I Took a Close Friend of the Family to A&E – and he went from unwell to barely responsive during the journey.
Our family friend has always been a truly outsized figure. Sharp and not prone to sentiment – and not one to say no to another brandy. At family parties, he would be the one chatting about the newest uproar to involve a regional politician, or regaling us with tales of the shameless infidelity of various Sheffield Wednesday players for forty years.
We would often spend Christmas morning with him and his family, then departing for our own celebrations. However, one holiday season, some ten years back, when he was scheduled to meet family abroad, he took a fall on the steps, holding a drink in one hand, a suitcase gripped in the other, and broke his ribs. The hospital had patched him up and advised against air travel. So, here he was back with us, doing his best to manage, but seeming progressively worse.
The Day Progressed
The hours went by, however, the anecdotes weren’t flowing like they normally did. He was convinced he was OK but his condition seemed to contradict this. He tried to make it upstairs for a nap but couldn’t; he tried, cautiously, to eat Christmas lunch, and was unsuccessful.
Therefore, before I could even put on a festive hat, my mother and I made the choice to take him to A&E.
The idea of calling for an ambulance crossed our minds, but how long would that take on Christmas Day?
A Rapid Decline
By the time we got there, he’d gone from peaky to barely responsive. Other outpatients helped us guide him to a ward, where the generic smell of institutional meals and air filled the air.
What was distinct, however, was the mood. People were making brave attempts at festive gaiety everywhere you looked, despite the underlying sterile and miserable mood; tinsel hung from drip stands and bowls of Christmas pudding congealed on tables next to the beds.
Cheerful nurses, who no doubt would far rather have been at home, were moving busily and using that great term of endearment so particular to the area: “duck”.
A Subdued Return Home
Once the permitted time ended, we made our way home to lukewarm condiments and festive TV programming. We saw a lighthearted program on television, probably Agatha Christie, and played something even dafter, such as a regionally-themed property trading game.
It was already late, and snowing, and I remember experiencing a letdown – did we lose the holiday?
The Aftermath and the Story
While our friend did get better in time, he had in fact suffered a punctured lung and subsequently contracted DVT. And, although that holiday is not my most cherished memory, it has become part of family legend as “the Christmas I saved a life”.
How factual that statement is, or a little bit of dramatic licence, I couldn’t possibly comment, but its annual retelling has definitely been good for my self-esteem. True to his favorite phrase: “don’t let the truth get in the way of a good story”.