Dialysis Nightmare

Dream 7-17-14

  Walking into the building, I notice a lovely fountain in the middle of the room, the open lobby spans from the first floor to the fourth. The stairs spiral all the way up much like a Frank Lloyd Wright design. The Dialysis floor is one floor down, in the basement. I wait for my turn. The nurse tells me that I am in the wrong clinic. "But this is the dialysis clinic?" I say. She tells me that it is one of two, the other is on the top floor and it's the bad clinic. I wonder what she meant by "bad clinic."

     I walk the stairs to the fourth floor. When I enter the clinic, I find a line of people, a lot of people, waiting for their treatment. Their are only two nurses and two seats. About fifteen people wait four hours for each patient to finish dialyzing. When it is finally my turn, which is days, I sit in the seat and wait to be stuck by the needle. The nurses are usually very gentle and make the process as painless as possible. Today is different. Different nurses, different technique. The nurse takes the needle (which is the size of of crochet needle) and stabs it into my arm. I let out a scream. She misses the fistula. She yanks the needle out of my arm, raises it above her head and brings it down into my arm once again. She misses once more. Dream ends.

I wake up.