The Pranks

When you're in the hospital for about three-four days. You get bored. I mean I wasn't bored with my adorable nurses running around the Cancer Ward trying to make me comfortable and happy. But of course, I had my own source of entertainment. My mother.

Now most normal people would leave their mother alone in a stressful situation and ask her how she was. No. Of course. Me being me. I had to have my own little fun.

Prank one:
  I was amusingly told that I was poisonous to people. My sweat, my saliva, and my bodily fluids were dangers to others because they could become exposed. I thought this was awesome, I was like some sort of exotic poisonous frog. Oh yeah.

  Now having a port in your left shoulder hurts. And since day one, I didn't really have much help getting out of bed to go to the bathroom. I was on my own.

My mother, as sweet as can be, offered her arms in a crossed fashion and told her to grab on.

  Me, seeing no point in this since I've been getting myself out of bed since day one, leaned forward and playfully bit the first layer of her clothes. OKAY. Before anyone of you start freaking out, my mother was wearing a jacket and a long sleeved shirt underneath. I was very gentle and I wiped the spit off her sleeve and she was safe.

Now Denise came into the room.
"SHE BIT ME!!!!"
"Did she break the skin?"
"NO! BUT SHE BIT ME!!"
"If she didn't break the skin, you're okay."

I was laughing my head off. My mother was not amused.

Prank two:

Let me tell you about the beds in the hospital. When I was first admitted back in april for my re-occuring psuedo tumor cerebri. my bed was stationary, it didn't move up or down or side to side.

My cancer bed did.

  My cancer bed inflated, deflated, moved, stretched, and made loud noises. I mean it was nice a little, but I'm more of a stationary bed girl. I asked Denise why the bed moved and she informed me because it was so that people who couldn't move wouldn't get blood clots. Now, that's a perfectly fine idea... except when you can move.

This is a little bit of an extention from "The Other Days" when I talked about my almost exploding bladder and my terrible nausea.

  I had returned from the bathroom with good ol' Robbert by my side as I sat on the bed and just relaxed a bit, One leg over the bed and the other on the bed. Now I wasn't saying much and it apparently freaked my dear mother out.

And then I started to sway a little....
and my eyes rolled to the back of my head...
and I started to fall over to the left side.

Now my mother began to freak out and was going to catch me when I suddenly fixed myself up, looked at her with a big grin, and started to laugh.

She was furious and began to chew me out saying what would happen if that was real? I was freaking her out with my fake out.

And that's when I told my mom about the moving bed and that I had complete control over the whole situation. I was just bored and I decided to go for a little bed ride.

Either way my mom was not amused and began to tell everyone the story of how I freaked her out. My pranks made me look like a bad child. But I wasn't. I was merely having fun.

And now to finished chapter three: The mix up.

This prank was not planned by me or my mother. It was a surprise on both parties involved and was entirely the fault of the volunteer nurse.

The surgical waiting room, if you're wondering, is much like an departure and arrival room for the airports. Here's your flight, is it delayed? Is in the sky yet? Is it descending?

My little story begins when I was in luggage claim mode. I was recovering and was waiting for my mother to come.

About two minutes later a nurse opened the curtains to my room and proudly proclaimed.
"HERE'S YOUR DAUGHTER!!!"
There was a father, a mother, and possibly a third person.
The father began to exclaim, "THAT'S NOT MY DAUGHTER!!"
Slightly appalled and highly amused by the situation of this all I then pointed at the four of them and said, "THAT'S NOT MY FATHER. MY FATHER'S DEAD!!!"

Needless to say they were gone in a snap, my curtains were closed and the family was returned to the 'airport'.

 Now it was my mother who returned to me.
Huffed and puffed and angry.
"That nurse should be fired!! She didn't even ask those people if they had a daughter named Annika! She just whisked them away and sent them here! Not me!!" My mother was being, as Mike Brand said, Feisty.
"I asked her, "So I heard you tried to give my daughter away! Nothing. No word of apology when I could clearly hear her tell the other family about being so sorry about the mix up!! Did she apologize to you?"
I said no.
"See? What a terrible nurse!!"
"Mom.. She was a volunteer."
"STILL NOT AN A EXCUSE!"
"I wanted to punch her in her little face!" My mother told me.

My mom is awesome.

   I'm finally at home, it's monday 29 12:23 PM  and i'll be doing my homework shortly so that I'll be caught up with my classes for tuesday, wednesday, and thursday. I'm so excited. I don't think people realize how amazing school is. I missed school for almost half a year in 10th grade, and now I'll be doing the same in 11th grade. It really breaks my heart. For me school is a get away and a small little haven to escape the world from all it's worries and cares.

   So next time you groan about that essay you have to write or the fact you have to get up in the morning, think of me. Awake since 6:34 am. Just waiting to return to school. To be allowed to go to school. Just itching to go to school. Please don't have a bad attitude about school. It really is a wonderful place if you have all the right friends and teachers.

Annika Severts