“He stuck a bottle up his butt.”

Yeah, you heard me right.  This was my first patient I had as a student in the Intensive Care clinicals.  You would have to understand how timid and shy I was back then to fully appreciate how upsetting getting this patient was. 

So, I came in that morning and got my patient.  Frequently, in the ICU patients get transferred off of the unit to another place as is what happened with the patient that I had the day before.  So, I got a new one.  We’ll call him Mr. Jones.  The nurse always gives the student nurse a full report which includes how the patient’s injury was sustained or a synopsis of their illness.  She began, “Mr. Jones was at home last night and had taken a soda bottle and put in pretty far up into his rectum.  When he could not get the bottle back out, he had to go and ask his elderly mother to take him to the emergency room.  Upon further inspection and tests, Mr. Jones had perforated (torn) his intestine and was seriously septic (infection throughout his body).  He is in critical condition and we are unsure if he is going to make it.” 

 Okay, I turned red, then white, and did not know how I was going to face this person.  A soda bottle up his butt?? I mean, I think, I’m pretty sure I knew what he was doing, but geez……HOW EMBARRASSING!  And now he may die from this?  How would you like to have people ask “What happened?  How did he die?”  I mean, the obvious out was “from an infection”.  But can you believe that he actually had to tell his mother about what he did so she could take him to the emergency room??? 

One other gross story was how a nurse friend of mine ended up in the ICU with a similar story, except he had gotten a gerbil caught up in his butt and hurt himself trying to get it back out. 

What is wrong with people??!!!!!