part 8

Book 2: In Repair

In Repair

"When the spring is cold,

Where do robins go?

What makes winter lonely...

Now at last I know."

-Feist-

 

 

1

Pain. This is all I feel now. What is happening? Everything hurts. I can’t move. I’m so tired. From what I can tell a woman is near me. She’s talking.

"Okay... this will feel uncomfortable."

What’s going on? I feel her hand on my face. She’s trying to force my mouth open. What is going on? Something is being put into my mouth. I try to turn my head, but I can’t seem too. I want to grab her hands and push them away from me, but I can’t move. What is happening? From what I can feel a tube is making its way down my throat. Oh God no! This is agony! I begin to gag. What is going on? The tube keeps going. It doesn’t stop. The pain is overwhelming. Did I land myself in hell? I think so. The pain is excruciating. I can’t even move to try to get away. What’s wrong with me? I’m paralized.

I think I may have lost consciousness, but I feel the pain now. I think the woman is back. Who is she and why is she here? I can’t seem to get a good look at her. Again, I feel her hands on my face. Who is she and why can’t I get away? She is putting something into my mouth again. Oh God not this! Anything but this! Something is making it’s way into my throat and I begin to choke. The pain is extreme.

I open my eyes, and see my parents sitting by me. I am in bed. Nobody has to tell me where I am. I can see right away that I am in a hospital. I know exactly why I am here. Will the woman come back? I’m anticipating it. I’m not sure how many times she has been coming by to put things down my throat. It’s been several and I see no end to it.

I try to talk to my parents but I find that I am unable to. My mouth can’t move. I’m getting frustrated, and it feels like my upper and lower jaw have been cemented together. All I can manage to produce are grunting sounds.

My parents say something, but all of my attention is now on a woman who comes into the room. She is a nurse. Is this the one who has been torturing me? I didn’t get a clear look at her before. I feel myself tense up. I seem to be able to move my right arm, so if she begins putting something into my mouth, I think I’ll be able to grab her hand and stop her. I’m getting prepared. My parents exchange words, but I can’t really catch what they are saying. Everything seems foggy. I see the nurse has a syringe in her hands. She reaches for a tube, and I think she inserts the syringe into it. I can’t seem to keep my eyes open.

I think I must have been asleep, but I’m awake now. I notice I’m itching. Everything is itching. What the hell is happening? I’m trying to scream but I’m just making grunting sounds. Something is wrong. I’m ready to tear my skin off. Only my right arm is moving, so I try to use that hand to claw away at my face. This is hell. A nurse comes in.

"Don’t do that! Stop scratching."

She grabs my hand and pulls it away from my face. The rest goes blank.

I wake up, and I see my parents are beside me. Everything still itches but I can not move my arms, I think they have been tied down. My right hand throbs badly. Very badly. I try to form words to let my parents know, and I think I am speaking a little better now.

"You mean your left hand hurts?"

"No! My right hand kills. What is wrong with it?"

"What? Your right hand? But that was the only thing that didn’t sustain any damage."

My mother decides to take a look. She pulls back the hospital bracelets on my right wrist and looks shocked.

"Oh! Oh what have they done! There’s blood everywhere!"

My mother calls a nurse. As soon as the nurse comes in, my mother snaps at her asking why this has been done to me.

"We had to tie her hands down because she was scratching so much. This is for the best."

"She bleeding!"

"Well this is what's best for her. So she won’t scratch."

"I won’t scratch. I swear. This hurts so bad!" I slur through the wire in my mouth. Apparently they used razor floss to tie me up. It has been cutting into my wrist.

The nurse takes a deep breath.

"Fine."

She takes a hold of the very thin piece of string that had been digging into my flesh and cuts away at it.

My hand still throbs, but it’s more bearable.

Later when we discuss this incident, my parents and I come to the conclusion that if they did not show up that day, and demand to have my hand untied, it would have needed to be amputated. The circulation had been cut off. It turns out that I had a very bad allergic reaction to the antibiotic they were pumping into my system. My father tells me it looked like my body had tripled in size and I was completely red.

It is later that I will find out that I began to come out of a coma after 2 weeks. The Doctors thought I would be in too much pain, so they very kindly ‘induced’ me back into a coma. They did an incredibly crummy job. All they managed to do was just paralyze me. I could still feel everything, just had no ability to beg for some mercy.

 

 

2

I must have fallen asleep. When I open my eyes, my parents are gone. I look around the room the best way I can. My head cannot turn anymore. There is some sort of neck brace restricting my movement. There are 3 other people in the hospital room around me. We are separated by curtains, but the curtains are drawn back. So I see my neighbors . To my left , I know there is a person lying in bed.. I cannot turn my head, so I don’t know if this person is a man or a woman. There are two beds in front of me. In those beds, both patients are men. One is young, and the other is middle aged. The older one is looking out the window. The young man has his eyes closed. Weeks later I will realize how strange it was to be kept in a co-ed room, but at this moment I don’t care. I’m tired and sedated, and I keep playing over and over the last memory in my head. I picture it clearly. I’m on the balcony. There is a young male police officer. He looks like he can be younger than me. I remember how he punched my left eye and I cringe. In that moment I feel a strong wave of pain. This wave goes through my entire body. I want to yell but I produce a moan instead. The cop uniform. I think he wears a bullet proof vest. He punches me. I want to scream, but only grunts are coming out. I don’t sound human. Just then a nurse comes in. She says nothing to me but reaches for my face. There are apparently tubes going into my nose and she begins to pull them out. Holy f**k they are long! This feels incredibly wrong and disgusting. She says nothing. She finishes pulling them out. Thank God that is over. That was one of the most uncomfortable things I have ever felt. Wait... she’s opening a plastic package. What is this? She’s pulling out more tubes!

"Just relax, okay?"

I can’t even turn my head away from this woman. But I feel the long tubes getting pushed up my nose. I think I’m crying because everything is a blur. I want to throw up, I want to scream.

She’s finished.

She reaches for one of the tubes attached to me. I think this one is attached to my right arm. I can’t tell. She takes out what looks like a syringe and inserts it into the tube.

"That’ll help the pain. You’ll sleep a little." She looks at me with a sympathetic smile. My eyes feel very heavy, they close and I’m asleep again.

Months later I will find out that my nose was broken in 2 places.

 

 

3

I think it’s nighttime when I wake up again. I wake up because the young male patient in the room is grunting and there are 3 nurses around him. His mouth is not wired shut like mine is, but he cannot produce clear words. His eyes look wild, as he looks from one nurse to the next. It is obvious right away that there is something really wrong with him mentally. It takes two nurses to turn him on his side and he makes a squealing sound like a piglet would.

I feel a dull ache through my whole body, but besides that I am numb. I find that I sleep almost always. I’m guessing around 22 hours a day.

In time I am able to keep up a conversation. My father tells me that from the moment I came out of a coma I kept saying that a police officer tried to kill me. My father brings a tape recorder to record a statement. He tells me that he felt things were suspicious when he was told that I fell off a balcony when the police arrived. He did not want to confuse me so he did not mention this to me. He asked me to tell him what happened, and just as he had initially suspected, I told him that a police officer tried to kill me. No one had told me that the police were on the scene. I remembered that on my own. And I remembered that correctly.

Some of my friends come by to see me. They bring stuffed animals and flowers. For most of them, this will be the first time they see me in the hospital, and the last time they will see me. Ever. My situation makes people very uncomfortable, but I do not know this. I’m convinced my friends know what happened to me. How I lived through my own murder and somehow survived. I’m unable to speak to them clearly because of my wired jaw, but I am convinced they know that a police officer was responsible for this.

When I mumble to my father about what happened, he understands what I am saying and responds,

"When you were in a coma I was 99.9% sure that the cop who came to the apartment did this to you. You were so happy that day. You were finishing up laundry in a hurry because you had plans to meet up with your friends. Then cops show up, and for some reason you all of a sudden fall from the 7th floor. Anyone with a brain could see something isn’t making sense and could put two and two together. I knew right away a cop was responsible."

I stupidly believe all of my friends think the same as my father. They don’t. All, except James and Loupe, have simply labeled me a suicide attempt. They don’t bring it up when they see me, and I don’t bring up that night because of my wired jaw. I assume that they all know that someone tried to kill me. The joke is on me.

The weeks after I wake up just blur themselves into each other. God decided he may show me some mercy, so I sleep a great portion of the day. When I am awake, I do have one memory that stands out the most. Every day, for several days, the nurse coming into my room, and inserting a long tube into my mouth. She would let me know that what she was about to do next would feel ‘uncomfortable,’ but I knew that what I would feel next would be agony. The tube would then make its way down my throat. I would gag. ‘Uncomfortable’ was a cruel understatement. It was an excellent form of torture. When I say that, I mean I felt such pain, medieval torture would be taking a break. I would have confessed to absolutely anything, and would have gladly accepted the death sentence. I would have begged for it. This was not an option. I do not know how many days this was done to me for, but I keep thinking about it now. It is burned into my memory forever. I ask my parents if they knew anything about what was done to me, to which my father replies,

"They said they had to ‘clean’ out your lungs. Your mother and I would come by every day, and one day we witnessed this. The things is, when they did this to you, you were still considered to be in a coma. It was stopped recently. That day we got to see this, a nurse came in with her equipment, and you looked like you tensed up. She then told you that what you were about to feel would be ‘uncomfortable.’ It seemed like you tried to turn your head away from her. Then she forcibly began to insert a long tube into your mouth. You’d make fists, and the expression on your face suggested you were undergoing something awful. The nurse turned to us then, and she seemed to try to comfort us by saying,

‘She can’t feel anything. She’s in a coma. This is just a reflex.’ You have to have a spectacular imagination to convince yourself that your actions where a simple ‘reflex.’ It was in no way a reflex."

My mom then tells me,

"They asked us to make a decision. They said they could make an incision in your neck and put the tube through that. Not through your mouth anymore. They said it would be easier on you. I told them absolutely not. You were already covered in scars. What? They want to make another one in your throat to add to the collection? You’d have to wear a turtleneck for the rest of your life to hide something like that. What would it matter anyways? According to them you couldn’t feel anything... so why would they try something different? What would it matter?"

For me this raises a question. If I could not feel anything, what would they make ‘easier’ ? They knew exactly what was happening, but tried to calm my parents down, and hoped I would forget about this when, and if I woke up from a coma.

Despite how hellish it felt, I am glad the tube wasn’t just stuck into my trachea. I doubt this would have helped. The thought of me getting through life with yet another scar, this time one that would forever remind me of the tubes going into my lungs, disturbs me greatly. I do however remember every second of the nurses ‘cleaning’ them out, as it occurred on several occasions. To this day I cannot believe I felt that kind of torturous pain being in a coma.

My parents later tell me that soon after my crash from the 7th floor occurred, they would come to see me and hold my hands. Each parent would hold a hand. My mother tells me that they would ask me to squeeze their hands to show them how much pain I felt. Part of my left hand was in a cast, and my mother would hold it.

"Even though your hand was in a cast, you would manage to squeeze so hard I would feel pain. We were told that since you were in a coma, your hand squeezing was merely a ‘reflex’."

My dad adds,

"That was no reflex. You were in a coma yet somehow you were present."

Months will pass until I begin to find out about the extent of my injuries. I will meet a nurse named Gwen, who will spend a great deal of time going over my injuries with me. I will finally find out why I had to go through experiencing such tormenting pain on a daily basis. She’ll explain to me what I had been wanting to know for months,

"You were at a point where you were no longer breathing. Not even 1%. You stopped completely. So tubes had to be inserted and attached to your lungs. They were attached to a machine that would breathe for you. Now when this happens to patients, and a machine is attached to breathe for them, there is then a 27% chance for the lungs to collapse." She will look at me sympathetically. "You fell into that 27%. Your lungs collapsed. As a result an uncomfortable procedure had to be performed to help restore them."

So it will finally be explained to me why such horrific measures were taken, and why that was done to me. What I don’t understand is how I was able to feel all of that if I was in a coma.

My dad tells me that I had originally been on a different floor,

"The floor was meant for people in critical care and those in a coma. Every single day, day in and day out, we’d see numerous police officers strutting around. In their bulletproof vests. With their firearms, and what I’m guessingcould have beentasers hanging on their hips. That’s such a ridiculous getup in such hot summer weather. Do comatose patients often pose a threat?"

"Of course dad. Cops are said to be in ‘constant danger’ somehow. Just like when I was standing on the balcony completely defenseless. I wasn’t aware of this, but somehow I was posing danger. I had to be killed immediately."

 

 

4

I’m in St. Frances’ Hospital and my parents come by to visit me as they always do, but at some point I lose the ability to recognize them. I look at my father. I know that I know him. I know that we live together, but I cannot remember why. I do not remember who my parents are. I voice my concerns to the man who has come to visit me. He looks very disappointed.

"I am your father Karina." I don’t believe him. He may as well have told me that he has now developed an ability to fly.

It would be weeks later that my parents would bring this up and tell me that several days after I woke up from a coma, all of a sudden there was something not right about me. It was soon after I mastered speaking with all of the wire in my mouth. You would have to listen very closely to understand what I was saying, but my parents told me it had become a lot easier to understand me. I clearly kept repeating the same thing,

"A cop tried to kill me. He tried to kill me. He threw me off the balcony."

My mother tells me,

"Then one day we came in and you looked very drugged up. You didn’t seem to know we were even there. You were in the same condition the day after, and then after that as well. When we brought it up to the medical professionals, they simply blamed it on the brain damage you experienced. Apparently all of a sudden it started acting up. It started to become obvious that you were on some sort of narcotic, and when we asked we were told it was simply to help the pain. They were giving you mind numbing narcotics probably because you tried to tell them a police officer tried to kill you. This is not a comfortable topic for them. It simply looked like they just drugged you up so you’d keep your mouth shut."

My father continues,

"One day we came in and there was a very unpleasant woman in your room with you. We came to visit and she told us to leave and wait in the hallway. We asked her what she was going to do that needed this privacy. This was before you had neighbors. This was when you had a room to yourself. We asked her what she was going to do to you, that we as your parents were not allowed to witness. She refused to answer us at first, but we kept asking. She became annoyed and rudely answered, ‘I need to give her a new memory.’ I was so surprised and said, ‘What!? What would she need a new memory for?’ Then we realized that she was probably trying to give you a new memory because you kept saying a cop did this to you. Doctors, nurses and cops all work for the same boss. The government. And one hand washes the other. When we objected to this unpleasant woman, she threatened to have our visiting privileges taken away. We tried to talk to her, but we could tell she completely ignored everything we said. We were wasting her time. She threatened to call security. We both left and returned back home."

My mother continues this unsettling story,

"When we returned the next day, you were so... out of it. You had your eyes closed and your head kept rocking back and forth. You kept saying you had to go drink vodka with your parents, because the Russian mafia was now after you and you were upset. You just kept rocking your head. And you were speaking English. You never speak English with us. Something was seriously wrong with you. We brought up the police officer throwing you off of the balcony and you replied, ‘Police are good. Police are very good...police are very good.’ you kept chanting the same line over and over. You sounded like a broken record. All of a sudden the police officers were saints, and the Russian Mafia appeared out of nowhere, and somehow you were connected to them. And you wanted to drink vodka with us. We never in our lives drank vodka together. Your father has on more then one occasion told you the story about how he tried vodka when he was 17 and became violently ill and refuses to touch it now. And I can't stand it... yet according to you, we as a family enjoyed drinking it together. We didn’t understand why all of a sudden you were using all of these Russian stereotypes. Then it became clear. The very unpleasant woman from the previous day. She said she had to ‘create a new memory’ for you. You were now convinced that police officers were all angels and we were all Russian drunks involved with the mafia. It’s like she used every stereotype she could think of in this situation. I’m surprised there was no mention of hockey.

We asked you if anyone had come to see you that day and you said yes. Two very nice men had come into your room to talk to you. You then began to tell us again that police officers are wonderful people"

My father looks upset as he relives this event. "I aged significantly at that moment. There was nothing left of the girl who came out of a coma. You were now saying the complete opposite of what you had been saying before. And the hope I was hanging on to vanished." It brings deep anger to know what it did to my father. I’m guessing they did not expect this, but over a short period of time my memory came back. I remembered the cop’s face. I remembered that night as clearly as if it had just happened. They were unable to hypnotize it out of me. When I consider what my parents told me about how that woman strongly insisted on giving me a ‘new memory’ and threatened to call security if my parents’ objections continued, I feel incredible disappointment. It’s becoming obvious that not only do the people in charge not want to believe me or help me, but they want me to keep my mouth shut, like a good girl and not bring about any trouble.

After hearing things of this nature, I begin to lose faith in today’s medical system. Sadly this incident is only the beginning of what is yet to come, but I do not know this right now. I unfortunately cannot see the future.

 

 

5

Time goes by, and all of a sudden I realize my hair is no longer there. I’ve been moving my right arm more than I used to. It is hard to do since it is attached to so many tubes, but I decide to run my fingers through my hair, only to realize there is nothing there.

My parents come by, and my mom understands my concern right away. I am now more conscious although I find myself falling, and staying asleep very often. My mother finds me looking distressed and pointing to my head. I feel so shocked, I cant seem to form words.

"Yeah, they chopped it all off. They had actually cleaned it when you first arrived and were still in a coma. We would come by to see you every day and some days we could tell right away that your hair had been washed and it looked clean. There was however talk about brain surgery. A day after that we came in to see you... and your hair was all gone. We asked the nurse why that was done to you. She very uncomfortably replied that your head had all of a sudden, days after the fall, had somehow started bleeding and your hair needed to be buzzed off. I could tell she was lying. It seemed pretty obvious that they did not want to bother themselves cleaning it, especially considering there was a 0% chance you’d stay alive anyways, so they decided to just go ahead and shave it all off to save themselves the hassle."

Months later when Loupe comes by to visit, I will complain and tell her that I hate that my hair is gone.

"Yeah there was blood and dirt so they had to buzz it off."

"My hair takes forever to grow back! It curls so you can’t even tell it’s growing! It took me years to get it the way I had it! Dirt and blood can easily be removed with soap and water. That’s basic knowledge, and medical professionals should know this. I wasn’t in a f*****g oil spill!"

"Well it’s starting to grow back a little now. You’re starting to look more like a girl."

This will make me chuckle, and I’ll smile.

I just don’t understand what the logic behind chopping off my hair was. Like what? I didn’t look s****y enough with my face destroyed, so they decided to take my hair away?" Time will pass, but I still will not understand what that was done for. I will not forgive this either. It sickens me to think that someone actually took the time to work on my comatose head by giving me a buzz cut. Someone was actually paid to do this to me. When I bring up my concern to nurses the responses are always the same,

"It will grow back." Theoretically it will, but unfortunately not over night. I actually have an incredibly strong feeling I will not live long enough to see it at the length it was before someone took a razor to it.

Another favorite line nurses would give me if I complain is,

"Your hair should be the last of your concerns. You have more important things to worry about." This is true, but the thing is, my hair should have never been made into a concern to worry about. It never was, until someone got their hands on it. Later on when I am returned home, I will try out putting on makeup and will give up. I will not look like a girl. With makeup I cannot even pass for a serious looking lesbian. I will honestly look like a 15 year old boy who had a field day with his mother’s makeup. Apparently I have the face for it. Who knew.

It is months later, when I meet Gwen, she will tell me that I had severe brain damage, and my brain had begun bleeding in my skull. Very badly, so much so, that surgery needed to be performed. A surgery was scheduled, but the blood began to disappear.

"It all went down to your stomach. You didn’t need the operation anymore. In that case you were really lucky to avoid that surgery." I was surprised to know that it was even an option. No one on staff had bothered to tell me I had brain damage for a long time. They did however bother to chop all of my hair off for no productive reason for me, whatsoever. The only outcome it would have is to make me feel self conscious for what I know will be a very long time. They didn’t want to be troubled to keep it clean. I will take dirty hair over no hair any day.

Time passes, and each day is like the one before. There is pain, and there is sleep. I am so grateful I sleep, considering there is nothing else to do. Only thing that seems to work is my right arm. The rest of my body is useless to me.