So I Broke my Right Leg
January 10: 5:30 a.m. out to get the paper, came in, slipped with wet boot on glossy tile floor...down I went, heard a major CRACK and realized I'd done some serious damage when my right leg began flopping around like a dying fish.
Crawled to the side table in the living room where sat the electronic phone. Knocked it off the table, which unplugged it. It wouldn't work.
Humped my backside up two short flights of stairs, dragging my broken leg behind me, to reach my office where the other phones were. Called 911...fortunately, the weather had been rainy so I'd been unable to lock the patio gate, and fetching the paper I'd not closed the front door properly so the medics were able to enter without tearing down the gate or front door.
8 a.m. Hospital E.R. Let me interject here that the day before, January 9, 2014, Ft. Pierce had 10.5 inches of rain, most in recorded history on this date. Flooding was everywhere, including all the Operating Rooms at the hospital. Spent the day and night in I.C.U., next day mid-morning was moved to surgical floor. Mind you, my leg still is broken at this point. Resting comfortably, no pain to speak of, no doubt plenty of drugs in my system though what kind I couldn't tell you.
A couple hours later, two little "nursing assistants" appeared at the foot of my bed and announced they were going to change my sheets. I said, "No, no, my leg is still broken, I haven't had surgery yet." They said, "you'll get bed sores." I said, "I won't get bed sores in five hours." They ignored my pleas and proceeded to "log roll" me (this term I learned was a particular technique for changing bed sheets). During the entire operation I was screaming blue bloody murder. It seemed eternal but was probably 5 or 10 minutes. Meanwhile, their hard little eyes dug into me, saying only too clearly, "You're a stupid old woman!" I was mashed with great force up against first one bedside rail and then the other, yelling and pleading the entire time. Where were the nurses? Where was any one else on duty on that floor? I have no idea. My roommate curled, shaking and terrified in her bed, and later told me I almost lost my religion, cussing and screaming.
That night around 8 p.m. I was operated on (in the obstetrical operating room, the only one above the ground floor) to repair the broken leg, and next day my doctor told me it was a lot worse than it had appeared on the exray taken when I first entered the hospital. I told him about the bed sheet change and said it was probably because they'd forcefully mashed me on that side. He nodded, and said that was possible.
After that it was a matter of days before I was able to recover slightly and on the following Tuesday my daughter arrived from Syracuse. She said it wasn't her ideal way to have a Florida vacation.
My dear daughter is still with me; we chose home health instead of the rehab center planned for me by the hospital, mainly because the rehab location was so bad Amy (daughter) could not have visited me in the evening. Did I mention that the hospital was in lockdown over a shooting during my week's stay there?
So much for Florida. With any luck at all, I'm leaving here as soon as I can recover enough to pack and drive. I hope to go back to North Georgia, to an apartment if I have to, hopefully to a little cottage or something near where I lived before in Blairsville, in the mountains.
Despite having actually found a job in Florida (delivering auto parts) I am ready to call it quits. The heat, the crowds, the traffic...Give me the mountains any time. I struggled, fought the foreclosure on my condo successfully and got a HARP mortgage from the bank. But HOA fees put such a strain on my budget I had to find work. Now I'm laid up I don't know how long it might be before I can drive and deliver auto parts again.
So I'm looking for rentals (internet search) in North Georgia in between trying to get my leg moving again so I can drive once more.
Wish me luck!
