Pull the damned plugs! I can't take it anymore...

I'm in the hospital. I was admitted yesterday. Well, it all begun Friday.

I had a soup and some cracker with tuna for dinner but I could tell it did not go too well. I felt bloated, burping too much. It pretty much felt like indigestion. A certain discomfort and heart burn; as you would feel after overeating something very heavy.

I drank some soda water, which usually helps, watched some TV and decided to go to bed. By then the slight discomfort was turning into pain and I wondered whether the soup or the tuna was spoiled. I tried some "Eno" and went to bed.

I couldn't sleep, though. It was really hurting and no matter what position I assumed in bed, it wasn't making it any better.

I hate throwing up. Some people do it so easily... For me it's always a nightmare. But since it was really getting worse, I had no choice but inserting a finger down my throat and inducing vomiting.

That, unfortunately did not help any and by 3:00AM I crying in pain. I decided to go to the hospital, determined to either have my stomach pumped or at least medicated for the pain.

I called a cab and proceeded to SGH (Singapore General Hospital). SGH is one of (if not the) best equipped hospitals in Singapore. That did not help me at all. In the end, it all boils down to people, believe me. And the quality of the service provided was lousy.

First, there was no queue but the lady at the admission desk took her time in filling in whatever details she had to input in her computer. Seriously, she took more than 10 minutes to insert my data and prepare my 'case'. Come on! Four o'clock in the morning, nobody waiting, no long queues... Is it asking too much to expect 'emergency' to be regarded as emergency? I realized that unless you are bleeding and unconscious, it's not an emergency. If you're having a heart attack, someone will come to ask questions and help you after you collapse. If you can spit some blood and open your eyes wide in a terror face or like a madman before the actual fainting, that could help getting a little bit of attention but it's not a guarantee.

After being admitted I was sent to see some recently graduated doctor who asked me the trivial questions: Are allergic to any medication? Have you ever undergone any major operation? What seems to be the problem?

Then she sent me to ECG saying heart attacks sometimes cause abdominal pain. Fair enough but, bloody hell, I was still in pain.

To make a long story short, I was attended to after 5:00AM, they had no idea what the problem was, I was given Buscopam for the pain, put to "observation" and released around 8:00AM.

Since I did not sleep much (or at all), I was very tired. That together with the Buscopam enabled me to finally rest a bit. But I woke up with pain again. This time I called Fred and WT for assistance. They recommended Gleneagles Hospital, a private one. Fred even drove me there. WT came to join me and help me shortly after.

I was diagnosed with gallbladder inflammation and scheduled for operation. Unfortunately, the doctors want to observe the pain I am going through in order to be sure the diagnosis is right so they don't want to give me any strong pain killer.

The suffering never ends...