In the Hospital With My Wrong Mind

"It makes me appreciate how wonderful a fully functioning brain is—and what we take for granted." --anonymous professor, ABA expert

So I had a few extra-curricular adventures after surgery.

I remember very clearly after surgery, I think they were trying to get me to urinate, and I was telling the nurses that it was of no use because I "I know too much." I was trying to tell them they could not use ABA on me because I knew too much about it. I also insisted that they call Dr. Melville and he could tell them all about what I was trying to say (apparently I was aware that I was not sounding too clear-headed).

ABA, or Applied Behavior Analysis is a psychology practice that is often used to treat autistic children. And to train dogs. It is a very complicated field of study and I surely don't know too much about it! But that is what got stuck in my head and it continued to give me problems for most of the time I was in the hospital.

My supervisor had stopped by to visit the afternoon of the surgery and I carried on a perfectly sane conversation with her. A couple of hours later when two friends who've known me for a long time stopped by, I was back to insisting I knew too much about ABA and they just couldn't use it on me. My friends, knowing and loving me so well, played along and messed with me just a little bit.

People, somehow (fever and morphine, they think, is how I got the idea) I got the idea that I had "liked" something on a professor's Facebook page and all the ABA people were "liking" it after me and that every time they did that my pain increased. My oldest daughter stayed with me one afternoon (Wednesday?) and pretended to me that she was fixing everything for me. But I was still hurting so I felt like she was not doing a good job of fixing it. At one point she tried to tell me the logical truth by showing me the Facebook page but of course I would have no part of the logical truth! I was convinced I knew the truth! She, in the meantime, was worried that I might not ever get back to normal (or at least, to my previous state of normal)!

Wednesday night, they gave me medicine for nausea. At one point, my husband said he woke up and there were about six people standing over my trying to rouse me but my eyes kept rolling back in my head. Sometime after that, I remember being awake and the room was dark but the television was on. I became convinced that I had unliked all the ABA stuff to try and relieve my pain but that now the ABA people were mad because of that and they didn't know it was me who did it, but they were trying to figure it out and they were threatening to make my life miserable (when they figured out who I was).

At this time I was on the oxygen tube thing to make me breathe right and they had those leg pump things on my legs that would blow up like a balloon and then release on a regular basis. I felt like the oxygen thing was making me work too hard to breathe and something about the balloon things on my legs was making my toes hurt and I mean HURT! But I thought that was all a conspiracy of the ABA people on the TV. I kept calling for the nurse and raising all kind of heck which is so totally unlike me. I think I scared my husband that night! It was by far our worst night there.

And to make matters worse, I finally decided maybe I'd feel better if I listened to "positive encouraging KLove" on my phone. I begged my husband to get my phone and start the music but he is not too technologically advance so it was a big ordeal for me to tell him how to get it going while I was in my wrong mind! We finally got it going and he handed me my phone but I didn't believe it was really my phone so we had a little "discussion" about that and I finally shut up about it even though I did not believe it was really my phone.

Well, people, the first song to play was called "Something Beautiful" a song I have loved since I first heard it. But it has lyrics like "I know where I need to be but I can't figure out" and "I can't figure out how much air I will need to breathe" and "will ya let me drown" but the absolute worst thing for me that night was "consume me like a fire." I was nuts! And I thought the radio was playing these songs because no one liked them and I had to "like" them to make them stop playing and to make my pain go away!

It was at this point that I called on God, Jesus and the Holy Ghost to please help me (not that I hadn't prayed before, but I was desperate now and I knew I could do nothing to help myself). I finally settled down and the morning came and after that, things seemed to get much better. That would have been Thursday morning. I did not go home until Monday.

The funny thing was, up until sometime Saturday, I still believed in my head that when I got myself out of that hospital bed and home to my laptop, I was going to PROVE to all these people that Facebook and the ABA people really were making me have more pain. I had shut up about it because it was clear everyone thought I was delusional but I just knew I could prove it!

Things kind of started unraveling when one of the professors called to check on me and laughed when she said she guessed they'd better not send the ABA expert to the hospital to visit me. It wasn't until another day or so when it dawned on me that he was not the professor whose Facebook page had caused me trouble. I would not have been scared for him to come visit. I realized he didn't even have a Facebook page! Then I realized the guy whose page I thought was causing me all the pain was not an ABA guy! And then I knew he did not have a Facebook page either! And slowly, slowly, my right brain began to return to me and boy was I ever happy to see it!

Lyrics to "Something Beautiful"

In your ocean, I'm ankle deep
I feel the waves crashin' on my feet
It's like I know where I need to be
But I can't figure out, yeah I can't figure out

Just how much air I will need to breathe
When your tide rushes over me
There's only one way to figure out
Will ya let me drown, will ya let me drown

Hey now, this is my desire
Consume me like a fire, 'cause I just want something beautiful
To touch me, I know that I'm in reach
'Cause I am down on my knees, I'm waiting for something beautiful
Oh,Oh,Oh something beautiful

And the water is risin' quick
And for years I was scared of it
We can't be sure when it will subside
So I won't leave your side, no I can't leave your side

Hey now, this is my desire
Consume me like a fire, 'cause I just want something beautiful
To touch me, I know that I'm in reach
'Cause I am down on my knees, I'm waiting for something beautiful
Oh,Oh,Oh Something Beautiful
Oh,Oh,Oh Something Beautiful

In a daydream, I couldn't live like this
I wouldn't stop until I found something beautiful
When I wake up, and all i want i have
You know it's still not what i need something beautiful

Hey now, this is my desire
Consume me like a fire, 'cause I just want something beautiful
To touch me, I know that I'm in reach
'Cause I am down on my knees, I'm waiting for something beautiful
Oh,Oh,Oh something beautiful
Oh,Oh,Oh