Being the possessor of many unique medical problems, some of which even doctors are very unfamiliar, and knowing about the Esplin cholesterol problem, medical stories of our family always interest me. Here Annie describes her medical ordeal which took place the summer after Gordon was born. In this story, she discusses riding on the sheep range with Frant.

This story is of great interest to me because of the difference between how a medical patient is treated now compared to then, walking her through a waiting room full of patients on the way to her surgery, telling her she couldn’t move her bowels for a week, how long it took to feed her, etc. A marvelous study in medical advances.

When Gordon was born, he came breach and I suffered a complete laceration. This, coupled with the trouble I had had for several years which the Drs. had told me was a growth on my ovaries, necessitated surgery.We lived on the ranch in the summers. Several times I had attacks of intense pain in my right side but we didn’t worry about it as we thought it was not appendicitis. One day Dad and I rode around the sheep range, up through Meadow Lake and all over, checking fences and observing things. Finally the pain in my side became so intense that I had to get off the horse and lie down on the ground for some time. Finally we walked to the house. We thought then that it was lucky I didn’t have appendicitis as I could die before I could get help or get to town as we had to go horseback to Sorensons ranch before we had a road to take our buggy home.

Dr. Macfarlane came to Orderville in April and wanted to operate on me at once but he was going back East and would have to leave the day after the operation so he thought we should wait until after he got back. He said after he operated he wanted to be in town and see it through. Later, after the operation, we were glad he did.

About July 1, I went to Cedar City with Howard Chamberlain in his car. Frant had to get the sheep located on the reserve, then he rode Flash down fro Duck Creek. We stayed with Howard and Julia and their girls, Irene and Genevieve.

The day before the operation, Doctor gave me an enormous dose of laxative. That night and the next morning I had other cleaning treatments and no supper. Next morning at the hospital I had the third enema. I felt as hollow as a deflated basketball.

My hair was long and they braided it in two braids. We wore long-handled garments (this was before they had us remove our garments for a hospital stay) so they would take my legs out and they swished back ad forth between my legs as we made the “Almost Death March” up the long hall, through the doctor’s office to the operating room. I have often thought of the amusement we supplied for the patients waiting for the doctors and dentists who all occupied the same waiting room. Drs. Macfarlane and Bergstrom in the lead, with their operating gowns on; Frant and I, both with gowns on; followed by three nurses. The room was filled with people and, though I was frightened and worried (this being my first trip to the hospital), I felt the curious eyes o the spectators as we passed through the office.

They had Dad stay through it all and he has told me they took all my insides out, laid them on my tummy which they had opened from stem to stern. When we were at the sheep herd, I wanted Dad or the herder to save me the soap grease whenever they dressed a sheep. He said then he was about to have Doctor wake me up and ask me if they wanted them to save the soap grease. But I believe he was really too worried to think then of that.

They found I had no cyst on the ovaries but that my appendix was what had been giving me trouble for several years. After the appendix were removed, they took my uterus, reattached the ligaments and shortened them so they wouldn’t tip back against my back, repaired the laceration and sewed me back together. Dad said he was afraid they would never get everything back into place again. I was in so much pain that I was sure they didn't’ get things in right side up. Doctor said he put over 100 stitches in the uterus alone.

We had a special nurse the first three nights, then they had Frant sleep in a cot right beside me for about three weeks. Poor guy, he took his tie and shoes off but never undressed for some nights.

They wanted to keep my bowels from moving for a week but I didn’t cooperate too well. On the fifth day I told Hilda, the nurse, what was going to happen and she tried to discourage me but I didn’t pass out as she had been afraid I might.

Saturday the nurse made me some beef broth. It was so weak that wen Dr. Mack came in and I was eating it he said he didn’t think the beef bone had been in the same kitchen with the broth.

During the night I felt sleepless and restless. Frant must have felt some impending danger. He woke up in the night, asked if I were alright and I assured him I was. “Do you want anything”, he asked. I told him no, but to go back to sleep, which he did. Sometime later I woke up startled and was about to call him, though I didn’t know what for. Then my heart stopped and I thought, ‘Well, it is too late now. It will be all over when the doctor comes and I don’t want to distress Frant.’ Suddenly my heart started up again, then it commenced to pound until I I could hardly breathe. The sweat poured off me yet I felt chilly.
I didn’t call Frant or the nurse but I finally settled into a fitful sleep. Next morning when the nurse came in and took my pulse and temperature she called Dr. Bergstrom. (Dr. Mack had gone up to Cedar Breaks with a number of doctors who were having a medical convention in the city.) They did what the could do for me that day but didn’t diagnose my ailment until later. That afternoon Dr. Mack returned and came into my room. He called the nurse and asked her to get me ready for the doctors to see the results of his operation. After they had all looked me over and left the room I told Hilda to call the Chamber of Commerce and let them come and have a look too.

About evening the clot that had passed through my heart had lodged in my lungs. They began the old fashioned method of mustard plasters to dissolve it and relieve my pain. I lay on my back with my hair braided in two braids. A few days later, as I was beginning to feel a little better, another clot left the incision and settled in my left leg.

For the next week or so it was touch and go with me. Dr. was surprised, as all of us were, when I finally came out of that siege. I could only move my right leg, which I drew continually up and down, and my hands, which I ran through my hair continually -- so you can imagine the time they had after a couple of weeks or so to get the snarls out of my hair.

The duration of my stay in the hospital was about fie weeks. When they took me out, Frant, Dr. Macfarlane and a couple of other men carried me down the steps strapped to the to of an operating table, which they put across the doors of Doctors’ car just behind the front seat. Dr. said, “When we carry anyone out like this, feet first, they never come back again, but I believe you will be back again. Needless to say, I have been back, not to the old hospital but to the new one in Cedar City which I entered July 4, 1923 and left with the prettiest baby boy the hospital had, red-headed Kent.