2 Days after Surgery

My day begins the same as before, this time with a male resident arriving very early to change my bandage and inspect my wound for any signs of trouble.  None are present and I go back to sleep until breakfast arrives, supplemented by the cookies Jerry brought which taste even better with the fat-free milk on my tray.

More physical therapy.  I get out of bed, grip a walker and begin moving with surprising ease while the same therapist as yesterday wheels the IV behind me.  "Awesome," she pronounces but she also encourages me to stop before I wear myself out. By the time I return, the same nursing assistant has changed my sheets.  She also gives me a washcloth and tells me to wash up in the bathroom as best I can.  I take advantage of the opportunity to relieve my bladder and sit on the elevated commode that is positioned over the toilet.  Not a good idea--as much urine ends up on the floor as in the bowl.  I grab some toilet paper and mop it up as best as I can by extending my good leg out from behind me, and gripping the handicapped bar while swooping down with my right arm.

A hip chair has been placed in my room during my ablutions.  I ask if I can sit in it for lunch which arrives just as Steven and Andrew, 2 of my housemates from the Pines, do.  Andrew points out that there's a diet Dr. Pepper in their gift bag, which also includes a banana, Fig Newtons, Us & People. Hands down, the Dr. Pepper is the most appreciated gift of all and I ration it over the next 2 days.

Dr. Ranawat suddenly appears at my bedside during the afternoon looking very elegant indeed in his hat and overcoat.  "I hear you're doing very well," he says.  "But you may hit a bump," he warns. It seems my pain-free, "awesome" progress may have as much to do with residual anesthesia and intravenous pain killers as my spirit, but as someone who always see the glass half empty, I respond well to his candor.

Now that my blood pressure has returned to normal, a kindly nurse, straight out of central casting, removes my IV.  She also is very deliberate in her itemization of the pills that she provides me in the morning and before she leaves in the evening.  It includes a vitamin and iron supplement, as well as warfarin, a blood thinner to help prevent clotting, percoset and the finasteride that I take on a daily basis.

Later Anthony arrives with a seasoned nut mix and brownies.  During the past few years, he has lost his mother and 2 sisters so I know that another hospital visit can't be at the top his to-do list the weekend before Christmas.  I feel much loved, especially when he agrees to empty my urine bottle, something I was hesitant to ask him to do, but which has filled rapidly in Marie's absence.

My roommate has a visitor, too.  Eavesdropping, I learn that they're both currently students at Columbia's business school and that both have sued their former Wall Street employers for failure to honor salary agreements that involve the sale of credit derivatives.   Now I see where he gets his chutzpah.