Chapter Five: Onto Bryn Mawr Rehab

Chapter Five: On to Bryn Mawr

I painted the above image while an inpatient at Bryn Mawr Rehabilitation Hospital. This was the beginning go spinal imagery I began to explore.

I am not sure at what point that I somehow knew that I needed to go to Bryn Mawr Rehab. I think some of the nurses may have talked about it, and I kept hearing about how amazing it was, and the miracles they had helped perform for their patients. Anytime a representative from Paoli came into my room to talk about my health insurance, or anything else, I insisted I wanted to go to Bryn Mawr. After a few days of this, I was excited to learn that I would be going to Bryn Mawr, on June 11, 2024.

This entire experience has exposed me to so many things I had never ever had to consider in the past. One of those was that I had never ridden in an ambulance, yet now in the space of one week, I had ridden in one twice, (not realizing I would be riding in more ambulances before this was all over). During my stay at Bryn Mawr, I would have to go to multiple appointments with Dr. Okpaku whose office was located in Paoli Hospital’s medical complex as well as having additional MRIs and two wound evacuation procedures (to be described in a later section). I can’t remember much about that particular trip, but I did learn over time there is an order to these rides. There is a driver and two other EMTs (Emergency Medical Technicians) two to help with moving the patient. One of them usually rides in the back with the patient to records their vitals and I assume monitor the patient through the journey to the hospital. Here is where you might ask if there is a difference between an EMT and a Paramedic and yes there is – Paramedics have a longer training period and provide a higher level of care. For journeys between destinations in an ambulance, EMTs are more appropriate.

The Bryn Mawr Rehabilitation Hospital campus is quite beautiful, and their reputation for excellence is well-earned. I am so grateful that not only was I able to get in (apparently not everyone does) and that my insurance covered absolutely everything. Thank the Gods my over 20 years of working for the State of Pennsylvania (and thus being a beneficiary of excellent insurance) were proving to be a literal life saver.

I had to wait many hours for transport from Paoli to Bryn Mawr. I learned that this is not an unusual situation, leaving me restless and anxious to get going to Bryn Mawr. Transport finally showed up sometime after 9 PM, and after a short trip, I was wheeled into a room in the Spruce wing, where I met my roommate, Diana. The hour being late we didn’t chat much, but I did learn that she that while she had an injury much like mine a few years before, currently she was at Bryn Mawr recovering from a knee replacement. Up until her discharge, we would share our miseries, our triumphs, and stories. I was grateful she was my roommate.

Our room was fairly large and had a big window facing a lovely scene of the woods behind the hospital. Diana was on the window side, and I was on the “door” side of the room. We found out we shared a similar demented sense of humor when one of the nurses came in and put a bib on me in time for dinner. Diana thought this was hilarious and took a photo with her phone. We laughed at my wild looking hair which I thought I had combed out of the way – but it ended up looking like Gary Oldman in Dracula. Diana taught me how to use the television and remote in the room and we liked a lot of the same shows. We each had our own television, so we would often watch the same show (police procedurals in particular) and comment back and forth.

I had arrived on a Tuesday, and the following day, things started to move rather quickly, when I began physical and occupational therapy. I was happy to begin, and I felt as though my strength began to come back surprisingly quickly. I met my physical therapist, a handsome young man named Parker who was enthusiastic and upbeat – as were all the physical and occupational therapists I met while at Bryn Mawr. Parker was tall and slender but muscular with dark hair and a friendly smile. He was always encouraging on both my good and my bad days. I have to say that physical therapists are truly the cheerleaders of rehab. They always sound positive and upbeat even when I was convinced I was not making progress. In fact, it is safe to say that ALL the physical and occupational therapy staff were incredibly good looking. I wondered if it was one of the job requirements. I also met my occupational therapist, Ashley, a recent new mother with lots of baby stories to share. Both Parker and Ashley seemed impressed with my quick progress.

Bryn Mawr Rehabilitation Hospital is not a bad place to be if you must recover from a spinal injury for two months. (I was there just under two months, but who’s counting?) The entire hospital has large wide windows so that you can see all the trees and flowers outside from wherever you happen to be in the building. They also host an art exhibition yearly called Art Ability for disabled artists (in which I was now eligible to participate) and the walls without windows are lined with beautiful art. Along with their lovely campus, which also sports a pond filled with carp (that visitors are allowed to feed), they offer services like art therapy, music therapy, horticultural therapy (the green house is amazing) and nurses who regularly offer reiki, which is based on an Eastern belief that vital energy flows through your body and a trained Reiki practitioner, called at reiki master, uses gentle touch – or places their hands just above your body – to help guide this energy in a way that leads to balance and healing)to patients. It is as if it is designed to make one forget their suffering.

I was surprised that a Western hospital would have such a holistic approach to healing. Prior to my experiences at Bryn Mawr Rehab, I was fairly convinced that Western medicine was only good for medical crises like cancer and broken bones. I had been seeing several holistic practitioners prior to my hospital admittance, and although they definitely soothed me and kept me calm, no one saw the abscess and infection brewing underneath my skin. I decided that from now on, I would not dismiss Western medicine, and instead would continue to seek relief from pain from alternative medicine, but I would use both in a more integrated way. I found that Reiki did in fact lessen my pain, and the soothing lavender aromatherapy in my room helped me to fall asleep faster at night.

I attempted to start a journal while at Bryn Mawr so that I could document everything that was happening and to also help myself recall things later. As the days wore on, sometimes it was just too much. Indeed, while my mind and heart were ready to do the physical therapy so necessary for my recovery, my body seemed to have other ideas.

Remember the Trigger Warning? Here it is again. Skip this if you are fainthearted.

The purpose of being at Bryn Mawr Rehab Hospital is for physical and/or occupational therapy. Unfortunately, just about any time I tried moving my body beyond my bed, I started having uncontrollable diarrhea; which was just truly mortifying. Countless nurses, nurse assistants, and physical therapists helped me get cleaned up multiple times. Having this incontinence reminded me how helpless I currently was, especially with having to rely on others to clean me up. At that point in time, I simply didn’t have the strength. I was tested for C diff C,diff is a horrible infection brought on by too many antibiotics taken for a long period of time and is exacerbated by other conditions being experienced by a patient. It can be very easily transmittable, which is why hand washing and keeping surfaces clean is so very important.

I had been on a PICC line (peripherally inserted central catheter) since my arrival at Bryn Mawr, having long term IV antibiotics pumped into my system. It is not unimaginable that I could have caught C.diff just by virtue of having antibiotics being delivered intravenously, but that was not the case just yet. Eventually, things seemed to clear up – at least for a while. I was glad to be able to get back to physical therapy and not shitting myself every time my body needed to move.

Speaking of things that we don’t discuss in polite society, I thought I would also mention that I had been on a Foley catheter since my surgery. This was convenient in that I never needed to go to a bathroom, but it was finally removed on July 2. Nearly a month had passed since I had been able to pee independently. Unfortunately, however, this did not mean I would be going on my own either in a bedpan or in the bathroom. I received the news that it was still going to be quite a while before I could do go on my own again, and I had to rely on the nurses to do a straight cath for me about every six hours. To complicate matters, this process involved having an ultrasound of my bladder just before the catheterization to determine how much urine needed to be removed from my bladder. Everyone seemed to be getting to know me on a much more intimate basis than I ever would have liked. Eventually, I learned to use the catheter myself, so at least I didn’t require help of any kind! Interesting fact, I was told by the doctors that it could possibly take up to a year for my brain to remember how to communicate with my bladder due to the incredible amount of re-wiring going on between my nervous system and my brain. Once again, I felt like my body was completely out of my control.

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