Maybe I'm guilty of crying wolf -- On My Way Out series, Vol. 1, Part 5

Say it ain't so, Dan!

Am I guilty of crying wolf? The idiom comes from one of Aesop's fables: The Boy Who Cried Wolf. In my case, did I become The Man Who Cried Wolf  a week ago when I panicked and thought I was packing it in? I called for an ambulance. A month earlier, my teammates didn't ask me and made the same call in what turned out to be a nine-hour stay in the emergency room with a bout of serious dehydration, brought on during a baseball game, due to a hot and humid morning under a blistering Arizona sun.

This story doesn't have a sheepish ending. In fact, an orthopedic surgeon will clear things up this morning as I still deal with heel pain in my left foot -- a pain so excruciating it continues to bring on sweats and a nauseous feeling that makes me feel like I'm on my last leg...a little humor there. Where that all comes from, I do not know. I'm guilty, if nothing else, of always adding humor to a not so humorous situation.

Maybe the villagers in this particular case are doctors and nurses. This second emergency stay: at the same hospital as my first visit, only this time they whisked me off to a room where it seemed like I was Home alone.

I love air conditioning. After all, I live in Arizona for goodness sake. But this room would probably shatter all those spurs in my left foot in less than 24 hours. Before I go on, let me say, I have nothing but praise for all the doctors and nurses...and techs -- all under the gun and I have no idea what is happening beyond my air conditioned room. I swear the knob on the door was shaking and slowly turning into a ball of ice.

A beautiful tech, knocked and entered with warm blankets. A nurse entered the room and checked my vitals. Normal! How could that be? Another entry. "Let's get you up and try on this boot."

That didn't work. 

The boot sailed through the air...right into the trash can.

Maybe later. No way I could put pressure on my frozen foot.

A few hours later, I was given my second round of morphine, given a copy of my release papers and whisked off to the lobby in a wheelchair, knowing a visit to an orthopedic surgeon was next on the list, according to the document I clutched in my right hand.

Not so fast! A tech ran out to the lobby and caught me motoring out the front door of the hospital. 

"Sorry!" she said. "We forgot to take the IV out of your arm!"

Now here I sit...four days later, the morphine is long gone from my body...the pain is...well...still painful, as I prepare to have a teammate show up and help me to my car, while my worn out significant other of 18 years, prepares to drive me to the Tucson Orthopaedic Center.

All of us old-timers -- male and female -- face similar scenarios as we all continue to face the aging process. That awful ad on television comes to my mind. "Please help me I can't get up."

Please let it be documented: Thanks to all the doctors, nurses, first responders, caregivers and significant others, too.

And try not to cry wolf, but don't think twice about making that call, if you think you are in trouble. The wolves can gather later.