“And did the Countenance Divine, Shine forth upon our clouded hills?”...or so wrote William Blake in 1810. Holidays 2024/2025 my continence was far from divine. To put it in grade school English (which I’ll get back to later) I could not pee. Or in medical terms, I had an enlarged prostate.
In early January,2025, I went to the Hometown Clinic ER (face it, creating fictitious names of real places is fun!). After some tests and insertion of a catheter (ouch) I was released after a few days; I decided to get some physical therapy and went to Riveredge Gardens. In itself a good facility, a labor of love (shhh) of a Clinic doctor. They also had an excellent head nurse with a nearly unpronounceable name.
However, much of their staff was made of the least trained members of the nursing spectrum—nursing assistants, who made comments like “I’m not working with no pee,” ignoring a key aspect of working with someone with my initially painful insertion.
I was also mistakenly placed on the “senior” floor—with several sad folk suffering from situations far more serious than an enlarged prostate. One man who apparently thought the ice machine created a good substitute for clay and disliked nurses telling him people don’t like someone playing with the ice in their drink. And there was one woman who, to be blunt, was completely devoid of, her mind. She’d walk into my room, quite oblivious to my presence and stand there until a nurse guided her to her room. As my mind works quite well, I was more than a little spooked by my neighbors so I complained, and was moved to the “main” floor.
The main floor had a TV and DVD player with movies on request. A popular film was the old western “The Sons of Katie Elder;” in addition to a rousing Elmer Bernstein score, John Wayne and Dean Martin played brothers. Makes one question their public personae and the genetic weirdness of these “brothers” (actually, Duke and Dino were good friends who admired the other’s work).
I did have two very attractive Asian physical therapists, quite cute but very stern. I was also disappointed to learn they were married, but they did seem to like the attention.
But my continence was, by this time, rather cursed. This led to another trip to the ER. Quite unbeknown to me, hospitals are frequently without available rooms and I spent a long night on a less than comfy waiting room chair.
Finally, after 7, I was admitted with a new, different, and much more torturous catheter. This was a Foley Catheter, where it was attached to a bag with a tap for removing “liquid.”
After a few days hospitalized, I went to a new rehab facility, Artista Home Care, where the staff was better trained and knew the Foley had to be emptied.
Where the old place had some strange smoking rules designed to discourage smoking—short smoke periods, staff approved cigarettes—not known for taste, and only cigarettes. As an inveterate cigar smoker, these rules did nothing for me. The new place had an outdoor area surrounded by the facility, and allowed cigars. There is, apparently, something dignified about an old, long hair guy puffing on a Churchill.
Artista was more caring about patients’ dietary wishes, and about 8am an employee—usually a young Black guy would go around and ask what clients wanted to drink with their breakfast. Coffee, tea, or milk (in addition to the apple juice, which everyone received).
However, an older White woman (who apparently did not celebrate Juneteenth) got the wrong idea. Seeing a young Black guy walking into her bedroom, she started screaming “Rape! Murder!). He took it in good humor, which was more than she deserved.
Unsurprisingly, there were also two older women there who could not stand each other and spent considerable time either checking the ashtrays for still smokable butts or criticizing the other for being such a cheapskate.
Artista seemed proud of their hi-fiber breakfasts. For my constituency, this proved to be a problem.
I remember a science teacher instructing us to use the correct scientific terms. That is, to report an “emergency” as I had defecated. Not I crapped my pants (slightly better). The cruder “I shit myself” still acceptable. But not “I have poopy pants.”
I cannot understand why mature adults choose to talk like six year olds. As Twain recommended, “Use the word, not its second cousin.” By “poopy pants” they were using a third or fourth cousin.
I also saw some specialists. One recommended a TURP, the removal of a bit of the prostate to allow better urine flow. I went to Clinic West for the out patient procedure which I believe was pioneered by Clinic urologists.
While at RiverEdge, I make a point of bringing at least one of my self-published volumes with me. The head nurse saw my name on the book and put two and two together. Gratifying, to say the least.
I was hesitant about the TURP, remembering the bad experience when I had my tonsils out in 1972: after two “local anesthetics," with very long, very painful needles, I woke up with a dramatic bout of nausea.
But I went in and after tests, was taken to the OR. The lead surgeon looked at me and remarked, “You look like an artist,”
That was the second time in a month my creativity was recognized.
Very quickly, I was out, with confused but painless memories. I woke up without the slightest hint of nausea—anesthesia has certainly come a long way.
I had a check up a few days later in which the catheter was removed, just a quick Zzzp! and it was out, far better than it going in. Artista also had discharged me by then (finally!).
Now I have a wounded prostate which is slowly healing. I am regular but more solid there. A urologist I saw said it can take up to six months. My bladder is yet to take control of the whole system, and I was instructed to do Kegel exercises (which are more than tools to help with women’s orgasms).
So as I sit on my front porch, smoking a cigar, sipping a soft drink, and reading a book, I am hopeful that my countenance will, eventually, once again be divine.
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