To be embarrassed about my behaviour in hospital?

[lizardsandgheckosandfrogs]

this happened a few weeks ago but has been slightly playing on my mind (out of embarrassment!)

I was unwell and was getting treatment in hospital. The medication had to be given quickly (not sure if there a name for it, but it was given in a syringe quickly into the cannula rather than on a drip,

As soon as the medication and the saline got put in I immediately felt like my arm was burning and over the course of about 10s it became excruciating and there was basically a huge tangerine size lump. I went from being quiet and chatting away to the nurses to literally wailing and sobbing and begging them to take it out my arm, all in about 10 seconds. I was honestly hysterical.

it turned out the cannula was in the wrong position or something along those lines, so all the medication and saline just went into my elbow instead. Not a big deal, they removed it and it was all fine.

it was a few weeks ago and it’s just been playing on my mind since. I’ve never reacted like that before, and I think part of it was panic setting in, but I really remember it being excruciating and I was in so much pain. It honestly felt like my arm was on fire. But I’ve never been so hysterical or reacted like that before, I was literally sobbing and probably would have ripped it out myself if I could have!

im in my 40s and have never ever behaved like that before and I guess I’m just a bit embarrassed and cringing thinking about it all. Was I being a bit of a baby or is this kind of thing genuinely really painful?

I had a cracking bruise and could barely bend my elbow for 2 weeks after so i know it genuinely was sore, but just not sure if it was that sore to justify my reaction or if I was being a bit OTT!

has anyone else ever had this?!

Nurse here. I would MUCH rather someone have your reaction than sit there with a tissued cannula. Perfectly normal and avoids any damage. I check my cannulas obsessively as most of my patients can’t communicate effectively or have a low consciousness so I can’t rely on them!

I was chatting to another patient at physio last week and he told me he woke up halfway through a knee replacement op and was chatting to the surgeon. Medical professionals can make mistakes and you have no reason to feel embarassed at all. You should feel quite cross. Hope OK now.

As a former ward nurse I'd have been horrified...with myself, not you, for causing you such pain! You have absolutely nothing to feel guilty about

That is so funny 😂 it must've been really freaky when you had that thought there as you were drifting off 😂

You were in pain and it obviously felt bad enough at the time to be behaving like that. I'm not a medical professional but I'd just feel sorry for you being distressed. Try not to overthink it.

Sounds like he probably had a spinal injection with sedation (probably the commonest anaesthetic recipe for knee replacements). It’s pretty normal with spinal & sedation to be aware of what’s going on and be able to chat to the team if that is the case - it’s not a mistake that he was able recall what was going on (the mistake may have been in him not being aware that we do not usually promise oblivion with sedation).

This. I would complain that medical professionals apparently didn’t know how to pit a cannula in properly. 🤷‍♀️

Honestly, don’t worry! They’ve seen and are used to a lot worse. I was hospitalised for a while having my appendix out and a few complications after. I went delirious over nothing once, I felt so silly and embarrassed about my behaviour but they reassured me it’s fine. Hospital visits, even minor ones (not saying yours is btw) can be traumatic and worrying and bring the worst out of everyone! I hope your on the mend now xx

ED staff nurse - pain makes people behave in ways they wouldnt normally, no one judged you, and no one will have thought anything of you. Trust me. Cannulas can be fickle, seem like they are exactly in the right spot with flash back, then boom, tissued immediately. Horrible for the patient, less horrible for the HCP inserting and administering, but unpleasant causing unnecessary pain by administering into it and having to re-site it again. But dont worry about it at all, you should not be embarrassed.

When my gallbladder was trying it's very best to kill me I was on the floor of the hospital, crying in pain before later being hopped up on morphine and stoned off my absolute box, puked everywhere and passed out, I'm sure you were fine lol.

That sounds terrifying as well as painful. You had a very human reaction and I hope the health professionals have learnt any lessons from it.

I remember crying quite hysterically at the dentist once, I had become extremely anxious about the dentist after some poor treatment and was due to have a wisdom tooth out. The dentist could not get the tooth out which had cracked in half during the process and she had her foot on the chair while yanking at my tooth. It was excruciating and I was crying my eyes out and shaking. In the end I had to it have taken out at the hospital while sedated.

Last time I was in hospital I cried and asked for the nurse to hold my hand. I was 38 at the time

This is on them. All they had to do was insert a cannula properly for saline! I know the pain of something being injected into a vein too quickly (in a medical setting!) - it is really awful, frightening, and NOT fkng funny. It's also then frightening to be under the care of people who don't know what they're doing. They should have been paying attention and should have apologised to you.

It's called self protection and the survival instinct. Well done for reacting. I went for a luxury pedicure once and the beautician had the booties on too hot. I reacted and said: Get these off me. They are boiling!

I wouldn’t have even gave this a second thought!
as you said it was misplaced so painful.

you should have heard my language when I was having a steroid injection in my knee
i apologised during and after but fuck me it hurt at the time

Last time I was in I vomited down myself, vomited so much I wet myself and told the nurse if she got me a scan sooner I would give her thousand pounds. She looked confused and told
me it was the nhs and I didn’t have to pay for scans.

I still over think this and how much of a tw@t I must have looked 🤪

Sounds very understandable and not really 'bad' behaviour so I wouldn't worry at all. These things happen!

I cried pathetically when they burst a vein when taking blood recently, and I was an absolute nightmare when giving birth. Out of my mind with the pain at the pushing stage, telling everyone to shut up and leave me alone, I also dimly recall doing a poo on the floor while labouring in a squat position... what a delight!

Oh this has turned into a 'how embarrassing was I at the hospital thread' now. You can feel better knowing so many of us have done this nonsense when you have no control. I'm such a chill/friendly person normally but I cannot cope with pain easily. Was horrible to a midwife once when she was telling me I didn't need anything for the pain. Second time was when I had pancreatitis. Rolling around in A&E screaming - genuinely had no control because of the pain (much worse than childbirth) I remember seeing a little toddler looking at me and thinking 'oh I really don't want to scare him' but couldn't stop. They moved me to a side room!
On the same stay (was in for a week) I was horrible to the junior dr because the said no scans etc over the weekend. I called her a lackey (very loudly) because the main dr wouldn't come to tell me and I still feel awful about that. Pain does weird stuff.

Artieal lines are so fucking painful,
I've been in ICU twice and I've had them placed many many times,
Luckily nobody could hear my screams due to the tracheostomy 😬

I was very restrained when my cannula tissued, and calm during painful procedures like arterial lines, but I still feel embarrassed about how much I was crying and begging the nurses in the recovery room to take off the ‘bear hugger’ after breast reconstruction surgery! I was so hot and felt like I was suffocating - they couldn’t take it off so one of the nurses had to sit fanning my face for about 20 minutes to keep me calm and stop me panicking 🙈

‘Tissuing’ is a reportable event in the health trust I worked for.

I think when you're vulnerable you can have a more extreme reaction to things.

I've never been rude or shouted. One time I was coming out of anesthetic and I decided to tell the doctor who was checking my vitals how pretty she was, then i proceded to cry and say how scared i felt. It was so cringy I must have sounded like a 5 year old 😫.
The other time I started to sob hysterically because the midwives took the gas and air away from me.

I had to have a steroid injection into my hip a few years ago. I don't generally find injections painful, so it never occurred to me to brace myself and hold my breath.

When it went in it really hurt and I was so shocked I screamed out "Fucking hell" rather loudly.

I apologised profusely and the doc that did it just laughed and said "Don't worry, I've heard plenty worse".