In The Waiting Room

I drove down at 5:30 a.m. to Methodist Hospital to meet my parents and see my mom before she goes into surgery.  It was pretty unbelievable timing - I was at the stoplight waiting to turn onto the street where the hospital parking garage is and my parents were across the street in their car at the same light turning onto the same road.  My parents had an hour drive from Lafayette, so I do not know how we timed it to be at the light by the hospital at the same time.  I parked by my Dad (after he dropped my mom off) and we met my mom in admitting.

Here is where we had an interesting experience, that Mike would have LOVED.  There were a few other people waiting to be called to the patient registration desks and my mom had been waiting while we parked the cars, so she had been there for a while.  Soon after my Dad and I sat down with my mom a couple walked into admitting and the lady stood at patient registration desk #1 (there was not a worker there yet).  Soon after the employee for desk #1 sat down and asked for the next patient.  The lady said "my husband is here for surgery" and was clearly trying to cut in line (hello, this is not King's Island and we are all waiting to go on a roller coaster and just can't wait so we cut in line).  So my dad stepped up and said "my wife is here for surgery" and then my mom pointed to a man sitting down and said "he was here first".  The man said to my mom, "my wife is already checking in, go ahead".  It was already very clear to this lady that my mom was next in line, but now it was for sure, especially after the other man sitting down told my mom to go ahead, because he knew she had been waiting and was next.  So my parents went up to the desk and the lady who wanted to cut in line continued to stand behind the patient chair at desk #1 even after my parents were checking in.  The worker asked for drivers license and insurance cards and was beginning the process, so my Dad asked if my mom would like to sit down. (this was obviously my dad's hint for this lady to back off because we were getting ready to give personal information)  My mom was not feeling up to any sort of confrontation, so she continued to stand.  At this point my dad asked the lady (politely) if she would mind if they could have some privacy.  The lady then said to my dad in a VERY RUDE and aggressive way, "Oh - you're a real smart man, you're a real smart ass". 

What???!!! Clearly this lady was stressed and is someone who is just looking for a fight.  This was the most odd experience and you couldn't help but laugh because it was so ridiculous.  The lady then backed away and went to go sit down next to her boyfriend/husband and was ready to fight the world.  They were then called to patient registration desk #3 within the next 2 to 3 minutes so it was absolutely no big deal (there was not a long line to check in, this is why this whole interaction is still so odd).  While they were checking in (the chairs to wait in were directly behind the registration desks, so there really wasn't much privacy anyway) the lady said very rudely to the worker checking them in, "I certainly hope they fix him this time! This is his second surgery for the same thing" she then continued the registration process, but said in a huff while looking over at my parents "Oh, I'm going to be pissed off all day!" A little while later, into their registration, the worker asked about some payments on their account and the lady said, "They're pending, I know they are!"  CLEARLY this lady has some issues and I know she is stressed out, but it was not nice of her to stress my mom and dad out more as we were checking in this morning, when clearly this is all very stressful anyway.  The good thing is - the only thing we could do was laugh, so we got a laugh and a story out of it - but now we are stuck in the same waiting room as her all day.  What a day (and it is only 7:30 a.m - this all happened about 6:10a.m.)

Thank you to everyone for all of your prayers - I will continue to update as I have the chance :)