Friday December 19, 2008

Life on December 19th has certainly held a greater quality of life status then I anticipated. David Lee’s pain level has stayed amazingly under control. Thank you, percocet.

Yesterday was the longest morning of my life. Well, right up there next to the two days between when David Lee called me to see if we could meet for coffee and the moment of him actually asking me out for our first date. At least this time I didn’t get caught practicing what I was going to say while mowing lawn. But I digress.

We had to be in by 6:30 and narrowly escaped having the wrong knee operated on. It was wrong on the schedule and he corrected them at the front desk. Then when he was prepped and Liam and I stood there keeping him company, the surgeon came in and after a few preliminaries said, “do you have your knee marked?” We’d joked that morning about the fun we could have with a sharpie. I thought I could draw a dotted line, “cut here.” David Lee thought we should draw a scalpel with a circle and an “x” on the wrong knee. Nice insult to the intelligence, huh. But we ended up not doing anything. And when I told Dr S. I’d thought of scribbling “oops” on the wrong knee he leaned over and scribbled. When he walked out, I realized he’d written “yes.” Excuse me?

The nurse walked in and said, “Ok, so we’re doing your right ACL….”

Nope.

What?

So they got a fifteen minute late start because they had to rearrange the OR. Funny. Or not.

I wish I’d know how many times I looked at my watch and discovered a whopping three minutes had passed. Mom came to join me around 9 which was such a God-send. I was just trying to figure out how I was going to get a huge diaper bag, my purse, the stroller, David Lee’s computer bag, our coats, and Liam who thought the stroller was NOT for sitting in, in to the bathroom, down to the cafeteria for a cup of coffee, and then out to the car for David Lee’s knee brace.

And finally it was all over. Go here for a look at what they did if you’re scientifically interested. Oh, and his screws are the bio-absorbable ones otherwise they could be describing his surgery exactly. Less then an hour later they were ready to shove us out the door; but David Lee was still feeling pretty lightheaded so we stayed another hour or so. We just barely got his completely straight leg into our Ford Escape by putting the seat back so he could scrunch up higher. Let’s just say he won’t be riding in comfort or style for awhile. Ouch.

Home again and he didn’t fall out on the front steps, thank you, Jesus. And while I knew we weren’t home free, that in itself felt like getting walked to first base. Very, very safe.

They gave him a femoral block pre-op and sent him home with a polar pack that circulates 40 something degree water around his knee. It looks like a little lunch box sized ice chest that needs to stay filled with ice-water and then tubing up to where it disappears under the bandage. I’m thinking if someone could just invent something of the sort for pregnant women during their first trimester to deliver a constant flow of easily digested nutrition straight to the stomach they would retire young and rich.

Adam has kept us in stitches. He is the self-declared nurse and he’s ready for a bigger case-load already. He delivers the pills, plugs and unplugs the polar pak, positions the pillows, tells David Lee when it’s time for a nap or time to ambulate, gets magazines for him to read, scrubs betadine off his feet (I forgot how that stuff makes people look like they had a run-in with cheap sunless tanning lotion) with baby wipes, brings the crutches when needed, follows David Lee when he walks to make sure he doesn’t get lightheaded, checks his temp, auscultates his heart and takes his blood pressure.

Last night he was trying very hard to hear heart sounds with my all-too-large for him Littman Cardiology III. “I can’t hear any heart sounds,” he said, “I think you’re just half dead.” I explained to him that nurses function in a lot of different roles and they even have to keep the rooms cleaned up. We’d picked up most everything downstairs already but he insisted on going back down solo to “clean up.” I followed him down a little later and heard the frig door closing. “I cleaned up the crackers and the cookies” he informed me. Ritz crackers in the frig, well, why not. He locked the doors when I told him they lock the hospital doors at bedtime for security and told my mom on the phone that we’d shut down the doors. He claimed he could stay up all night so I explained about shift change and told him it was time for him to report off.

“Uh, yes, this is David Beachy with Edenali incorporated. He just had surgery, today and needs some help.”

“Ok,” I said, trying to help him out. “And what’s his pain level been like?”

“Um, a one.”

“Oh, that’s excellent.”

“Well, actually it’s a 10.”

“Ok, and how are we treating that?”

“Just with Calcium. And some Vitamin C.”

One more night of setting the alarm to stay ahead of the pain with meds and to keep that polar pak filled with ice water. Please let those little guys sleep in again tomorrow.

• ← Monday December 15, 2008
• Sunday December 21, 2008 →