I Think You're Bleeding

I Think You're Bleeding

The dairy was about a 40 minute drive from home. There was supposed to be someone there waiting for me to help put in a prolapsed uterus when I arrived. As I pulled up to the barn, I quickly located the cow. She was the one laying in the mud hole, with the giant bloody uterus hanging out of her back end. But there was no help to be found.

So I found some straw and laid it out behind the cow to keep things a little cleaner. Then I’d put a halter on her head and tied her to a nearby post, and put ropes on her hind legs and pulled them straight back behind her. It’s an unnatural position for a cow, but that’s kind of the point. In this position she’s unable to do any hard abdominal pushing, and it makes my job of putting the uterus back in much easier.

I’d then gone back to my truck to get a bucket of water, and other supplies I’d need to do this job. When I returned, I found that my “help” had arrived. He’d removed all my ropes, and had just slapped the cow in the ribs to get her up, assuming that I’d want her standing in a chute (a position I typically find more difficult to replace a uterus).

She stood, took a few wobbly steps, and fell on her side with her butt in a corner (a position I find nearly impossible to replace a uterus). Try as we might, we couldn’t get her to move again.

So I finally give up, and wedge myself into what seems about two inches of space between the cow and the wall. She’s laying on her side, and straining and fighting me every inch of the way as I push and lift and strain against her trying to get this giant bloody mass, back into the little bitty hole it had come out of.

After what seems like forever, it finally falls back into place. My arms feel like jelly, and there’s a definite kink in my back from a board in the wall that had been digging into my spine.

After some IV fluids, and a little encouragement I get the cow to stand again. So I head to the barn to clean up. My coveralls and clothes are completely blood soaked. So I strip off the coveralls, and my shirt, and take a quick sponge bath in the sink.

Back at the truck I pull out a clean jacket to wear on the ride home. As I pull around the corner from the dairy I notice the lights of a 7-11 up ahead, and think to myself “a Big Gulp might help keep me awake on the drive home, and will definitely help wash down a couple Ibuprofen.”

So I pull in, and head inside. I fill my cup, and head to the register. The man behind the counter sees me, his eyes get big, and he asks with some serious concern in his voice “Are you alright, Man?!”

“Yeah, why?” I reply nonchalantly.

“I think you’re bleeding!” He says, pointing at my face.

Which is when it hits me, that while I’d scrubbed my hands, and arms, and chest. I hadn’t looked in a mirror or washed my face.

My mind is racing worried about how bad I must look to this poor kid, and it fails to monitor carefully what my mouth is now saying. Which comes out as “Don’t worry. It’s not my blood.”

I didn’t think it was possible, but this statement causes his eyes to grow even wider, and his jaw is now resting on the floor.

At this point I decided it was best if I just quit talking, and excused myself from the store. I’m pretty sure he called the police as soon as I was out the door.