She Had A Spell

“She couldn’t make it today. You know, she had one of her spells.”

“She was right there in the middle of the grocery store, buggy slap full of groceries, and just hit the floor right there in front of the cabbage. Yes, they had to call an ambulance! They think she had one of her spells!”

“Everybody knew something was wrong when he got up in the middle of the sermon and slowly walked her out. She was probably about to have one of her spells.”

“She was helping her plate at Homecoming when she just fell over in the dressing! Thank goodness they found her bottle of ammonia in her purse and waved it under her nose! It brought her back to in no time!”

While growing up, that was a phrase I used to hear. “She had a spell.” It was just one of those things folks said. As a child, I figured “having a spell” was just as accurate of a description of a medical term as anything else. It was just one of those words or sayings you heard and accepted.

Kind of like chester drawers. “Go put your clothes in your chester drawers.” While that might be a fine name for something, maybe a person, or a style of underwear, I was surprised to find out that it wasn’t the name of the piece of furniture in my bedroom at all.

Anyway….

After becoming a nurse, I thought back at the many things “having a spell” could have been. Was is low blood sugar? Was it a blood pressure issue? Was it something even more serious? Most of the ladies I saw “have a spell” usually recovered. Usually after having a bottle of ammonia waved under their noses.

Grandma had a bottle in her medicine cabinet. “What’s this?” I asked. “It’s for when you have a spell,” she replied.

Now I just wonder what a doctor would have thought if I had reported “The patient in room 5A is having a spell.” If he handed me a bottle of ammonia and said, ”Go wave this under their nose,” I’d bet he had been raised in the South also.

You just don’t see folks having spells as much as you used to see them. And I don’t even know where to get one of those little bottles of ammonia.

From the mind of me.