Perplexing Paradoxical Ironies

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esclavo

esclavo

from frying pan into fire
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I have been thinking for a long time about the things I've seen and done in the hospital which have changed what I thought was normal/abnormal in the world. I don't know what is normal or right anymore...

I was in the trauma bay with a 35 year old female with a bad pelvic fracture. She had blood all over from her lower abdomen to her legs. I cut her pants off with trauma sheers and found that the perineum region was where the blood was coming from. As I was trying to figure out if this was a rectal or vaginal injury... you guessed it, I had to stick my finger in both. As my mind took a trip to Costa Rica, my finger was checking for a torn vagina or rectum. My mind came back to notice that this woman had absolutley no hair anywhere on her body (except her head). I didn't know if she just never went through puberty or if this was some other self-imposed condition... it was really weird... that afternoon I got a call from my attending to come and check a patient out who we did a fibula flap on. The guy thought that there was some lumpyness under the flap and my attending wanted a second person to feel if this guy was getting a recurrence under his fibula flap. As I looked into his mouth to check out his flap there was more hair in his mouth than on Scrotties back. I stuck my fingers in there and palpated for a minute or two.... Then the guys asked me if I could take all that hair out of his mouth... I thought, I need to get that girl extubated with the pelvic fracture so I can find out who did her !@#$ hair job to see if they could do the same for this cancer patient....

Later I was at my dinner table and I was looking at my hand which was holding an egg roll and I thought about where that damned hand had been that day and I just lost my appetite. Later on I was holding the youngest of the esclavo Juniors (about 3 months old) and he started sucking on my knuckle and I just about washed his mouth out with soap!

I don't know what is normal anymore, I mean guys with hair in their mouths, girls with no hair on their bottoms...I then get on SDN and there are periodontists taking out wisdom teeth and because my "inner compass" is so thrown off, I don't know if this is abnormal or if this is like the hairless girl or the hairy mouthed guy....am I all alone feeling like I am free falling through space? Next thing you know I am going to walk up to the operating room and see a plastic surgeon putting dental implants in someone... 😕 😕 😕 😕
 
esclavo said:
I have been thinking for a long time about the things I've seen and done in the hospital which have changed what I thought was normal/abnormal in the world. I don't know what is normal or right anymore...

I was in the trauma bay with a 35 year old female with a bad pelvic fracture. She had blood all over from her lower abdomen to her legs. I cut her pants off with trauma sheers and found that the perineum region was where the blood was coming from. As I was trying to figure out if this was a rectal or vaginal injury... you guessed it, I had to stick my finger in both. As my mind took a trip to Costa Rica, my finger was checking for a torn vagina or rectum. My mind came back to notice that this woman had absolutley no hair anywhere on her body (except her head). I didn't know if she just never went through puberty or if this was some other self-imposed condition... it was really weird... that afternoon I got a call from my attending to come and check a patient out who we did a fibula flap on. The guy thought that there was some lumpyness under the flap and my attending wanted a second person to feel if this guy was getting a recurrence under his fibula flap. As I looked into his mouth to check out his flap there was more hair in his mouth than on Scrotties back. I stuck my fingers in there and palpated for a minute or two.... Then the guys asked me if I could take all that hair out of his mouth... I thought, I need to get that girl extubated with the pelvic fracture so I can find out who did her !@#$ hair job to see if they could do the same for this cancer patient....

Later I was at my dinner table and I was looking at my hand which was holding an egg roll and I thought about where that damned hand had been that day and I just lost my appetite. Later on I was holding the youngest of the esclavo Juniors (about 3 months old) and he started sucking on my knuckle and I just about washed his mouth out with soap!

I don't know what is normal anymore, I mean guys with hair in their mouths, girls with no hair on their bottoms...I then get on SDN and there are periodontists taking out wisdom teeth and because my "inner compass" is so thrown off, I don't know if this is abnormal or if this is like the hairless girl or the hairy mouthed guy....am I all alone feeling like I am free falling through space? Next thing you know I am going to walk up to the operating room and see a plastic surgeon putting dental implants in someone... 😕 😕 😕 😕
Click to expand...


esclavo, have you ever considered writing a small book about your unique experiences as an OMFS resident? you love what you do and you have a thing for creative writing. why not combine both and write a book. you know....something like Thoughts of an Oral Surgeon.......it has been done. a few months ago, i read a book called Complications , written by Atul Gawandee, a young famous general surgeon at Harvard. the book is about surgery, surgeons, their residency, their mistakes, and the unique, and sometimes mysterious cases they come across. serious here.... 👍
 
fightingspirit said:
esclavo, have you ever considered writing a small book about your unique experiences as an OMFS resident? you love what you do and you have a thing for creative writing. why not combine both and write a book. you know....something like Thoughts of an Oral Surgeon.......it has been done. a few months ago, i read a book called Complications , written by Atul Gawandee, a young famous general surgeon at Harvard. the book is about surgery, surgeons, their residency, their mistakes, and the unique, and sometimes mysterious cases they come across. serious here.... 👍
Click to expand...


We definately dont want any books about our experiences out there. It would be bad for business! Trust me! A general surgeon is a different story. I read that book as well.

Esclavo, why do you have to put up with OMS duties while on trauma surgery? They should pay you extra for that!
 
Dude, the no hair in the nether region is the best fashion trend of the 20th and 21st centuries...of course, it's a lot more appreciable when a person isn't bleeding from her rectum...

There have been a couple things this year that have made my head spin--the worst of which was OMFSRes showing me "the goat". =)

On a serious side, I recently admitted a 20 yo BF with what I thought was an osteosarcoma of the posterior mandible. Bx confirmed my suspicions. During the 4 days while she was here, I appreciated the lesion to have doubled in size, but I chalked up most of the growth to post-op edema. PET scan was negative for metastasis. She was discharged, to come back ~ a week later when the final pathology came back from Baylor to formulate a treatment plan. By yesterday, her follow-up, the lesion had expanded to fill the maxillary vestible, and the patient now looked like she had an enormous buccal space abscess. In less than one week, this thing had quadrupled in size. This is the most aggressive sarc that any of our attendings have ever seen. The patient is starting to exhibit dysphagia, so is getting an emergent trach today. Resection has been scheduled for Friday. Originally, it was semi-planned for the patient to receive neoadjuvant chemotherapy prior to resection (as I'm told this has shown promise in increasing the 5-yr survival). Because of the unbelievably aggressive nature of this osteosarc, the pre-surgical chemo isn't even a possibility. Couldn't have happened to a nicer girl. It pisses me off that 95% of the patients I see abuse the body they've been given with reckless abandon, yet somehow continue to get by, costing the taxpayers of the state hundreds of thousands of dollars. While in the meantime, this 20-yr old non-smoker, non-drinker, sweet as can be, young girl is going to be shafted out of her chance for a normal life.

Last night in the ER, I helped the ortho resident place some pressure wraps on a guy who had been shot at close range once through the right knee, shattering his patella and the distal head of the femur. He was shot three times in the left knee and lower leg, shattering his patella, fibula, and tibia. The patient said he knew who had shot him, but wouldn't talk about it. I didn't realize that this "shoot out your kneecaps" **** really happened outside of the Sopranos. Crazy...

There are some days after which I can't believe the world that we live in is the real world. I know what you mean, Esclavo...there's a lot to process in the "off-hours"...
 
esclavo said:
...As I was trying to figure out if this was a rectal or vaginal injury... you guessed it, I had to stick my finger in both....
Click to expand...
Ahhh yes.....the old "Two in the pink, one in the stink" exam....

This is why you can carry girls like a 6-pack when they get drunk.
 
A wise upper level of mine opened the door for deep thinking the other day, when he posed the following question:

Have you ever thought about the fact that our second wives haven't even been born yet?
 
esclavo said:
I don't know what is normal anymore, I mean guys with hair in their mouths, girls with no hair on their bottoms...I then get on SDN and there are periodontists taking out wisdom teeth and because my "inner compass" is so thrown off, I don't know if this is abnormal or if this is like the hairless girl or the hairy mouthed guy....am I all alone feeling like I am free falling through space? Next thing you know I am going to walk up to the operating room and see a plastic surgeon putting dental implants in someone... 😕 😕 😕 😕
Click to expand...

Dude, I think that somewhere between ATLS, Trauma Surgery Rotation, OMSATs, sleepless nights in the hospital and with the new Esclavo, Organizing your Illegal Immigration demonstrations, the obsessive compulsive washing of your hands, and your 2 months away from being the big chief resident, you are starting to crack.... This is where you need to sit down and pop open an ice-cold beer. Wait... u don't do that either... Just go kick the neighbor's dog, that should make u feel better.
 
OMFSCardsFan said:
A wise upper level of mine opened the door for deep thinking the other day, when he posed the following question:

Have you ever thought about the fact that our second wives haven't even been born yet?
Click to expand...

:laugh: :laugh: :laugh: :laugh: :laugh: :laugh:
 
I had a perio resident tell me that perio was the most competitive specialty to get into, after endo and ortho...
 
6897round2 said:
I had a perio resident tell me that perio was the most competitive specialty to get into, after endo and ortho...
Click to expand...
He was probably just trying to get you to sleep with him...did it work?
 
6897round2 said:
I had a perio resident tell me that perio was the most competitive specialty to get into, after endo and ortho...
Click to expand...

Just because I am smarter than most Endo and Ortho residents (and all OMFS residents) doesn't necessarily mean that my specialty as a whole is more competitive.
 
OMFSCardsFan said:
He was probably just trying to get you to sleep with him...did it work?
Click to expand...

Nah - I have too much integrity to cheat on your mom. But I told him that your dad might be interested in playing a little pitch and catch...
 
6897round2 said:
Nah - I have too much integrity to cheat on your mom. But I told him that your dad might be interested in playing a little pitch and catch...
Click to expand...
OWNED
 
esclavo said:
I have been thinking for a long time about the things I've seen and done in the hospital which have changed what I thought was normal/abnormal in the world. I don't know what is normal or right anymore...

I was in the trauma bay with a 35 year old female with a bad pelvic fracture. She had blood all over from her lower abdomen to her legs. I cut her pants off with trauma sheers and found that the perineum region was where the blood was coming from. As I was trying to figure out if this was a rectal or vaginal injury... you guessed it, I had to stick my finger in both. As my mind took a trip to Costa Rica, my finger was checking for a torn vagina or rectum. My mind came back to notice that this woman had absolutley no hair anywhere on her body (except her head). I didn't know if she just never went through puberty or if this was some other self-imposed condition... it was really weird... that afternoon I got a call from my attending to come and check a patient out who we did a fibula flap on. The guy thought that there was some lumpyness under the flap and my attending wanted a second person to feel if this guy was getting a recurrence under his fibula flap. As I looked into his mouth to check out his flap there was more hair in his mouth than on Scrotties back. I stuck my fingers in there and palpated for a minute or two.... Then the guys asked me if I could take all that hair out of his mouth... I thought, I need to get that girl extubated with the pelvic fracture so I can find out who did her !@#$ hair job to see if they could do the same for this cancer patient....

Later I was at my dinner table and I was looking at my hand which was holding an egg roll and I thought about where that damned hand had been that day and I just lost my appetite. Later on I was holding the youngest of the esclavo Juniors (about 3 months old) and he started sucking on my knuckle and I just about washed his mouth out with soap!

I don't know what is normal anymore, I mean guys with hair in their mouths, girls with no hair on their bottoms...I then get on SDN and there are periodontists taking out wisdom teeth and because my "inner compass" is so thrown off, I don't know if this is abnormal or if this is like the hairless girl or the hairy mouthed guy....am I all alone feeling like I am free falling through space? Next thing you know I am going to walk up to the operating room and see a plastic surgeon putting dental implants in someone... 😕 😕 😕 😕
Click to expand...


yeah, I saw this man the other day with a foley that just seemed to disappear into nothing and I was like "hey, were is this guy's penis?" and then in the bed next to him is a little old lady and I take a closer look and she has a full grown beard, so then I'm left wondering, what the hell is going on here? which one is a man? or are they chics? how am I supposed to concentrate with questions like that running through my head?
 
Love this post!!


esclavo said:
I have been thinking for a long time about the things I've seen and done in the hospital which have changed what I thought was normal/abnormal in the world. I don't know what is normal or right anymore...

I was in the trauma bay with a 35 year old female with a bad pelvic fracture. She had blood all over from her lower abdomen to her legs. I cut her pants off with trauma sheers and found that the perineum region was where the blood was coming from. As I was trying to figure out if this was a rectal or vaginal injury... you guessed it, I had to stick my finger in both. As my mind took a trip to Costa Rica, my finger was checking for a torn vagina or rectum. My mind came back to notice that this woman had absolutley no hair anywhere on her body (except her head). I didn't know if she just never went through puberty or if this was some other self-imposed condition... it was really weird... that afternoon I got a call from my attending to come and check a patient out who we did a fibula flap on. The guy thought that there was some lumpyness under the flap and my attending wanted a second person to feel if this guy was getting a recurrence under his fibula flap. As I looked into his mouth to check out his flap there was more hair in his mouth than on Scrotties back. I stuck my fingers in there and palpated for a minute or two.... Then the guys asked me if I could take all that hair out of his mouth... I thought, I need to get that girl extubated with the pelvic fracture so I can find out who did her !@#$ hair job to see if they could do the same for this cancer patient....

Later I was at my dinner table and I was looking at my hand which was holding an egg roll and I thought about where that damned hand had been that day and I just lost my appetite. Later on I was holding the youngest of the esclavo Juniors (about 3 months old) and he started sucking on my knuckle and I just about washed his mouth out with soap!

I don't know what is normal anymore, I mean guys with hair in their mouths, girls with no hair on their bottoms...I then get on SDN and there are periodontists taking out wisdom teeth and because my "inner compass" is so thrown off, I don't know if this is abnormal or if this is like the hairless girl or the hairy mouthed guy....am I all alone feeling like I am free falling through space? Next thing you know I am going to walk up to the operating room and see a plastic surgeon putting dental implants in someone... 😕 😕 😕 😕
Click to expand...
 
Teefies said:
yeah, I saw this man the other day with a foley that just seemed to disappear into nothing and I was like "hey, were is this guy's penis?" and then in the bed next to him is a little old lady and I take a closer look and she has a full grown beard, so then I'm left wondering, what the hell is going on here? which one is a man? or are they chics? how am I supposed to concentrate with questions like that running through my head?
Click to expand...

See what I mean!!!! This crap just tends to screw up your sense of sense and nonsense....excellent post. Next I'll have to tell you about a guy with an aeresol canister top stuck in his rectum 😕 😕

I just want to see some normal humans with normal problems....
 
esclavo said:
...Next I'll have to tell you about a guy with an aeresol canister top stuck in his rectum....
Click to expand...
You mean like this....

 
OMFSCardsFan said:
Last night in the ER, I helped the ortho resident place some pressure wraps on a guy who had been shot at close range once through the right knee, shattering his patella and the distal head of the femur. He was shot three times in the left knee and lower leg, shattering his patella, fibula, and tibia. The patient said he knew who had shot him, but wouldn't talk about it. I didn't realize that this "shoot out your kneecaps" **** really happened outside of the Sopranos. Crazy.../QUOTE]

Yeah, those Shreveport gang bangers are some bad dudes. When I was in middle school, I was once caught in the middle of a drive by. Just one of the character building perks of growing up in the port city.
Click to expand...
 
toofache32 said:
You mean like this....

Click to expand...

Now I know where the can is!!! If that guy can't find the lid, I think I know where it is or where it was removed from.... the anesthesiologists dared me to go ask him why he had a aeresol lid in his keaster. So, I did. The guy was so ashamed, not making eye contact with anyone. I walked up and said that I'd be doing his anesthetic and I then asked him how that lid ended up in the poop-shute. He had this emotional outburst and started crying and said, "Okay, so I'm a pervert! Are you happy now!!" I could hear the anesthesiologists around the corner trying to hold their laughter... it was so funny. I feel guilty for getting amusement out of another's shame/anguish...
 
esclavo said:
....I feel guilty for getting amusement out of another's shame/anguish...
Click to expand...
Huh?! That's the best part of our job!
 
True statement, Gavin. This post has changed my life...for better or worse, I don't yet know, but I will never be the same.
 
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