Chinese Hospital Adventure: Part One

What an adventure. I think that might be the best way to describe my last two weeks here in China. From the moment my plane touched down in Shanghai to this afternoon when my new friends and I walked around the beautiful West Lake in Hangzhou, this crazy country has done nothing but keep me on my toes.
Granted, I figured that my first few weeks would be a bit of a challenge. But I thought that those problems would come in the form of jetlag or of having a Chinese vocabulary that consisted only of, “hello,” “thank you,” “too expensive,” and “watch out for the car.” But nooooo, this Eastern country just had to be different and throw a complete curveball in my direction. I am talking, of course, about my six-day stint in a local hospital where I lost a bit of hair and gained a lot of stories.
To truly understand this tale, I have to take you all back to the week before I left. Nope, strike that. I have to take you back to the middle of last summer when my jaw first started to hurt. I was working at a summer camp and would wake up every now and then with what I thought was a sore jaw muscle. The times when this happened were few and far between though, and I would usually forget about it until the next pang occurred.
By the time I got home, I noticed that my jaw was a bit swollen and that the pain was becoming more frequent. Having only two weeks to prepare for my trip, I squeezed in an appointment with every type of doctor possible in hopes of getting my jaw taken care of before I left. The dentist thought I was grinding my teeth. The doctor at Lawrence Prompt Care didn’t know what was going on, told me not to worry about it and to just keep taking ibuprofen. My regular doctor just figured that I had TMJ syndrome caused by excessive gum chewing and told me it would go away with time. Like hell it did.
As the time to leave for China got closer, my jaw became more swollen and the pain more constant. The night before I left was horrible in that my jaw kept me up all night and left my poor parents trying to convince me to postpone my trip until the situation could be resolved. But I was sure that it would all go away with time and decided to board the plane as planned at 6 a.m.
Fast-forward to my fourth day in China and I was a wreck. The ibuprofen wasn’t working and my Tylenol only offered me a few hours of solace at a time. Plus, I couldn’t open my mouth. So as my two co-workers, Linda and Jessica, got to indulge in the amazing local cuisine, I was stuck on a nursing home diet of semi-melted yogurt. And that semi-swollen jaw I had told you about? Well, it had taken on a life of its own and ballooned out to the point where I belonged more on an episode of, “America’s Got Talent,” than in a school house.
Luckily for me—and I really mean LUCKILY—I am surrounded by an amazing community here in Hangzhou. When Monday rolled around, one of the teachers took me, Jessica and Linda to the international clinic at the Sir Run Run Shaw Hospital. Really, I swear that’s what it’s called! I knew it would be a good clinic in that it automatically reminded me of Run DMC. But I digress…
Let me just say that NOW I love this hospital. However, when I first arrived, I was not the biggest fan of Sir Run. When our car pulled up to the front entrance and let us out, our group walked through not a door but several sheets of heavy plastic (like the ones they use to keep the cold air trapped in freezers with) and into the chaos of the admittance lobby where a long, loud line of people both sick and well were trying to get help from the front desk. My heart sank. It was going to take forever for me to even see a doctor.
This was the first of many instances when I would begin to realize that being a Westerner in China can be a very “helpful” thing. We skipped the admittance line completely and went straight to the elevators to go up international clinic on the fifth floor. Apparently, being a foreigner made me a VIP patient and let me bypass the regular healthcare protocols. While the ridiculousness of me being any sort of VIP made me laugh and feel a bit better, my nerves started to creep in again when we got to the waiting area for the elevators. I wasn’t exactly in the mood for a lesson in social practices at that point but that’s exactly what I got. While in the US people wait for everyone to get off of elevators before they enter, in China it is a mad, melee dash. It took us a few tries and a lot of help from the school’s teacher but Linda, Jessica and I finally managed to push and shove our way into one of the elevators.
Oh my God it smells like corn. Yes, that was the first thing that came to my mind when I stepped on the elevator and watched as the doors closed to seal me in with the strange scent. (Side note: Corn on the cob is the equivalent to America’s ice cream bars…it’s the bees knees and everyone eats it). Luckily for all of us, the clinic waiting area was extremely nice and did not smell of produce. In it we had access to the internet, CNN, clean water and an awesome nurse whose ringtone was, “I Want it That Way,” by the Backstreet Boys. I was in a good place.
They quickly called me to be checked by a doctor and Jessica, being the absolutely amazing person that she is, went with me to offer emotional support. So as the my school’s teacher (who, by the way, is name is Luke) and Linda waited in the clinic’s lounge, Jessica and I went to see what the heck was going on with the right side of my jaw.
When the door opened and I met the man who would be one of my three doctors at Sir Run, I was surprised to see not a Chinese doctor but a very tall American who introduced himself as Peter. He was in Hangzhou working with an exchange program and by the end of my six days in that hospital, Peter would become my favorite person in the entire world. Well, Peter took one look at me and knew exactly what was wrong. I was not suffering from TMJ but a horribly infected Parotid gland. He paired me up with a specialist, Shen Yao who could drain the gland and get me back to normal.
Before he left, Peter asked if he could take a picture of my cheek for a class he taught back in the states because it was so swollen. In non-medical terms: he wanted to take a picture because it was just that gross. This was when I first started to suspect that my situation wasn’t exactly normal. I later asked him about it and Peter said that this sort of infection doesn’t happen that often anymore and that I was one of the more severe cases he had seen in his 20 years of practice. I’m not particularly thrilled to be the holder this title.
When I met Shen Yao, she immediately went to work and took me to get an ultrasound so she could see what had caused the infection. I hadn’t exactly had an ultrasound before (you’re welcome, parents) and thought that it simply involved skimming the surface of my skin. What I didn’t realize was that there would be a lot of pushing and pressure involved. It was not a pleasant surprise. As I lay there on the table and the ultrasound technician pressed and rolled her way across my face, I lost it. No, there was no guttural sobbing but I couldn’t stop the tears from rolling down my face nor stop my body from shaking from the pain. I was tired, hungry and completely terrified. In their own way, I’m sure my doctor and the technician tried to comfort me but I couldn’t understand a word of what they were saying. I just wanted to go home.
After the ultrasound, Shen Yao determined that my gland had become infected due to a large cyst that had formed and blocked it up. She also determined that because it caused me so much pain, that I would have to go under general anesthesia to remove the cyst and drain my gland.
Well this sucks, I remember thinking.
Thus began the second stage of my hospital adventure: preparing for surgery. I was admitted to Sir Run and given a private VIP room. It had a gorgeous view of downtown Hangzhou and a TV that got CNN. For this room, I would only be charged $80 a night. (Yeah, I know). Then I went to get some x-rays taken, draw blood and all of that other fun stuff. This portion actually turned out to be a highlight in that when I went to the hallway where I could get all of the procedures done it was filled with laughing, happy, healthy people dressed in the hospital’s pj’s. All of them were running around from station to station like it was some sort of game. It was so strange. At one point a guy actually lit a cigarette in the hallway to start smoking! Silly Chinese! Thankfully, that action was quickly squashed by a nurse passing by. The school’s teacher, Luke, said that he thought the group was a business that had come in to get their physical’s taken care of together. I think we offered as much entertainment to them as they did to us.
Once the tests were over we went back to my room, Shen Yao came to look at my gland and to further explain the surgery. It was during this time that I met my other doctor, Nick. The first time I actually saw Nick was when Shen Yao was drawing the surgical lines on my face. He came into my room, didn’t say a word to anyone, looked at my face and then ran out. We of the Hangzhou Foreign Language School were quite confused. Our confusion only expanded as more people came in for a visit. It was like an episode of, “Grey’s Anatomy” when the residents get really excited about a strange case. All of these young doctors kept peering around the corner of my room to get a good look at the yellow-haired girl and her swollen puss-filled gland.
When Nick returned, he brought a strange old man with him. At first we were all very confused because well, we thought that this older man was just a patient or a patient’s family member who had wandered in from the hallway. But no, this was my barber and he wanted to shave my hair. Honestly, before this point I hadn’t even thought about the fact that they would have to give me a haircut. I mean, I had just gotten trimmed before I left the country! But I really didn’t have any other option and got up to take the walk of shave (ha! Punny) to the chair in the corner of my room.
The barber ended up shaving only a little bit of my hair off. Right now there’s just a small portion of my head that, as the German teacher in our school so eloquently put, makes me look like a skinhead. While the barber shaved off my hair, Nick decided it would be a good time to read me the dangers of the surgery and have me sign a consent form. Basically, he said that there was a chance that my face could become paralyzed by the procedure. My mouth dropped open. I mean, before this moment, I had never even broken a bone.
After asking Nick how confident he felt about his surgical abilities…for future reference, this is not a good topic to joke about with a Chinese doctor…I went ahead and signed the form. They had already cut off my hair so why not add a scar to the mix.
With the form signed and my hair cut, Jessica, Linda, Luke and I prepared to settle in and wait for the surgeons to call me. But that weird barber just wouldn’t leave. Well, as it turns out, pre-surgery haircuts are not complementary. We were the ones who had to cover the bill. Granted, it was only $3 but still, it’s the principle of the thing!
We also had to try to explain to Nick that I react poorly to hydrocodone. This proved to be a problem in that none of us realized how to actually spell h-y-d-r-o-c-o-d-o-n-e. He finally said he understood but we weren’t too sure. Then the room cleared out of doctors, residents and nurses and we started to play the waiting game.
This also proved to be a bit difficult for me. The longer I sat around, the more I felt the pain and thought about what I was about to do and the fact that Nick might not understand how important it was that I not have hydrocodone. Again, I just wanted to go home. But sitting on a 14 hour flight just wasn’t an option and I really did have faith my doctors. But still, everything mounted up and yes, I cried again. In a strange way, this led to another great memory that I’ll never forget.
Linda, who I had only known for a few days, came over to sit on my bed and gave me exactly what I needed: a hug. She told me everything was going to be just fine and then, as I started to get a hold of myself, Linda gave me a quick kiss on my forehead. Those simple acts made all of the difference to me. I didn’t feel like I had to take this on alone.
After about 30 very long minutes a man came in to take me to the surgery room. He wheeled me out to the elevator with Linda, Jessica and Luke following. Unfortunately, they couldn’t ride on the super-special-surgery-elevator I was on and we had to say our quick goodbyes there.
As the doors to the elevator closed, I couldn’t help but smile…it smelled like corn. My doctors kept me awake until I got to the surgery room itself. In there I saw a few familiar faces and one of the nurses I had been with that day even grabbed my hand and squeezed it to show support. Kelly, what the heck have you gotten yourself into? That was the last thing I remember before the anesthesia kicked in and I fell asleep.

End Part One

What to look forward to!
-My awkward hospital meeting with my boss
-My stylish PJs
-No toilet paper
-Walking outside as a patient
-Peter becomes my favorite person
-Squirrels in China
-Using my wound to get a taxi cab ride
-Shopping with my surgeon
-Explanation of my students
-Our military censorship in a restaurant