I awoke to find the house covered in streamers and a poster courtesy of Sam :D We had the usual Jabulani morning meeting and Kate brought a massive plate of flapjacks (which are actually small pancakes) as a birthday present, thanks v. much to her for those :D Sarah and Bernard came by to give wish me Happy Birthday and give me a cute bracelet from Coffee Bay. Sally sent me a text saying she had a surprise waiting for me in OPD so I made my way into work to see her walking down the OPD corridor with a massive bag of post :D
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| Opening my presents in the pharmacy |
I was excited to the max to see all the mail I had – everyone here has been in on the plot to make me think I had no birthday post so it was a great surprise to see all the parcels, letters and cards. Cue cheesey grin which didn't leave for a considerable amount of time! I better get around to thanking everyone, I will try my best to reply in a decent amount of time to all the people who wrote, you've no idea how amazing it is to get so many letters. My wall is covered in them all, it's like something out of A Beautiful Mind...
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| My room |
Thanks to: Mum, Dad, Gregor, Kirsty, Fiona Cleat, Megan, Hannah, Auntie Denise, Uncle Richard, Robert, Beth, Eddie, Auntie Lynda, Steve, Nicola, Christopher, Oliver, Auntie Kathryn, Uncle Phil, Eleanor, Sarah, John, Amy, Uncle David, Auntie Helena, Isobel, Alice, Aunt Gerda, Auntie Fiona, Uncle Donald, Cameron, Bruce, Grandma and Grannie! I loved all the cards, letters, presents, sweets, DVDs and the tea towel of the London Underground!
Throughout the morning people came in to the pharmacy to say Happy Birthday so I really did very little work, and kind of made a mess of the place with all the wrapping paper. At around 10am I got a call from Liz telling me that there was a delivery taking place right that second so I rushed down to maternity to watch.
When I got there it turned out it was a vacuum delivery and it all happened very fast. Within about 5 seconds of my arrival the baby had been born. I had expected it to be particularly unpleasant to watch but it really wasn't as gruesome as I had been warned! It was very strange when the whole baby suddenly shot out and began crying - the whole thing seemed pretty surreal and I couldn't quite believe it had just happened. The woman must have had an incredibly high pain threshold for she barely made any noise the whole time despite the fact that she had no analgesia whatsoever. After the baby was born, Liz had to suction it a bit so it could breathe properly but he was otherwise fine and was sooo cute :D [I guess that's kind of a given for a 1 second old baby] However, there was more to come when Liz was called to resuscitation in paeds while she was writing up the notes for the delivery.
We ran across to paeds to find a young boy in cardiac arrest [he was one of the kids with Kwash I'd seen with Liz on Saturday]. All the other mums and babies on the ward had left to stand outside, nurses were going in and out with equipment for the resuss and his mother was sitting sobbing on the floor at the foot of his bed. Seeing her all huddled up in tears was one of the most tragic things I've ever seen.
Liz set up for the resuss and asked for someone to do the chest compressions but for some reason no one was did, so there I was putting on gloves and doing CPR on a kid. It was crazy, surreal, horrific, all at the same time. I got some kind of morbid adrenaline rush – I've never seen someone die before and I didn't want to see it now. Liz was calling someone, telling them to come and help and bring a laryngoscope from the OPD and seconds later Sally came in. I think they intubated him at some point, it's all a bit of a blur, then there were adrenaline injections. All the while I was doing the chest compressions, looking at this kid as he slowly faded further and further away.
We continued for a short while, but I could see for myself that nothing was going to bring this little boy back, and I could see it in the other doctor's faces when the second adrenaline injection provoked no response. Finally, after a final round of compressions, we let him rest in peace, having done everything we could. I didn't really know what to do next, this was the first time I'd seen a dead body, let alone watch them die, let alone help to do CPR on them while they died. I just switched off and felt absolutely nothing. The staff put him back into bed and closed his eyes, and then later on the nurses came and put him in a cot to take him away to the mortuary. I found it hard to believe that he was actually dead – he was still warm, and looking at him it was like he was asleep. I'm not sure why, but I expected a dead person to look different. I'll always remember the moment when the nurses lifted up his limp body and carried him away, truly heartbreaking.
I think it will be a long time before I experience such an intense 40 minutes – seeing the start of one life and the end of another immediately after kind of blows the mind! We went for a break to recover, then returned to our separate days. It was a huge deal for me, but it happens every day here and I don't really know how all the doctors and nurses here cope, they really are incredible.
Since this is a blog about my birthday I guess I should revert back to less depressing topics! Sam had given me a brownie mix for my birthday so we made that, then went for coffee and chocolate at Liz and Lisa's. We went for a lovely dinner of chilli con carne at Kate's house, then had a party in our rondavel which almost everyone came to. Shannon made me an enormous 18th birthday cake which was stuuuuuning, then Liz brought round a tiramisu and there was wine and other food too. I got a South Africa soccer top from the Gaunts and Le Roux, a candle and Oreos from Anita and Etienne, soaps from our neighbour Ncediswa, chocolates from Megan and Joff – thank you very much to everyone :D I'm bound to have forgotten someone else so I'm sorry for that! We had a good night and I really enjoyed myself :D After everyone went home, Sam and I stayed up late chatting and eating far too much cake [I was ill for 4 days afterward, that’s how bad it was!]. Yet another unforgettable day!
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| The birthday table |
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| Our victorious thirty seconds quiz team :) |
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