
Emily was given intravenous feedings to correct her body chemistries, but she did not awaken. Meanwhile, nobody was able to find out anything more about her. Apparently she lived alone in a small apartment in an unfashionable part of town. Apparently she had no friends, no living family. No one came to visit her. She was an isolated, neglected old woman, obviously unable to care for herself. She was in our hands.
And we were not able to determine why she was unresponsive. She appeared to be in a deep sleep, but we couldn’t tell why.
Abruptly, on the third day, Emily awoke. She looked around at all of us.
“Oh shit,” she said.
Her language further distanced her from the resident staff. An old lady who swore: she was obviously senile. We questioned her. What was her name?
“You think I don’t know? Scram, Daddy-oh.”
Did she know where she was?
“Don’t be ridiculous.”
Did she know what day it was?
“Do you?”
Did she know who the President was?
“Franklin Delano Roosevelt,” she said, and cackled.
A psychiatric consultation was requested. The psychiatrist found Emily to demonstrate “bizarre
It didn’t make any sense to me. The people who were being punished were having the best experience. The people who were being indulged were having the worst experience.
I saw my first delivery. It was, on the one hand, just like what I expected. And, on the other hand, to see the little head appear, and then the little body, immediately transported you to some other reality. It wasn’t a medical procedure; it was a miracle. I walked around in a daze. I saw several more deliveries. I couldn’t get used to the feeling. I was floating.
I went back to the room with the girls from the Home. It was still peaceful; the girls still panting, alone. Debbie was gone. I checked the other rooms; I couldn’t find her.
I found the resident scrubbing outside a delivery room.
“Say, did that girl from the Home deliver?”
“What girl?”
“Debbie.”
“Don’t know her.”
“Sure you do. Cute girl, red hair. Debbie.”
“I never look at the faces,” the resident said.
I grew to despise the Boston Lying In Hospital. I stopped showing up for my duty hours.
Of course, childbirth has changed greatly since then. You let a husband in the delivery room and he won’t permit his wife to be tied down screaming like an animal, even if the doctors and nurses see nothing wrong with it. And the negative consequences of delivering narcotized babies have come to be more clearly acknowledged. Natural childbirth was a rarity in Boston in the late 1960s. The few doctors who did it were considered outlandish kooks. Now natural childbirth is quite unexceptional. In fact, except for the recent enthusiasm for cesarean sections, childbirth practices represent one of the areas where medicine has changed for the better. And the Boston Lying In Hospital has long since been torn down.
Lousy on Admission
Emily was a sixty-six-year-old woman who lived alone in a small apartment. On a routine visit by a social worker, she was found lying unconscious on the floor, and was rushed to the hospital.
In the emergency ward, she was noted to be semicomatose for unknown reasons. Her clothes were filthy and unkempt. She was also infested with lice. She was cleaned up, deloused, and admitted to the medical floor.
When I first saw her, Emily was a tall, gray-haired, sharp-featured woman, sleepy and unresponsive. If you tried to wake her, she would grunt and push you away. Nobody knew what was wrong with her, how long she had been lying on the floor of her apartment, or why she was stuporous, but lab tests showed her chemistries were severely unbalanced.
My resident, Tim, reviewed her chart. “Lousy on admission,” he sniffed. “Obviously a lot of neglect here, probably some senility. God knows how long she was lying on the floor.”
Emily was given intravenous feedings to correct her body chemistries, but she did not awaken. Meanwhile, nobody was able to find out anything more about her. Apparently she lived alone in a small apartment in an unfashionable part of town. Apparently she had no friends, no living family. No one came to visit her. She was an isolated, neglected old woman, obviously unable to care for herself. She was in our hands.
And we were not able to determine why she was unresponsive. She appeared to be in a deep sleep, but we couldn’t tell why.
Abruptly, on the third day, Emily awoke. She looked around at all of us.
“Oh shit,” she said.
Her language further distanced her from the resident staff. An old lady who swore: she was obviously senile. We questioned her. What was her name?
“You think I don’t know? Scram, Daddy-oh.”
Did she know where she was?
“Don’t be ridiculous.”
Did she know what day it was?
“Do you?”
Did she know who the President was?
“Franklin Delano Roosevelt,” she said, and cackled.
A psychiatric consultation was requested. The psychiatrist found Emily to demonstrate “bizarre
Similar Books
