14. The Elephant Tube In The Room

Then Marilyn was my nurse. She used to play Premier Praise Christian radio and I would mouth the words to the songs. I know you just need your heart to praise, not your voice. I considered raising my hand in worship, which I could just about do now. (My first nose scratch was amazing.) However, I didn't want to look like I was asking for help. An advert used to come on for male counselling which would say "Are you alone? Can't talk to anyone?" I would nod along to Joanna. Marilyn and I attempted conversation through the letter board and made each other laugh. Joanna brought in my laptop one day and asked if I wanted to hear one of my playlists. I straight away spelt out 'Jesus Jamz' (Cool, I know). (YouTube/Spotify). Marilyn was jamming along, and said she needed a copy of this playlist. She was my instant fave. 6 months later, she found me on Facebook.

Once, I spelt out "I'm scared," and she pulled a face, non-plussed.
"You're scared?"
I finished my sentence, "Of dribbling." She assured me I wasn't. My sensations were messed up, so my whole left side was tingling. It was like there was a line running down my face, dividing the tingly side and the non-tingly side. It was like I was being patted by lots of tiny hands. My face felt wet sometimes, and sometimes it felt like I was my toes were crossed. I'm assuming this fieeling was my nerves going haywire, I don't know. I never bothered adding this to the list of all the things that felt wrong when I talked to the doctors.  It went away gradually after 3 months.

It all came to a head one night when Marilyn was my nurse. I coughed my traccy out. I had to be repositioned every few hours, to avoid pressure-sores, and that required multiple people putting a slidey sheet under me to move me about the bed. (A nurse would shout out, "Annnyone free for a roll?" like a market hawker.) It was during a move like this one, at 3am, that I coughed a bit too hard. The tracheostomy (just a small plastic tube stuck through your neck) is connected from the wind pipe (trachea) to a ventilator by a ridged, opaque tube about the width of a nose, or a small egg, called 'elephant tubing.' This tube was in danger of popping out whenever I was moved,  or I hacked too hard. That night, I had a bout of full-bodied, fly-off-the-bed into-the-bed-rails kind of coughing, and the tube was no match for me this time.

The attachments flew off and a collective "Ooo" went up, (well, I thought it) as a yolky globule of phlem shot out of the hole in my neck. The night-shift doctor who was camped out that night in ICU was called straight away. I found that, actually I was able to breathe okay. Half of me was thinking, "Oh no, that's not good," and another half was yelling, "Yoooo! Awesome!" Talk about the mindset of an 8 year old. In no time the doctor was putting a new traccy in. (He sewed it in this time). Quite a few nurses were there, and Marilyn was being reassuring. I stayed calm and focused on my breathing, as I knew that was the best advice. Then a portable x-ray machine had to be called out. All in all I didn't get much sleep.

These days I was being visited by a physio called Emily, whose job it was to wean me off the breathing machine. She once gave me her phone and earphones so I could listen to music, and it was worship song medleys. She started me on spells with the traccy not plugged into the machine and just covered with an oxygen mask. As my time without the ventilator increased, I was taken on more walks outside, and saw the autumn leaves. I kept playing a game with Joanna were I would make the 'leaves' fall: a real leaf; the teddy;  her arm. I didn't want to be too annoying, but I did play fetch with the teddy a bit (I threw it, Joanna fetched it). Hilarious.

There came the day where Emily brought a small cap (speaking valve) for the tracheostomy. This cap allowed some air flow out of my mouth, as well as through the tube, so I could talk a little bit with it on. She warned me my voice would sound awful after having had a traccy in. She tried it on me, and I prepared myself, ready to come out singing. I just coughed terribly and shot the cap off millimetres from Emily's face. Eventually, we got the cap to stay on, and I to make a growling noise, trying to say something. My family strained to hear. By the end of the day, they got it: 'dog'. That was my first word as a baby, and I chose it to be my new first word now.

Traccy.