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Legless in Thailand
Red Lead Press
Category:
Biography
Publisher: Dorrance Publishing Company, Inc.
ISBN-10: 0805983643
Type: Non-Fiction
Pages: 45
Copyright: Jan 5, 2007
ISBN-13: 9780805983647
This is an autobiography of my last 8 years in Thailand
Legless in Thailand
Just the start of another boring day?
Just woke up to a new day, but hey! Why does my body hurt so much this morning? What did I do last night? Staring at the ceiling, I suddenly realise that I don't recognise this room, "where am I?" "What hotel is this?" Then the familiar voice of the person I loved, Noi, says "Ian, you are awake?" I reply that I am awake, but I hurt like hell and I don't know why, She tells me " You have been asleep a long time and I was worried", I say "I never sleep long, you know that, I only usually sleep a few hours, anyway, where are we staying now? I don't remember" she replies " Ian, you don't remember anything? I am sorry my love, but you have been asleep for 3 weeks, ever since your accident" I say "what accident?" she replies " Your motorbike was hit as you were turning of the main road in Pattaya, a pick-up truck ran a red light and you almost died" "you are now in Pattaya International Hospital and there is something else, they have removed your left leg below the knee,” “I am sorry”, “I had to sign to let them do it, they said it was necessary" I thought, " Now I am starting to understand everything", but really I remember nothing, nothing at all, I can't even remember a few months ago, Oh my God!
“What do I do now?” First thing, I need a cigarette badly, so I ask her "can I have a cigarette please?" she replies "You must be hungry, you haven't eaten in a long time, never mind the cigarette, eat something" I reply "I am not hungry, but I do need a cigarette now" she complies and gets me a cigarette, which I am grateful for, I really need it after having my present situation explained to me, God, I do hurt a lot, but at least now I know why, I smoke the cigarette but my chest really hurts, I touch my chest and I know from past experience that most of my ribs are broken and what is this? I feel a tube underneath my left arm and going into my chest, I ask her "What is this?" she says that she doesn't really know, but the doctors call it a CD, " What a compact disc?", I say, I later found out that this is the medical abbreviation for a 'Chest Drain'. On further examination of my body, I find many things, there is another tube going into my leg just below my left testicle, my pelvis feels broken and very painful and I can now see where they cut off my leg, I am a quite resilient person, so I just take in the facts and accept it, the important thing to me is that the love of my life is here with me, I don't really care about anything else, this is the most important thing to me. I call Noi to me, I really needed to hold and kiss her, and she came to lie on the bed with me, I was happy again and forgot about the pain for now.
After many examinations over the next few days by the doctors and draining of the tubes coming out of my body, I am still hurting like hell, but I felt that I needed a beer, I am a regular beer drinker and I do need it, so I ask Noi to get me a couple of cans of beer Chang and she goes out to get them for me. When she returned, I drank thirstily, beer helps me to sleep and I needed sleep even after my long coma. Noi now told me that this was the second hospital I had been in, I was in Chonburi hospital for a week and they were the ones who removed my leg and soon I would be moving again to a hospital in Sattahib because it was cheaper than this one, so then I asked "how are we going to pay for all this, I don’t have any insurance?"she said "Michael is taking care of the bills", Michael is a friend of mine who owns a furniture factory in Pattaya, I say "That is very good of him, I don't have much money now".
After my second beer I got drowsy and fell asleep holding Noi in my arms, but a strange thing happened that night, I started feeling my body shutting down one part at a time, it almost completed my whole body, but when my heart stopped, I realised that I was dying and screamed to myself in my head “No!” “If I die now I shall never see my love Noi again, she is my life and my only reason for living" and then my body started to open again bit by bit, it was a very strange experience, I opened my eyes and saw Noi lying next to me and held her tightly to me, everything was going to be alright, “Really!” The next morning the doctors checked my blood and it turned out that I had MRSA, a deadly hospital bourne disease that is drug resistant and usually lethal, now I understood what happened to me the night before, but I beat it because of my strong love for Noi and for another major reason, that I shall tell you about later.
A few days later I moved to the Queen Sirikit hospital in Sattahib, it was quite nice and the staff were pleasant, I was now starting to get some of my memory back, but I still can remember nothing about the accident, I do remember what I was doing prior to the accident, but nothing about the accident itself. When I mentioned about my loss of memory to Noi, she said that she sort of understood, what I didn't know then was that they had to push part of my brain back into my head because it was hanging out after the accident, Noi told me about this, to which I replied “I don’t think they put it all back” trying to bring some humour back into this serious situation. I don't normally let physical things get me down, I have lost a leg, so what! I shall get by and this pain won’t last forever, but, what I didn't know then, was that I was in store for a much greater pain that doesn't go away with time and still affects my life to this day, so badly, that for many years and even still sometimes now, I wish that I had died in the accident.
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