Monika's Trauma of past painful Experiences

On Friday I told you that we were staying a night longer in Gurgaon, as Monika should be released on 3rd January, after changing her dressing once more and getting her up to stand. Today and tomorrow I want to update you on what actually happened and is happening with Monika.

On the morning of the 3rd January, Monika’s mother called us and told me that Monika wanted to talk to me. I was surprised, as she had never called me for talking. She asked me ‘Please tell the doctor to make me unconscious for changing the dressing!’ I asked her how come she thought of this and she said she was afraid of the pain! I tried to soothingly talk to her. I then passed her on to Ramona to whom she also had established a bond. We both told her there was nothing to be afraid of but wondered – where did she get the idea from that the doctor would give her an anesthesia for changing the dressing?

We found out the reason some time later when we reached the hospital ourselves: Monika was too afraid of the pain, so she wouldn’t let the doctors do her dressing without an anesthesia. The moment the doctor came in for this actually rather small work, she panicked.

The doctor told me that it doesn’t hurt. She would feel it but it wouldn’t cause her pain. They had to give anesthesia to two-year-olds but already three- or four-year-olds would have it done easily. They normally manage to engage the patient in talk – but Monika would not even meet their eyes. She just concentrated on her mother, asking her to make them leave, not to do it, simply panicking. That’s how the doctors twice changed her dressing with anesthesia – on 31st December 2014 and on that day, the 3rd January 2015.

The doctor told me that it was obviously a trauma of the pain she had experienced in the other hospital where she was treated in summer. We were already told by the mother that she was the one cleaning the wounds herself – without professional help, because nobody was there to do it. We can only imagine the pain that Monika has experienced which has caused this trauma!

In a conversation with Monika’s doctor, he asked me to talk to her and try to get her psychologically to the point that she lets them change the dressings without panicking. Not only would it increase the cost of each visit – as they would need the anesthetist as well – but it was also not good for the body!

I talked to her. Ramona talked to her. And what came out of this, where Monika is now and whether she did today’s change of dressing with or without anesthesia I will be able to tell you tomorrow.