The elevator opened to the large doors of the OT area. I waved salaam to my family one more time. I had to change the trolley in the corridor area and hand over the bed sheet that I had on me. I usually have a pillow to support my leg. That also had to be replaced with a pillow from OT.

After that, the staff wheeled me off to the Pre OT and parked me between the other patients. I was still coming out of my disorientation. I looked around me and saw patients on the left and the right of me, Yes, I was going to strike up a conversation with either one of them and get out of my disorientation( Me being a selfish perhaps ) I picked up a conversation with the person on the left. She, like most patients in pre-OT, wore a tensed and worried look. We started a conversation about our families. Especially if you have grown-up kids, parents love to talk about their child’s growing up stories, studies, or work. Her daughter worked in the IT industry. She told me how hard her girl worked to get into an IT firm. I noticed people tend to calm down talking about fond memories. I listen and try to pick the positive points in the conversation and repeat those points back to them. Kinda like giving them something to feel good about. It helps most of the time. I have also noticed there is one topic we, pre-OT mates, eventually end up discussing, that is our upcoming surgeries. I usually give them my example of going under the OT lights many times, I make it sound very light. I could tell this lady was still tensed. So I didn’t move further with surgery discussions. At times like this, it’s better to let them be and leave them thinking about the fond memories we had a conversation on.

Meeting Hashim

I lay silent for some time and I noticed the blurry image of a brown outfit among the greens uniforms. That reminded me of Hashim. So I caught the attention of one brown outfit. Motioned him to come over and asked him about Hashim. He said that Hashim is his batchmate and would let him know that I was looking for him. The last time I met Hashim was on the OT table under sedation. This time I was going to see Hashim in my full senses 😁 I mean I chatted with him over WhatsApp a couple of times. But this time I was going to meet him in person. I lay wondering if I would get to meet him. What if they wheel me out to OT before I get to meet him, perhaps he was already in another OT. That’s when the earlier brown outfit came up to me and said “I have informed Hashim. He will be coming soon” I waited, Although I was expecting him I didn’t have my glasses on, so when he walked up to me in his brown outfit and brown mask, it took like a second to realize it was him. I had never seen his face up close. He said “It’s me Hashim ” We shook hands. We got on pretty well. He asked me about the upcoming surgery and I asked him if he’d be my sleep OT assistant, but unfortunately, he had a posting somewhere else. While we chatted it was time to wheel me out of the pre-OT to the OT table.