Yesterday, @manujune resumed her treatment and that meant I had to get up in the middle of the night to get her a spot for consultation and treatment. After a year, we have got used to all these steps and so far we had not had any issues. Yesterday was a first.
I walked down the usual road, seeing the usual things, except for two kids on a motorcycle, who startled me for a moment. There was not a soul at 3:30 am, despite the fact that a comando of the national guard is just one block down. It was the first time I got scared at passing bikers. The way they looked at me made me take a keep breath and wait for them to turn around.
Luckily, they did not.
We have been on edge because in the last months violence has increased exponentially in the city. Most people think it has to do with the hundreds deported from the States, many of them criminals. On Sunday, one guys was chased into the emergency room of the Vargas Hospital and killed. An innocent woman was also killed in the process. Irony of all ironies: the hospital is between that national guard station and a police station.
I can't pint-point the reason of the violence surge, but we feel unsafe now. The economy keeps going down, cost of living keeps going up, political persecution is more ubiquitous and indiscriminate and in the capital it is just more visible.
Social descomposition is also more visible. The kids in the picture got out of a dolor (house?) near the hospital and started running down the street ringing bells and banging at doors, tossing garbage around and just making noise. They were probably 12-14 years old. I can't imagine where they were going and why at that time of the morning.
When I arrived at the Blood Bank, there were about 7 patients or relatives of patients ahead of me.
I took one of my cachitos to kill time.
We were invited to pass at about 6 am.
@manujune got #10 (not bad. I estimated she would be done by noon).
I headed back to the apartment at 7 am, after signing her up.
Even with the new beautifying programa recently lounched, this continues to be the spectacle, even one block from one of the most important hospitals in the capital of the country.
I got to the apartment, had breakfast and tried to sleep a little, while my wife and @manujune headed to the lab and then to the Blood Bank. However, I was restless and could not fall asleep.
At about 10 my wife sent me alarming texts. @manujune had had a strange reaction soon after the nurse started passing the medication. They had to call the doctor because she could not breathe.
I immediately rushed back to the Blood Bank.
She was already calmed, but she had cried a bit. She was very scared and so was her mom.
One of the advantages of the Blood Bank is that there are always specialists just across the hall ready to respond to any emergency. They did great. It was just an alergic reaction probably due to the speed at which the medication was being administered.
They made it go down at the minimum drop rate possible.
The problem now was that @manujune was unable to have lunch when she was hungry. We were done by 5 pm and she was gassy and not feeling very well. She barely tried a few spoons of chicken soup when we got home and could not pass dinner.
Fortunately, she was better today. Eleven more days to go of this cycle (weekend included).