More surgery

OK - Thursday morning has dawned. Well not really. I had visitors it seemed every 30 minutes, but, your know, that's SOP for hospital stays post surgery.

When 7am finally rolled around, I called to place my breakfast order. Simple - scrambled eggs, sausage... "YOU CAN'T HAVE THAT". What?? I am still on the clear liquids diet. Oh come on folks. I have a digestive system that can take a regular diet now. I am not some little shrinking violet who would not be able to tolerate a real breakfast. So I had jello, cranberry juice, beef broth, and coffee. I was not a happy camper. Not. At. All.

I asked the nurse how I can get off this thing. I had to tolerate that, and then she could move me to a liquid diet for lunch. Oh happy day. So lunch looked a lot like breakfast, but I added cream of wheat. "You know you will have to wait an extra time for the cream of wheat." You mean to tell me I am the only patient in this huge hospital who is on this "diet," and wants cream of wheat instead of tomato soup? Ok. I'll wait.

PT came in to "evaluate me. I got the walker and walked to the end of the hall. She remarked about how well I did. Oh yes, I know the rules of this game. The second PT came later. It was my sweet Mike from the last time. Once again, off I went to the end of the hall.

Things went well for the remainder of the day. Nothing remarkable happened.

Come Friday morning. I was on a regular diet - finally. That was great. I still had the catheter and the epidural was out yesterday. No reason to get up for anything at that point. After a bit, here was Mike. I jumped out of bed, I was hurting so bad. I made myself walk to the door to the room and about three doors out in the hall. I went back. My thigh, of all things was killing me.

A while later, Mike came in and took the "automatic ice pack" off. He made up an old fashioned one.
He said it would mold better. Some time later, the doc and nurse came in to change the bandage. I told him it is a good thing this is #2 because if it had #1, there would be no second. They were at a loss.

During the night, I was in such pain that my blood pressure shot up. Something like 198/99. We got serious with pain meds. It was morphine and oxy. The bp came down, but every time I would be in pain, up it would go.

The cardio doc's PA said to schedule pain meds. Don't wait. Just take them. That's great, but the nurses get paid to remember when to administer drugs. They couldn't remember every 4 hours.

Pain and I continued to play hide and seek because - especially at night I wouldn't get my drugs. What else is there to do at night for the nurses?? The one I had Friday and Saturday night was absolutely useless. Totally.

This is long enough, and Saturday night is a real gem. It deserves its own post.

Peace be with you.