Thursday February 23, 2012

Three months ago, today, I received a call at 1:13 in the morning that I could never in my wildest dreams imagine would come: the call to start my new life.


Getting the Call
Correction, at 1:13 am I heard the sound of my voicemail alert -- instantly I knew something was off-kilter. Having climbed in bed two hours previous, it was quite unbelievable that this barely audible 'beep' woke me up from a dead sleep (and those who know me well, know that I can sleep through anything -- including various pumps alerting in the night and even fire alarms). The fact that my phone had no service, and usually would not alert me of a voicemail until I returned to a service area, was even more miraculous. So at 1:13 in the morning, my heavy eyelids opened, I momentarily considered waiting until the morning to check my messages, but my gut highly objected to this procrastination. For the next 10 minutes I attempted to check my voicemail several times (service kept cutting out) then after hearing the voice on the other end say "This is Toronto General, we're trying to reach Lindsay Bishop, please page this number when you get this message," I took another few minutes to scramble down the rushed number, confuse myself thoroughly while calling back, then finally connected to the Charge Nurse who told me what I expected, "we have lungs for you and you are first choice." I responded with "Are you kidding?" and of course she wasn't, TGH doesn't prank call you, but I felt compelled to verify that for some reason. After writing her instructions down (where to go, nothing to eat or drink, bring list of medications, get there within a reasonable amount of time, etc.) and hanging up the phone, I took a moment to think of NOT physically vomiting, then proceeding to mentally vomit a concoction of dead fear, pure excitement, anticipation, relief, and reserved optimism. After all that, I tapped on the door to my Dad's room (he'd already heard me on the phone and knew what I was about to say), he then phoned my Mom who was in Brampton, I phoned my cystic sister Hattie, texted a few people, updated FB, and packed in about 10 minutes -- hacking the entire time.