I had surgery three years ago. I was scheduled to show up at 7 a.m. I was required to have someone bring me, stay with me, and then not only bring me home, but stay with me for 24 hours. I had a live-in BF at the time and I was in terror the entire time he’d leave to go drink and forget and leave me there. Still, he waited to complete a drug deal before going to pick up my pain meds and he left me a few hours later to go drinking, but at least he hung in there with me at the hospital. Fortunately, I was fine and just slept.
That guy is no longer part of my life and while I have a couple friends who I think would probably pick me up and drop me off, I think it would be a bit much to expect someone to spend 24 hours with me. In fact, I get anxiety attacks just trying to think through the what-if in the event I have to do that again. I don’t know what the hell I’ll do. I thought maybe you could hire a home health care nurse to just hold your hand for a day and a half, but this thread seems to indicate no, that’s not what those agencies do.
I would bet it’s easier to find someone that you’d expect unless you’re an INCREDIBLY solitary person and don’t speak to a soul. If an acquaintance or co-worker asked, I’d certainly offer unless it was truly impossible.
But, I’d also bet that a lot of people (me included!!) wouldn’t think to ask their broader circle of acquaintances.
Personal situation: Yes, because I’m married, but even then it’s occasionally difficult from a logistics standpoint.
This situation is probably more common than people think. Many of us neither work nor go to church or live near family. For many years, my ‘friends’ consisted of coworkers, but we didn’t socialize much outside of work. It’s often difficult for people that work nights to keep up with the daywalkers socially, and night shift workers have difficulty coordinating schedules to get together when family obligations are hard enough to meet. It typically requires someone to take time off, so doesn’t happen more than once or twice a year. Now that I no longer work, I find myself quite isolated.
I had to drive myself to Baton Rouge for tests, which was around an hour drive for me. Waaay longer than my doctor wants me behind the wheel, but I had no other choice. SO worked that night, and needed sleep. Try to find a former coworker that neither worked the night before, had to work that night, or had family stuff to do? I don’t think so.
TL;DR Unwanted social isolation is difficult enough with medical professionals acting like I’m the only person they’ve ever encountered with this problem. It doesn’t mean I’m an undesirable. People working long hours with small children don’t want to spend their limited free time with the housebound lady and her dogs, watching foreign films and knitting.
Dogzilla, I bet you could get some folks to do this in shifts; you know, someone to take you home, someone else to spend the night, etc. Also, I’m glad you don’t have that BF any more, even if it does make you feel like you’re “all alone.” Whoever you could get to help would be better than that guy. Furthermore, there may be Dopers in Florida who would help you out. I’d help but I’m too far away. So, don’t have anxiety.
It’s embarrassing to reveal to people how isolated you are. Asking a coworker is basically saying you don’t have a social life. No BFF. No SO. No “girlfriends”. No nothing.
I know that for me, my fierce independence is why I have a hard time making friends. I have a hard time letting people see me vulnerable and “needy”. The only favors I ask are from close family, and even then it’s with great hesitation.
I live far from my family. There are a few people at my church I’d feel comfortable asking for such a favor, and would happily do it for any of them. If the time was known in advance and there was a possibility of need for aftercare my sister would travel to take me. (and has)
My mom lived far from family, and was not a church goer and was not one to ask favors of her neighbors. She found a paid car service with a cutesy name I wish I could remember now to transport her and she just had a cranky fit at anyone who said she had to have a person in the waiting room for the whole procedure. My mom threw a good cranky fit.
Recent experience here. I’m happy to know that I do have at least one person locally I could rely on for help in this regard, and in fact have done so within the past two weeks. Family is out of the question as the nearest relative is 1500 miles away. If for some reason my friend was not available, I’m pretty sure I could get assistance from some of my co-workers.
I was also surprised to hear about the requirement some have mentioned for someone to attend during a procedure and initial recovery. I just had a procedure that required general anesthesia (in Texas) and no one from the medical staff mentioned that a relative or friend had to be on hand. OTOH, I was kept overnight for observation after the procedure, so maybe that was the difference.
This is me too. I’ve been lucky enough the last couple of years to find a couple of other fiercely independent single Moms to develop a friendship with. But for most of my life there was no one I wouldn’t have been mortified to ask.
My husband would take me for sure, but if he couldn’t do it for some reason, his retired parents would. I also have a handful of friends who only work part-time, so there’s a good chance I could call on one to help out. When I was feeling very dizzy at work one day, a coworker offered to drop everything and drive me to urgent care and stay with me till family could come get me. So I bet I could ask her, too. I guess I’m lucky to have a good group of people I can rely on.
My father-in-law volunteers for a “driving seniors around” service of some sort, and I know he’s stuck around to drive people back after dental work and those eye exams where they dilate your pupils. I don’t know if that service would deal with an all-day procedure, but maybe?
Wanted to share my story. When I was on my own in san antonio, I had no idea how I would find transportation. I had my coworkers, but they worked. I finally met a group of friends at a library meet I attended nearly weekly and many worked part-time/semiretired/SAHM’s. but the three years before I was on my own. It was a blessing I found two hobbies that I got to meet folks as I’m not a churchgoer, didn’t know my apt. neighbors, nor had relatives around.
When I moved back to my hometown, I did have my mom who retired drive me around and vice versa. But then I went back to full-time and it is difficult to get time off. My mom needed to get her pupils dilated and eye checked at hospital and it was on a day I could not get time off so my mom told the doctor’s office and they said it was okay she could wait around an hr after her appt was over to clear her eyes and plus they gave her special sunglasses to wear to drive back home.
I have heard of medical transportation and I believe my county has that option. It wasn’t a matter of not knowing friends/relatives, it just so many people work and doctors rarely offer procedures/operation weekends
Fortunately, this is the sort of thing where my wife can generally be there for me. And both my sisters live not too far away - ~45 minutes for one, and just over an hour for the other. Also, we’ve got some friends from work, and we’ve made friendships with parents of the Firebug’s friends at day care and elementary school.
However, last year as I was recovering from my Achilles tendon rupture and still couldn’t drive, I needed to have a fairly routine appointment with my doctor, whose office is about 40 minutes away, and it wasn’t a good time for any of the usual people.
So you know who I got to drive me? My son’s babysitter.
I paid her the same rates to drive me up to the doc, wait around during the appointment, swing by Trader Joe’s and pick up a few things, and drive me home, as I would have paid her for the same amount of time babysitting the Firebug. Plus mileage, of course, since she drove her own car.
She was quite happy to do it - I’m sure it was easier work than keeping my son occupied for the same length of time - and if I hadn’t gotten the OK to start driving again just a couple of weeks later, I’d have probably had her drive me around on some other errands.
So if you don’t have babysitter-age kids, talk to acquaintances who do. You can probably find a teenage girl who is willing to drive you around for the equivalent of babysitting money. After all, this IS an easier gig than babysitting.
I’m pretty sure I’d be able to find someone to take me other than my husband, or alternatively someone to come watch the kids while my husband took me. We have two kids - one in second grade and one in preschool - so they couldn’t be left alone.
I have a close friend who was there for me and watched our kids in the middle of the night when I had an ectopic pregnancy that ruptured during work and had to have emergency surgery; I can also think of a couple of other close friends and neighbors we’re very friendly with who would pitch in.
the babysitter idea reminds me of how my petsitter could possibly do it, her hours are flexible and she does have backup…I also thought of the scenario of if my parents had been in that situation and one could not do a day-off that it would be cheap to pay the petsitter to pet-sit I mean human-sit for part of the day.
I think this is one of those situations where the gap doesn’t seem that wide but any solution would actually make it worse for a lot of people.
Basically, right now the very fact that there is no real alternative to imposing on someone kind of makes it okay to impose on people, so that 95% of the population can find someone. If there were some sort of service for “those who really need it”, there would be a lot more people who suddenly needed it–because the existence of a pay alternative would change that whole dynamic. And if there were insurance coverage, it would be even more dramatic. I don’t think there is anyway for an insurance company to figure out who “really needs it”, so many, many people would. There’d be bosses that wouldn’t be happy about an employee taking a day off to stay with a spouse if it wasn’t pretty well understood, as it is now, that it’s just one of those
things that you have to accept.
It would be interesting to see a study of how many people have delayed or simply never had important procedures because of this.