Wendyl Nissen: Mowed down in public

Photo / Thinkstock

You are a lawn. We are mowing it and taking grass clippings to look at it. We are not planting a new garden," said the gynaecologist.

I love a good metaphor, especially when I'm wearing a hospital gown, blue paper slippers on my feet and a hairnet on my head.

I was having what I now call "my mini-op". Not dissimilar to the ones I remember all my mother's friends having at a certain age for "women's troubles". There would be much discussion about meals put away in freezers for husbands and children while they were "convalescing".

"Why can't your friends' husbands cook a meal while they are sick?" I remember asking my mother.

"Because they are hopeless," was all she said.

"You might want to fill the freezer," said my naturopath the day before my mini-op as she created a herbal tincture to aid in my recovery.

"My husband can cook," I said defensively.

"Oh, lucky you," she replied.

I checked my phone to see that I was in the year 2010 not 1971.

"I forgot to tell you about what might go wrong," said the gynaecologist on a return visit as I waited patiently in my La-Z-Boy chair reading the newspaper.

"See this wall, I might poke a hole in it. And if there were water and sewerage pipes behind it I might puncture them as well. If this happens you will be spending the night in Auckland Hospital."

I smiled weakly, trying very hard not to think about my wall or my pipes or my lawn.

It had been 34 years since I was in hospital for an operation. Back then it was to remove an appendix and I was in a private hospital. My parents are great believers in health insurance.

I'm not. And so I have all my healthcare needs addressed by the public health system where I've always had excellent care.

In the waiting room I sat with Chinese, Middle Eastern, Maori, Samoan and I'm pretty sure a Russian woman. "So I guess everyone in New Zealand who isn't an immigrant or tangata whenua has health insurance and goes private," I whispered to my husband.

"Perhaps this is everyone in New Zealand," he said.

I saw a woman who looked exactly like our country's youngest convicted killer Bailey Kurariki's mother, only 20 years younger. She was clutching a beautiful baby and her two other children sat on the floor a little dishevelled and confused. She charged out of the door then came back and used the f word and the c word several times. No one took any notice as they chatted to each other in Mandarin, Arabic, Samoan and Russian.

And then they took her boy away, an angelic thing who looked a lot like Bailey probably did at 4, and gave him his operation.

As I later sat in my glamorous outfit in my cubicle waiting for my turn I heard a child screaming nearby. I hoped it wasn't little Bailey.

I was petrified. I was a "fit and healthy" 48-year-old, according to my medical chart and struggling with the idea that I would be put to sleep and someone would do something to me which even on a good day doesn't sound right, even if it is described as mowing a lawn.

"This will make you feel like you've had a few too many of your favourite tipple," said the anaesthetist, before having a think what that might be and adding "a few too many chardonnays." I felt momentarily flattered he hadn't said Jim Beam.

I looked up at four men who were leaning over me and tried not to think about what they were all about to focus on and the fact that I had worn my comfy nana undies.

And then the male nurse put his hand reassuringly on my arm. "It's okay, all over soon," he whispered.

And it was. I stumbled home to bed and painkillers prepared for a long convalescence and surprised myself by feeling right as rain the next day and switched on the computer.

"I want to remove mildew on curtains which are light blue! I thought you may be able to use this convalescence time to nut this one out," wrote a woman on my email.

"I'm terribly sorry," I wanted to reply. "But I've just had my lawns mowed and don't give a stuff about your curtains." Instead, I turned the computer off and went back to sleep.