the sweet smell of singed flesh

yesterday's 12 hour shift started out like any other. Night folk meet in the break room before the shift change, we all tease each other, DT attempts to show me various pressure points on my wrist and behind my ears. "Does it hurt? Does it hurt? Huh does it?" And I have flashbacks to my older brother doing the same dang thing right before he broke my wrist. I slap DT on the shoulder and give him a quick jab to the ribs, and that's the end of that. We saunter out to the triage desk (if it's possible to saunter in ill-fitting scrubs and sensible shoes) and check the board. Busy, busy day. My first patient is a twentysomething female with a "3 inch vertical lac to forehead." Easy. She shuffles back to the bed, holding a blood-smudged towel to her forehead, boyfriend in tow. I get her settled and she pulls away the towel to show me a thick gash that goes from her hairline down to the bridge of her nose. I nod, impressed. Then-- flop flop-- the skin on both sides of the lac sort of slip, revealing a lovely, smooth, blood slicked expanse of skull. Spurt spurt go various blood vessels onto my clean scrub shirt. I hastily replace the towel with a lot of 4x4s, report to the RN and the doc, and get the lac tray and sutures ready. The doc meets me back at the bed with the cautery gun.

Oh, horrors.

Brief digression:
Last week, it was a warm sunny day. I'd used up most of the energy from my caffeine and Boomi Bar (it's hippie food, and that's all you need to know) chasing my best friend's cat around the front yard, into the neighbor's back yard, and into a tree, which I then climbed to perform a five o'clock newsworthy rescue. I got to work still a bit out of breath and sweaty from the chase, and headed to the back bed to help out the MD with the suturing of a dangly, hanging-by-a-thread finger of a squirmy, screaming, pissed off 18 month old boy. I'm helping hold the patient. Mom has the kiddo on her lap. They're both crying, we're all sweaty, the heat from the spotlight is almost unbearable. We're all doing remarkably well until the doc pulls out the cautery gun and burns two holes in that itty, bitty fingernail. The smell was bad enough, but then I realized the doc was using the fingernail like a lacing card, and sewing up through the holes.

Ewwww. Grody.

Suddenly, the smell of the. . .and the idea of the. . .and the squirming and the sweating and the screaming and the hot light and the lack of carbs all became a bit much. My vision narrowed, my ears started buzzing, and I informed the doctor in a very pleasant voice that I needed to leave post haste. He took one look at me and ordered me out of the room, and I didn't hear the end of it for the next two shifts.

How embarrassing.

End of digression.

Imagine my dismay when I saw that cautery gun. But I mostly held direct pressure with one hand and fanned the stinky smoke back at the doctor with the other, and we all came out of it just fine.

The holy spirit came in again, this time with the story of how she lost all three of her children when the sun imploded in Jesus' chest earlier in the day. God told her to come to the ER to get some rest, and that's exactly what she did. There was some mention of spaceships and demons, and she wouldn't stop fidgeting until we told her none of it was her fault. After that, she slept easy.

I guess sometimes, it's just nice to have somebody tell you everything's going to be okay.