Lights Out

Two Thursdays ago, on the 16^th of June, I woke up with a sore throat. I didn’t think much of it, until it was Tuesday and it still hurt to swallow. So I finally got enough sense to take a look in the mirror and discovered an ugly pink ulcer perched stubbornly on a bright red tonsil. Schools had cancelled on Monday and Tuesday so I had spent the days at home in Litein and felt a little feverish on and off both days. So Tuesday morning I asked Mum if I could go for a walk for some fresh air, tired of reading in my room. I ended up at Rachel’s house, where I found Baba Victor by himself. He’s a nurse at a mission hospital in a neighboring town, so I asked him to take a look at my right tonsil. Mama Victor came home then and I showed her my throat before she told me I felt warm. They both agreed that I should see a doctor. So after lunch, Baba Victor and Victor accompanied me to Kaplong Mission Hospital.

The nurse who saw me agreed with what my dad (my American father who is a doctor) had prescribed: a shot of penicillin. I expected to receive the shot in my arm, just below my shoulder, like every other shot I’ve gotten. But they gave it to me in an IV form, through a vein in the top of my right hand. I was in a small room seated in a chair by a table with my arm resting on it and the nurse sitting on the other side. Victor was in the room, sitting on the exam bed opposite me, for “emotional support” (I’m pretty sure he just expected me to cry and wanted to watch). Nurse Caroline did a wonderful job giving me the penicillin. It didn’t hurt at all. But many of you who know me know that I have a bad tendency to get light headed and to even pass out at the sight of my blood (particularly when donating blood). I was doing a good job distracting myself from the thought of something being strapped onto my hand and injected into my veins. I could feel the penicillin shooting into my bloodstream and asked Victor if there was still anything sticking into my hand. He told me to look for myself. Bad idea. I glanced and saw the cannula still attached to my vein. That’s when I knew it was over. I put my left hand up to my forehead and told Victor, “I feel light headed. Am I getting really pale?” His African eyes told him that I looked normal and he said, “You’re fine.” That’s the last thing I remember before passing out completely. I was slumped in the chair, my neck hanging over the back and my legs limp in front of me. The nurse was still looking at my hand, but Victor jumped off the exam bed to my rescue after he realized that I wasn’t “just relaxing” like he thought at first. He and the nurse carried me over to the bed and that’s when I came around. I remember dreaming about something before waking up to two blurry dark spots that became Victor and the nurse’s heads above me as they helped me lie down. “Shoot,” I said, laughing. “Did I just pass out?” I couldn’t hear anything Victor was saying. “Oh my gosh, I’m so sorry. I can’t believe I just did that. That’s so embarrassing!” I kept saying to Victor as the nurse left us. I was super hot still, but I could see and hear ok again. “You really scared me,” Victor told me. He said his heart was pounding the whole time! I really freaked him out, poor guy. I’m glad he was there, though. Gosh, the nurse would never have been able to get me out of that chair by herself. Victor said I was out for 40 seconds, which is a really long time, but I think it probably just felt that long for him because he was terrified.

I waited on the bed for some time, then sat up and eventually I was ready to go. Baba Victor was chuckling as I met him in the waiting room, and the other Kenyans were smiling too. I’m sure they all heard what happened. I felt sheepish. Victor and I die laughing each time we remember it happening. Poor Mum was extra happy to see me Wednesday morning. “Oh, Ann, I was so worried you might faint again in the night.”

It’s been almost a week and I feel much better. My throat doesn’t hurt at all and the redness and swelling of my tonsil is almost gone. And I definitely haven’t blacked out again.