My hostel's routine felt monotonous, like I was living in an aquarium swimming round and round, the same scenery swirling before me. My class was five minutes' walk from my room, the kitchen a little further away. I felt claustrophobic, I wanted to break free. I prayed for change but what happened next turned my world upside down.One evening, I had a severe stomach cramp. The excruciating pain lasted for two days. The doctor at the local hospital said I had appendicitis, and had to have my appendix removed immediately. The surgery could have been carried out there but I was rushed to Kathmandu instead.
Everything after that is a blur. I woke up in the post-operation ward and was later discharged. The doctors said I needed a two weeks' rest, which meant no hostel. Maybe this was the change I'd been praying for.
I was wrong. I missed the routine: classes, friends, music festivals, walking from my room to the classroom. I was recovering slowly and longed to rejoin college. My friends called me asking "Feel better?" But things took another unexpected turn.
The pain returned, and this time it was worse. I was rushed to the hospital again. The doctors said any post-operation pain, at least after an appendectomy, was abnormal. Appendicitis involves a minor operation and complications are rare. I fell in that 'rare' percent.
I was rushed to the emergency room yet again. This is my third time in the hospital, for the same reason. Apparently, my appendix was removed later than considered safe; as a result it had burst. Particles that should have been removed in the operation had been left untouched. My body was fighting them with antibiotics. It took the doctors two weeks to understand that my new pain was a side-effect of the antibiotic I had been given. As soon as they changed my prescribed medicine, I recovered.
I have been in bed for a month now, more change than I had bargained for. I sit here in the general surgical ward, trying to keep track of them. The saline water flowing into my arm changes from NS to D5. Patients in neighbouring beds change every two days, my daily dose of medicines change, the nurses change with every shift. Outside the window, the colours of the cars whizzing by, the pedestrians, and the light of day change. I think of my friends preparing for exams in what I once considered an aquarium. Only, now I'm on the outside longingly looking in.
