One of the few ways I still amaze my wife after thirty-some years (when I'm not irritating her by doing the very same thing) is by remembering little details of a place and time. What really makes her shake her head is that I can tell you—draw a floor plan if I must—exactly how the ER was set up in 1954 when I would pass through it. But, except for very few exceptional bleeds, I can’t remember what was bleeding to save my soul. It completely baffles my wife.
I have always been able to remember the very trivial, like what Dion wore the first time I saw him on American Bandstand, but I draw a complete blank on the more important moments. This is my way of saying I have completely forgotten this girl's name and how I met her.
I believe her name started with a 'D,' which is as good a letter as any, so I'll call her Donna. I have a hunch I met her at the Prehistoric Forest, a tourist trap/roadside attraction in the Irish Hills area of Michigan. I worked there as a tour guide during the summer between my high school junior and senior years. It was the perfect job for a young man with a highly developed interest in young women, and I had more than a few dates because of it. I think the chain of events went something like: I met Donna and got her phone number when her family stopped at the Prehistoric Forest. Then I had this hemorrhage, and, finally, Donna and I went out on our one and only date. Some of the details may be incorrect, but I know I had the hemorrhage, and I know we had the date, and I know there was only one.
The hemorrhage was a doozie. In fact, it was one of those exceptional bleeds I actually remember. My knowledge of neuroanatomy is, on a good day, sketchy at best. I have a good idea of the general location of the brain, arms, legs and things like that. But go much below the skin, and my vague awareness becomes total ignorance. However, there is, I was told, a spot near where your leg meets your torso where some nerves and blood vessels share space in a tube-like thing, and inside that tube-like thing, my body decided to experiment with some spontaneous bleeding not long after I met this girl not really named Donna. (Diagram that sentence, Sister Rose. I dare you.)
At this time, treatment for bleeds consisted of what was essentially the second or third generation of AHG—the horrendously named anti-hemophiliac globulin—but I think it had a new name, which I have forgotten. They might have taken to calling it AHF (anti-hemophilia factor); I don't know. There were a lot of variations on a theme at the time, and they all seemed to be experimental. Cryoprecipitate was still a year or so in the future, and the focus was on finding anything consistently effective.
Anyway, the new AHG, or AHF or whatever was basically a freeze-dried powder that had to be mixed with sterile water. The problem was that it dissolved about as easily as ground glass and would form a more-or-less permanent, useless foam if stirred even slightly vigorously or shaken at all. The nurses didn't have a spare 45 minutes or so to mix it, and the blood bank employees didn't think mixing the stuff was their job. (Our products were handled by the hospital's blood bank until the late ’60s or early ’70s, and until the advent of the first factors.) So, we the patients often got assigned the job of mixing the stuff.
A nurse would bring in three to six vials about an hour before your treatment. They were about an inch in diameter and about 6 inches long and were handled with the same care and overt steadiness you would give to nitroglycerin. You would then spend the next three quarters of an hour or so gently rolling the vials back and forth on your bed until they finally mixed. The nurse would then transfer the contents into a larger bottle, and you would get your treatment. The transfer also had to be done smoothly and gently. If the nurse injected the fluid too quickly into the large bottle, you could end up with a bottle full of froth that would never be coaxed through an IV tube, let alone a needle. Makes me tired just thinking about it.
This hemorrhage soon let us know it was no run-of-the-mill soft tissue bleed. It felt like a white-hot spike was being driven into my groin and soon had my complete attention. This was before the hospital allowed guys with hemophilia to be given narcotics. Since we always seemed to be bleeding, the hospital feared creating addicts right and left if it opened that cabinet. We had to find our own ways of dealing with the pain. This time, none of my usual practices worked. Actually, they never really worked all that well, but they usually allowed me to get through the day with a modicum of sanity. For several days I couldn't even scrape up a modicum.
Since I was too old for the pediatric service by that time, I had a third-year hematology resident in charge of my day-to-day treatment. After watching me have my fun for a couple days, he decided enough was enough, and not only ordered, but personally administered a hefty dose of morphine. I don't know what kind of trouble, if any, he got into for this breach of policy, but the shot, and one or two after, allowed me to get through the worst of the bleed. Anyway, the hemorrhage finally resolved itself, and sometime around the third week, the discussion during rounds turned to sending me home. The only problem was that my leg didn't work.
The hemorrhage had pinched a nerve or two in that tube-like thing, paralyzing the muscle responsible for straightening my right leg and keeping it straight. For you anatomy buffs out there, I think it was the rectus femoris, which also has some role in flexing the thigh. For the rest of us, it was the big muscle on the front of my upper leg.
The upshot was that walking was just a bit iffy. Actually, it was a given I was going down. When taking a step, my foot wouldn't come forward like it should, and it would drag like I was doing a bad imitation of the mummy. When I stood still, I was just balancing on my leg, and eventually, it would collapse—usually at the most inconvenient moment. Dancing was completely off the table. I also had trouble—as in couldn't do it if you paid me—lifting my foot to cross my legs or do something mundane like move my foot from the gas pedal to the brake. And as for pressing the brake pedal, well, we'll get to that in a minute.
About two weeks after I got home, I called Donna. I told her that due to an injury while doing some very hush-hush work for an agency I couldn't disclose, I had been unable to call her until now and was wondering if she'd be interested in taking in a movie.
She couldn't that weekend but indicated that the next weekend was open for consideration. This was perfect because it allowed me another week to practice some moves. (Please, don't think that way.) Specifically, getting my right foot off the gas pedal and onto the brake, and then if there was time, pressing the brake pedal. I worked on that for several hours every day. It is now my firm belief that young men that age, or perhaps men of any age, would be much more responsible about their physical therapy, if as a collateral result, there was the possibility of a very pleasant evening with an attractive young lady.
Now, my parents had some rather old-fashioned ideas about safety and made it clear that I wasn't driving any car, even the '53 Ford Dad drove to work and I used for dates, until that leg was functioning properly. I pointed out that this would all be a moot point if we had a car with an automatic transmission so that I could use my left foot on the brake. Mom and Dad said they were willing to show me a moot point if I really wanted one, and we had a couple of debates about the meaning of “functioning properly,” which I lost. Mom started darkly hinting about driving Donna and me to the movie. This was clearly unacceptable.
I worked feverishly on lifting that leg onto the brake pedal. I developed a move I thought was quite ingenious: Instead of reaching directly for the gear shift, I dipped my hand down and quickly grabbed my leg and threw it onto the brake pedal. I practiced that move for hours in the driveway and then along the country roads near our house. Finally, the motion was so smooth that it almost certainly looked safe, and I was ready for the big test.
I drove Mom to Kroger's and back safely. I was so nervous that I think I had to change my shirt when we got home, but I passed. After talking about it over and over and over, my parents decided to let me use the car.
Without any mishaps, I drove the 20 miles to Dundee and found her family's farm south of town. I still usually used a crutch on my right side when walking to keep from falling when that muscle didn't pay attention to its duties, but in the interest of looking cool, I left it in the car when I went to her door.
That’s when I found out she had two big farm dogs that looked like they brought down the occasional bull for a snack. The dogs circled, waiting for their chance, but I somehow made it to the door without stumbling. Then I met her father, who looked like he could palm bowling balls, and had a cabinet full of very nice shotguns. He had some rather strong opinions about the time his daughter should come home and the condition she should be in (which he shared with me while showing me the shotguns). The dogs watched sullenly when she and I went to the car, and we started the drive back to Tecumseh.
Everything was going smoothly. I was being so suave and witty that Cary Grant could have taken notes, and I was managing the brake more smoothly than Fred Astaire could dance. When we got to the theater, she was laughing and seemed to be having a great time. It's just too bad I had to park the car.
Pulling into the parking space, I made my patented leg grab. Unfortunately my toe got caught on the brake pedal, and I couldn't flip my foot onto the pedal. I jerked the leg a couple more times but only managed to look like I was having a spasm. Luckily, we had been moving very slowly when we pulled into the parking space, and the city had very kindly put a large telephone pole in front of that space.
Donna was out of the car like a shot, acting as if she'd never seen anyone use a telephone pole as a parking aid. As I got out, my leg buckled under me, and it seemed she had never seen anyone genuflect when exiting an automobile, either. That night's showing of an Audie Murphy western and a Steve Reeves Hercules film didn't help my cause much, either. When it was time to go, Donna was cold enough that she would have come in handy if I had had a bleed.
Later that week, I tried to call Donna, but her dad seemed to think she was going to be busy for at least the next 20 years, and he suggested I wait until then to call again.
Still wish I could remember her name.