A Chilling Story

     As much as I love “old people,” sometimes they have the worst memories! Even without Alzheimer’s they forget the little details, often only hearing what they want to hear. Well I heard about a really scary Alzheimer's moment a few days ago. It was a long story involving my grandma's neighbor and friend MaryAnn.

     MaryAnn went to go visit her father at the hospital, he had a serious surgery a few days earlier. Well MaryAnn being old like her father had her fair share of heath problems too. At the hospital she had to find a bathroom so she could take her daily dose of pills. On a daily basis MaryAnn takes five pills a day, all at the same time. As she took her pills, something didn’t feel right. It felt like the pills weren’t going down her throat.

     Quickly she went to a hospital store and bought a little food, which she swallowed immediately to help the pills go down. The pain in her throat sank down with the food. Now she was having chest pains, and her throat was just fine! Not knowing what was happening; she walked to her father’s room and proceeded to talk to the doctors, informing them of her strange pain. They informed her that they couldn’t help her, they advised her to go immediately to her own doctor.

     There was a violent snow storm that day, but the doctors gave MaryAnn no alternative. She had to go to another hospital on the other side of town with the occasional twinge of chest pains. When she made it to the doctor, MaryAnn had a check up, blood withdrawal and all. But no matter what tests he ran, the doctor could find nothing wrong with her. He sent her home advising her to take it easy and call him if the pain should get either worse or more persistent. A little shaken MaryAnn drove home.

     After parking in her driveway, she climbed the stairs up to her front door and entered her house. That’s when it hit, excruciating pain filled her body, and it was like she had been shot. She doubled over in pain, and hobbled to a phone. She took her doctor’s advice and called him. With an alarmed voice he told her to come back to the hospital immediately.

  MaryAnn knew her life was on the line and listened to her doctor’s guidance. There was only one test that the doctor hadn’t run the last time. He didn’t think it was necessary, but now it was an essential task. MaryAnn was x-rayed. Cautiously the doctor asked her if she had swallowed anything square that day. A little hysterical by this point MaryAnn immediately cried, “No!” The doctor replied, “It looks like an aluminum blister-pack from some medicine…” MaryAnn had a horrifying flash back of earlier in the day. She didn’t remember throwing away the rapper of her pill pack! She had swallowed not only her pills, but the whole pack! The doctor hurriedly told her that the aluminum would shred her intestines if they let it go through her system. It had already cut up her esophagus. MaryAnn listened to her doctor in shock as he told her that she would have to have surgery, or die. The doctor wasn't such a heartless guy, he gave the panicked old woman a word of comfort with an alternative. The doctor told her that there was a slim chance that they might be able to take the aluminum out with a scope. Hopeless MaryAnn agreed, although using the scope might waste the last minutes of her precious time. But what if it actually worked? It seemed like at the time that anything was better than surgery.

The doctor successfully pulled out the aluminum from Mary Anne’s stomach using the scope! MaryAnn wasn’t a lucky old lady that day, but being saved from death and surgery, she felt like she had won the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.