cause the hardest part of this is leaving you

I visited my grandma in the hospital today. She's fine, just had a minor op to remove some gallstones from her body.

Next to her bed, an elderly woman was screaming. They were helping her with medication (couldn't see cause the curtains were drawn), and she had her daughter by her side. She was screaming (in chinese) that she wanted to go home, and whenever the nurses did something, she kept brawling for help. She yelled and struggled - and in that experience something hit me hard in my heartstrings.

I sat there, next to my grandma. This was the first time I've been to the hospital for something good (a successful operation), although my grandma was in mild pain. The past few times I've been there, my relatives were going to pass away, and my family was there to accompany them for their last few moments on earth.

I remembered both my great granddads. My god-great-granddad. I never witnessed my grandfathers passing away - On the maternal side, I was not born yet and on the paternal side, I was too young to remember. The last time I went to the hospital, I was supposed to undergo intensive blood donation to save a friend's dad's life. I couldn't, because my vein was too thin and it was risky for me to donate such a huge amount of blood. He subsequently passed away.

The elderly woman on the next bed made me wish that I would never ever set foot in the hospital again. She made my heart bleed.

Photo credit: Ivan Tan

I'll be back there in a couple of weeks.