The ER doctor, the mushrooms of the blackforests, and the man who called himself Rumpelstiltskin.
Once upon a time, there was a short-staffed hospital with a busy emergency room somewhere in
Germany. Here worked a middle-aged Indian doctor overwhelmed by and currently panicking during her 24h shift.
The year was 2023 and the doctor was me.
The language barrier and the nine cups of stale coffee were not helping. Then there was the missed lunch, the stress, the adrenalin, all piling at the base of my skull, clawing their way up to right to my eyeballs, triggering throbbing pains with each eye movement.
I popped another pain killer, willing myself to suffer four more hours, before a pizza, Netflix and a solid 12h sleep could materialize.
Meanwhile a harried policeman and a paramedic brought him in, just as I was considering a 10- min power nap. The patient was a pudgy old man, with a bright orange pant, a blue smock and a pointy cap.
“The patient was found dancing around a mushroom field in the black forests.” The police paused for an effect. “He was seen by some hikers who alarmed the police two hours ago. He is vital stable, has no external injuries, but needs observation. Drug consumption cannot be ruled out.” Then the policeman and the paramedics looked at each other and snorted.
I raised my brows at them.
“He has no ID on him, and calls himself Rumpelstiltskin. We are guessing he cooked and ate some of those hallucinogen mushrooms.”
“Frau Doktorin, you see Rumpelstiltskin is a beloved fantasy character from brother Grimm…” The paramedic started to mansplain (in German), and I held up my hand.
“Heute back ich, Morgen brau ich, Übermorgen hol ich der Königin ihr Kind; Ach, wie gut ist, dass niemand weiß, dass ich Rumpelstilzchen heiß!” I quipped in fluent german, the famous lines from the German fairytale, to the impressed germans. The patient hooted in glee and clapped hard.
( For the uninitiated, these were the famous lines in the German fairytale Rumpelstilzchen/ Rumpelstiltskin where his name comes to light and the story ends).
“
I did his quick head to toe check, trying to pinpoint a diagnosis.
“Haben Sie etwas eingenommen? (Did you consume anything funny?)” I asked in German.
“May be some dewdrops, the fairy dust in dollops,
The berries from the forest, or the moonshine my dearest,
For me it is all the same, Rumpelstilskin is my name.”
“Ah! But you speak English!! I was surprised.
“Just the way you speak german – we all need to keep up no?” He sounded quite clear in his head for a person on drugs.
“What do you do for living Herr Rumpelstiltskin?” He looked well groomed for a vagabond.
“Argh, guessing and professing is not the way,
I once knit gold from the hay, all day
I kept up with age, updated my résumé,
I am now into talent hunt and recruitment,
As they say!!
They all applauded at his riveting performance until he pulled at his i.v. line splattering the newly painted walls with blood droplets.
“I knew the good times would not last in the ER..” The nurse from the isolation room rushed to get the Haloperidol injection.
Meanwhile the speaker announced three more emergencies. I sighed!!
“You look tired Frau Doktor. How about I give a taste of my magic mushrooms? Just among friends! After all I ain’t I your favorite Grimm’s tale character?”
“Hä?” It took me a moment to realise, that he was right. As a child, Rumpelstiltskin WAS my favorite fairytale character, vain glorious, talented, witty, but I wasn’t about to indulge his flight of fantasies. I signaled the staff to search him for them ‘mushrooms’, while I documented.
Diagnosis: ? Schizophrenia (Delusions of grandeur)
Differential diagnosis :
? Hyperactive Delirium
? Drug-induced psychosis,
?Wild mushroom poisoning
To my surprise, the worlds on the screen turned into ants and started scuttling around on the white background.
I rubbed my eyes.
He giggled.
“Still don’t believe me?” He had something in his hands, that suspiciously looked like a poisonous mushroom species local to the adjacent black forests.
“Well, if the fairytale has taught me anything, it is do not believe in a certain Rumpelstiltskin.” I said testily and walked towards him to confiscate whatever he carried. “Did you just spill something in the air? What is it?”
He pulled out a Sponge like bag from inside his folds. How the hell did he free himself? The nurse had him properly fixed to the bed.
“Rapunzel sends her regards.” he said, holding a golden hair. Or was it a straw woven into gold?.” Then he pulled out an apple, a rose and a thimble. “I come bearing ‘gifts’.” He cackled at his own pun.
(You see ‘gift’ in German means poison, not presents). Typical Rumpelstiltskin behavior! Damn, what was I thinking? I willed myself back into reason.
Then my buzzing pager somehow turned stone cold and stopped working. The air grew thick, with a fluorescent green tinge to it. The on goings slowed, sputtered till they stood frozen in time.
“The fairytale creatures are sad, you don’t visit them anymore. Why did you stop reading the fairytales, they ask.”
“Because magic ain’t real and I have a shitload of work piled up?” I humoured him. “Why is it important to you anyways?” Where were the damn mushrooms?
He laughed and danced around me. The ER looked like some kind of a desolate scene from sleeping beauty, with only the self proclaimed Rumpelstiltskin and me able to move.
“We are trying to recruit and convert the folks who lost faith in the magic. Our Community is shrinking and we need representation.” He puffed out his chest.
“I get a commission for every conversion.” He said shrewdly. “Fairy gold”. I am telling you because I believe in a full disclosure.” He cackled again.
“This place is teeming with magic. I feel it in my bones. I can almost grasp it.” He made a huge show with his fingers and elbows. “Come with me to the black forests now. You can them all about this kind of magic. Its different from ours, yet so potent.”
“Well I have day shifts, and night shifts, and weekend shifts. I cannot just dump away my residency and saunter into the blackforests at a whim!” I answered to get him off my back.
“So read them books ja? You don’t even open your Grimm’s fairytales anymore.” He looked genuinely hurt.
“Why? because I have to relearn the medicine in german. Hansel Gretel wont help me clear my exams; but Harrison and Harold will. Goldilocks is imaginary, but geriatrics is real and intensive, and I have to stay on top of it. No prince Charming is coming to rescue me, I have to rescue my career all by myself.”
“Oh but what is life if full of care, you have no time to stand and stare?” He quoted W.H. Davis, leaving me mildly impressed.
“There is no magic in the life of us lesser mortals. There is just hardships, entrance exams, strife with authority and burnouts.” I could pretend to play a damsel in distress as well.
“And all of it lead to….a happily ever after.” He sprinkled some more of the mushroom powder around. Where was he getting it from? I started to grab him.
“You want to find out? Lets go.”
He grabbed my hand and we landed on roller coaster in a simpy pink colour, with glittering seats and satin belts.
“Well, move your tail, let’s hit the trail! Don’t drag your feet, your memories we visit!”
“Snowwhite and the dwarves song? really?”
“Heigh ho! you remember!!” The Rollercoaster moved through blue colored whispy clouds on a lavender sky, held together by a huge rainbow. The purple swans greeted us as we moved past them. I shook my head, feeling wondrous, slightly nauseous, holding to my dourness like a weapon against this hallucinogenic scenario.
The coaster moved into my childhood. A 12-year-old me was on a floor of an ancient library reading Grimm’s fairytales, enamored by the magical narratives, desperately wishing to be in their august company for once.
I smiled. Would I see the Tinkerbell with pixie dust, the Rapunzel in the tower, or the forest elves any moment now?
But the ride brought us to the hospital psychiatry wing, and I felt a palpable disappointment. “Time to see them at go,
A wondrous yet a deadly flow,
Happiness in a box,
Ripping through a fort Knox!”
Rumpelstiltskin rubbed his hands.
“Hopelessness and depression. This ward won’t help with recruitment in your cult.” My voice was tart.
„A stream of electrons, released with utmost precision, at a flick of your hand. They travel with precision, permeate your brain, undeterred by nature’s own fortress – the blood brain barrier. They prod and pick at the brain cells, enchanting them to unlock the molecules of happiness. How is this electroconvulsive therapy any less potent than magic you have ever read?”.
For a moment, my mind was blown.
“Well, this is science. Its…hard facts.”
“So now you need theatrics? ok!” Mr. Rumpelstiltskin swished his hands and the roller coaster plunged deep into a cavern with yellowed waters. I held my breath and trying to calm my thundering heart as the shock room came into view.
Blood everywhere. Alarms ringing non-stop. A code was being run. There lay a young man on the table, blood spurting from his neck with every heartbeat. The consultant made a makeshift tamponade with a catheter and held it tight against his neck to stanch the blood loss.
The nursing chief meanwhile pushed down hard on his chest. 28…29…30…all hands away. Shock, 350 Joules.
His body lifted in the air for a moment, then sunk down just before the wispy fingers of death could grasp his life.
Someone intubated his airways, lidocaine was injected into his heart.
1, 2, 3… The chest CPR continued. The coordinated tango with the death. Then the ER head got 3 bags of blood and started a blood transfusion.
I could feel the shift in the energy. „We got a pulse.“ Someone said jubilantly. Beep…beep…ventricular tachycardia…beeeep…Ajmalin i.v. Sister….
Sinus Rhythm. BP 90/50. Chyne Stokes Respiration.
Keep the OR doors open. Tell them we are bringing in the RTA… Off they went.
The shock room was shrouded in silence. Even the man who called himself Rumpelstiltskin sounded deeply impressed. “They restarted his frozen heart.”
“Yeah. I have been here before, as a part of this wonderful team.” I said with fierce pride. Mr. Rumpelstiltskin beamed at me. “Then it is clear. You have experienced magic right here.”
“A different kind, but maybe.” I hesitantly started to see it now.
“A better kind.All without a true love’s kiss!” He smirked.
“Well, our devotion to their call of duty is true enough!” It dawned. “May be that is what breeds this energy.”
“And did they give him real blood?” Rumpelstiltskin asked me still peeking at the mess in the shockroom, breaking my reverie.
“Yeah, that was the blood magic.” I decided to put my grey matter to sleep and go along with his madness. There was a lot of time, later for retrograde panic and anxiety.
“Why did you choose medicine?” He asked me while steering the Rollercoaster.
I smiled. “Because I believed somewhere deep within me, that it was my only chance at magic. A happy ending within my grasp. Like in the shockroom.”
“Then lets end this ride on a sweet note shall we? He quipped and we soared high up into the skies with the pink elephants flying alongside us.”
He huffed and puffed, then whooshed and swooshed, till we came to our next destination. The hospital chapel.
The place was serene, a group of people sat clustered around an aisle. A Gottesdienst ( Christian service) was in progress. One of them started humming a hymn, the choir followed.
Their notes filled my heart with a frothy joy. Wherever the music touched me, it took away the palpitations; washed away my exhaustion, It coaxed me to breathe deeper till I sighed, almost wept.
“Music, the medicine, the brightest magic. It is not just the sirens and the mermaids. It is also the birds and the insects, the leaves and…in you.
Then with a whoosh, he was gone.
“Our patient, the delusional one is missing.” The panicked nurse roused me from my desk.
“What? How? Where was I?“ I wiped the sliver of saliva off my slack face and looked around. My body felt limber and light, my head amazingly clear. This was contrary to what I expected from a drug trip.
“Looks like he sprinkled the some powdered psychobilinogen mushrooms in the ER. We were all delirious and disoriented for who knows how long. Its a mess. The Consultant will call you, though we gave him an idea of what happened.
“Hallo Dr. I heard. I checked the documentation. He was fixed to bed wasn’t he? I will be there shortly. Please call and inform the police. Fax them all the documents and the forms. We will lodge an official police complaint.” The ER Consultant was genuinely sympathetic.
I shuffled towards the fax machine. Did I space out? hallucinate? or had a bad case of a Freudian Slip? I had no idea.
An envelope lay neatly tucked at a corner of the fax machine. It was addressed to : “To the girl who forgot her fairytales.”
With an open mouth, I opened it to find one of my favorite medical articles by the Diabetes Hope Foundation.
“It was a day unlike any other. Dr. Banting and his student Dr. Best entered the diabetic ward where the terminal children plagued by the diabetic coma lay. Their parents sat by their side hopelessly waiting for an inevitable death. Without further ado, the duo injected the children with their new purified formulation.
It is said that before they finished injecting the last patient, the child on the first bed woke from the coma. Gradually every child woke up from what was perceived as a sure sleep of death. The dreary ward was at once transformed into a joyful place of hope, prayers and laughter.
The invention and the history of insulin remain, to date, one of the most miraculous stories in modern medicine.”
Magic!! Maybe not the whimsical one with rainbow Rollercoasters and unicorns kind, but more potent, more ancient and healing kind.
I smiled as I turned the page over. A handwritten verse from an old copy of Grimm’s fairytale was scribbled in a neat cursive.
“The dreamer awakes; the shadow goes by.
The tale I have told you, that tale is a lie.
But listen to me, bright maiden, proud youth.
The tale is a lie; what it tells is the truth.”
(credit—traditional folktales Nordic and Grimm’s).
Credits :
- Grimm’s Fairytales
- Diabetes hope Foundation
