I startled it when I came in and, instead of going for the door, it went for the corner and hunkered down, looking rather scared.
I left it alone.
In the next photo of the slideshow above, you can see a couple of cats, both of whom still have their new necklaces. Not that you can see the one on Fancy Pants. Last night, I noticed a bright orange cat collar on the roof of the isolation shelter, where I’d seen Midnight sitting earlier. Yes, it was Midnight’s, and I was able to get it back on him this morning. This afternoon, I found one other cat – Mochrie – without his necklace, but there was no sign of it anywhere I could see. So he got a new one. We only have a few left. When the budget allows, I’ll order more.
Talking with the girls, we have decided not to plug the cat house in. We have yet to open the roof to clean it inside, test the ceramic heat bulb or test the smoke detector, and there’s a reason for that. This former dog house is quite old and parts of it are getting quite rotted out. The roof itself is very heavy. While it’s designed to be opened with the use of a counter weight, it requires two people to open it to keep it to keep it from twisting and cracking, which has been getting worse over the years. The cats seem to use it only rarely, too. Not sure why. I used to see The Grink in there at times, but she is among those that have disappeared over the summer.
We still need to plug in the heated water bowl, which is plugged into an outlet inside the cat house. The cord I had set up for the cat house – which was used for other things in the summer – had enough slack wrapped up that I could run it around the eaves of the cat house to the water bowl shelter and plug the water bowl in, all on its own.
So we will leave it for now. There are a couple of cat beds still in it, and the floor is covered with a high density plastic mat I found in the barn, so it will still provide shelter, if not heat. The isolation shelter has the heat bulb set up and working, so they have a place to stay warm if they want. In time, it would be good to dismantle the cat shelter and salvage what we can from it – the wall joists, for example, are just fine. Eventually, it would be good to build another cat shelter with different dimensions – and one that is easier to get into to clean!
There is only one thing of note and concern today; a shaky and distressed call from my husband’s sister. My FIL has taken a turn for the worse and, at the time she called, was being transferred to a different hospital for treatment. He has not been doing well, and while he has been paneled for a nursing home, there is the very real possibility that he will not make it to one. My husband is, outwardly at least, handling it well, but I know he is incredibly frustrated that his pain levels prevent him from going to see his own father. From what we’ve been told of late, chances are his father might not even recognize him.
My husband’s sister promised to keep us updated, and we’ve heard nothing in the hours since, which means there is nothing for her to tell at this point. So we are just waiting for word.
I will definitely be keeping phones – both my cell phone and a land line handset – closer that usual, when I go to bed tonight.
So, this no-longer doing daylight savings time nearly messed us up again.
While my younger daughter and I were out, the eye clinic called to conform today’s appointment. I asked my husband to verify the times, as it was a joint appointment with my older daughter and I. It had been rescheduled twice, but I never updated the note stating my daughter’s time, which was now about 5 hours later, instead of half and hour later. I also asked him to confirm the cost of my daughter’s appointment, since she does not have any insurance to cover it.
My calendar said the appointment was at 11, so my daughter’s should have been 11:30.
After we got home, my daughter asked me to cancel her appointment, because of the cost. She wanted to save the funds for something else. My husband and I intended to cover it for her, so she could pay us back later, but she refused.
So I called the clinic (because she was making supper) to cancel, starting off by saying that we had a double appointment at 11am. At the end of the call, I confirmed it was 11am.
Then the messages my husband sent through Discord came in.
The appointments were for 10 and 10:30am, and the cost for my daughter’s was $125.
So I now had two different times, with both from the clinic. I made this appointment months ago, though it was rescheduled, so the time should not have changed, like it had when I tried to make more recent appointment in my phone’s calendar.
This was all figured out too late in the day to call back, so my younger daughter and I headed out before 9am, to get there early for 10am. If it turned out to be at 11am, we could just go somewhere nearby – or wait in their waiting room. This clinic is very good about taking people in early.
We left early enough to get there shortly before 9:30, and sure enough, the appointment was at 10. The receptionist told me that a lot of people have been having the same problem.
I didn’t have long to wait before someone came in for my field of vision test. Which no longer involved a dark room and my head in a dome. It now has this spiffy new gadget.
Virtual reality goggles, with remote control clickers. Two of them available for right or left handed people. I did left handed, though I could have used either.
That was so weird.
The first weirdness was the view when it was first put on. Huge windows with a nature vista beyond a room with a glass coffee table in front of me, and my name and other information floating in the middle. When looking down to the remote clicker in my hand, it glowed a blinding white – but just the remote, not my hand holding it, hovering in space.
Then a cheery, annoying female voice gave instructions and I just about jumped out of my skin.
Then the test started, with a status bar around the green dot I was to focus on, letting me now how far along the test was – right eye first. Half way through, the cheery voice announced that I was half way there and doing great!!!
Yeah, I almost jumped out of my skin again.
The voice came back 3/4s of the way, telling me I was almost done, and doing really great!
This time, at least, I didn’t startle quite as much.
I can’t remember which time it happened, but I remember saying “that voice has got to go!!” 😂
Then there was another little information intermission and the left eye was done.
One of the issues I discovered was that, around the green dot, it wasn’t fully dark. More of a mottled dark grey. Which meant it was very hard to tell if the dimmer lights I was supposed to be hitting the trigger for every time I saw one was actually a light, or just part of the background. I’m sure I missed a lot of those little lights.
After that, I was back in the waiting room for a bit before being called back for the puff test. That one is always “fun”. Once it was done, I got the dilation drops, then back in the waiting room with my daughter for the 10 minutes or so the drops needed to do their thing. Once there was enough time for the dilation, it was back to another machine to take images of my eyes, then once again to the waiting room until the doctor came for me.
Most of this part of the appointment was going over what she saw in the images. I have been coming back every 6 months to monitor some tiny hemorrhages in my eyes. There was one spot in my right eye were fluid was visible between layers.
That pocket of fluid was noticeably bigger.
Not a concern yet, but something to monitor. If the fluid broke through the tissue, treatment would be needed, with involved an eye injection. That gave me the total heebeejeebies. I told her I knew of the treatment, as my mother had gotten it. She was an absolute trooper about it, too.
I am not as brave as my mother when it comes to stuff like this.
As we talked, I mentioned to her a couple of things. A couple of nights ago – my first night sleeping on my own bed instead of on the couch, away from the cats, my eyes had started to hurt. Like a headache, except in my eyeballs. That went away, however for the past while, I’ve had issues with irritation in my right eye. It felt like I was developing a sty, but I could see nothing.
I also gave her a short version of what’s happened over the past year, and of my surgery just a few weeks ago.
She immediately recognized that all of this is the most likely cause of what she was seeing in those images. Now that the surgery is done, things should settle down, but she wanted me back again earlier than 6 months, to monitor. We settled on my coming back in April. I chose April because the weather and road conditions should be past the worst of winter by then. It also puts us back on track, after my appointments being rescheduled several times. She made sure to let me know that, if I had any issues, to come back earlier.
Then she did a direct eye exam, with the bright lights.
Interestingly, that didn’t hurt anywhere near as much as it usually does.
She went through both eyes as usual, started to back off and switch gears, then went back to look at both eyes again.
She found why my right eye was bothering me.
Turns out, I’d burst a blood vessel. Nothing major, and the blood was being re-absorbed as expected. However, she felt that the physical stress of the past while easily explained why this would have happened. I got instructions on what to do – and not do – for the next while as it heals.
Oh, and that field of vision test? Where I know I missed a lot of those little lights?
It seems they take that into account by simply doing more of them all over the grid. My field of vision test came back just fine.
So with that done, I booked another appointment in April – and my calendar didn’t even try to change the time! I’d mentioned it to the doctor and she has an Android phone too, and she showed me something in the calendar that’s there when a new appointment is being made, where I could change things. I ended up not having to do it.
What I had done today was completely covered by our province’s system, but my appointment in April is going to cost me $60, as this one is going to include an actual eye test for my prescription – something that wasn’t going to be done while my eyes were dilated.
After we were done, my daughter and I made a quick stop at a small grocery store on the way out. This store tends to be a lot more expensive for most things, but there are a few things that are worth getting. I ended up picking up a rib roast that was on sale, plus also had a price reduction tag on it, so it was something that needed to be cooked right away.
It’s in the oven right now, and the house smells heavenly.
I ended up getting my daughter to pick something for her and her sister, but they were out of what she normally would have picked. She ended up choosing some fresh made submarine sandwiches and, when I saw them, asked her to pick another for my husband. We also ended up getting a couple of bags of a dozen fresh baked cookies each, to split between the four of us.
Meanwhile, doing through their British Imports section – a favourite section of mine – I decided to try a new tea.
We get Tei Fu lotion, regularly. It is exceptionally good for sore muscles and joints, and to combat Charlie Horses. Finding a tea of the same name, spelled differently, was just funny to me.
It doesn’t take much to amuse me.
I’ve since had a cup, to go with a couple of cookies, and I quite like it!
From there, we did make one more stop on the way home, this time at the feed store in the town we drive through along the way. I picked up a 40 pound bag of kibble in a different brand, so the cats have some variety, that my daughter carried to the truck for me. The woman who came out to process the sale was the same women that was trying to arrange chicks for us in the spring, splitting an order between us and others. We never did get a call about it, so that didn’t pan out. I told her, it ended up turning out for the best, because so many things happened. She totally got that!
From there, we finally headed home.
I say “finally” but, in the end, because they took me in so quickly at the eye clinic, it was just barely noon by the time we drove up our own driveway.
Once we were home and everything was put way, I started on that rib roast. For the meat, I rubbed it with olive oil, then cut slits and pushed in whole garlic cloves. The meat was surrounded by whole, peeled potatoes and quartered onions. Then the meat was seasons with a steak spice mix my SIL gave us, while the potatoes and onions were seasoned with a lemon dill seasoning mix, also given to us by my SIL. It’s almost done, and I am quite looking forward to seeing how it turned out!
Oh, the house smells so good right now!
Meanwhile, I think I’ll be making myself some more of that tea.
It was another lovely day, and I was feeling well enough to finish winterizing the cat isolation shelter.
They are so happy!
My brother had been able to do a bit of leveling of the patio blocks, but they some of them are still a bit off. I had to put something under one of the front wheels of the shelter to keep it from wobbling. The weather blocking box also needed something put under the front legs, with one needing twice as much as the other.
One of the things I would normally want to do is put rigid insulation under the roof for the winter again. Unfortunately, the cats REALLY love that insulation. They love to scratch it, more than they like to scratch the hemp rope scratching board that serves as a ramp between the levels. Before cleaning up, I had pieces of insulation I’d been cutting from nearby, including a fairly large piece. The cats were all over it – and trying to burrow under it, too!
So while I’d love to put insulation under the roof to create a ceiling, nothing lasts the winter. It gets destroyed.
We need to figure something else out, because it really does make a difference to have an insulated ceiling. Thankfully, it’s still warm enough to not be an issue yet.
Other than that, it was a mostly quite day. My daughter and I did run into town this evening for a quick little grocery run. When we got to town, we found gas prices as dropped to $1.599 at two stations, and the Shell station I normally go to was $1.539
I filled the tank. With my CAA card discount, I paid the equivalent of $1.509
It was full dark before we even finished shopping. It’s been a long time since my daughter has driven at night. She had forgotten how much she enjoyed it. Except for oncoming vehicles forgetting to turn off their brights.😕
I’m feeling really good about getting at least one major thing finished today!
We can’t leave her with me. Partly becayse there us no place for a litter box and partly because she’s one of the cats that likes to jump on my abdomen when I’m in bed. A big no-no right now.
I think bringing her in with me will become a daily thing, though. She needs the break!
Beyond that, it’s been a good day. It was gorgeous outside. My younger daughter and I were able to do a dump run, though I was banned from handling anything. After, we made a trip to the general store and post office. My husband had something in he thought would fit in the mail box, but there was just a card. We will have to come back on Monday.
My older daughter gave me her wallet to pick something up, then both my younger daughter and I got a couple more things. I was not “allowed” to carry the bag of combined purchases but I was happy to at least go into the store.
Tonight, however, I just got hit with a wave of fatigue. Sleepiness enough that I’m having to be careful not to drop my phone as I tap this post.
Today, my daughters got some progress outside. The last 4 haskaps have been planted, and all 144 of them got a deep watering.
The garlic bed also got a deep watering, before a straw mulch was added. If all goes well, the garlic should start growing under there, before the ground freezes.
Over time, the haskaps need to be mulched, too, but with so many, that will be done slowly, over time.
I was able to head outside for my daily walkabout, before things got dark. Of course, I checked on things and did what little I could. I even remembered to move the trail cam and it’s stand away from our sign at the corner of the property, since we no longer have to worry about the sign being vandalized. I’m hoping to find a way to use the stand to hold the solar critter cam to monitor the isolation shelter, once it’s set up under the kitchen window for the winter.
While looking at where my daughter planted the last haskaps, I noticed the spade was forgotten, so I took it to the sun room.
Where I promptly startled four skunks
!!!
I left the sun room, since the cats and I were blocking the exit. Three left.
One stayed and looked like it was settling down for the night. 😆
There’s really no way to persuade it to leave from there. Too many things between it, and the door. Namely me and swirling cats, wanting their evening feeding!
So I took care of that and left the skunk alone.
Aside from that, I’ve spent most of my day in the cat free zone, doing little crochet projects. I’m trying to use up two colours of mill end cotton I’ve had for quite some time. We now have more dish cloths and coasters, and I’m working on another bowl.
I’m hoping to have a better night tonight. Last night, I went to bed early, and promptly became wide awake. At one point, I gave up trying to sleep, got up and made another pot holder in Tunisian stitch, because why the heck not? I’d love to do more than drift off and wake up, over and over, all night again, though. Not something surgery or recovery related, as far as I can tell. In that respect, things are going quite well.
Normally, tomorrow would be our second stock up trip to Costco in the city. That will be delayed. If we need anything over the next week or so, we can make a short trip into town.
You know, for a day where we did “nothing”, we actually accomplished some important things.
Today was chilly and damp, so only the essentials got done outside. The girls did the morning cat feeding, as usual, and the Shrine Lady was very loud about her displeasure that warm cat soup comes AFTER the dry kibble. It always does, and she always complains. Then they get to pet her while she has her soup.
We should look into getting a heated water bowl, just for cat soup in the winter, so it doesn’t freeze before they all get to eat some.
It was a sleepy, not even getting dressed, day for me. I ended up making little crochet projects with my cheap cotton mill end yarn, starting and undoing projects several times before settling on things.
Meanwhile, on top of taking care of all the household stuff, my daughters were able to reschedule their medical appointments to December. My older daughter could only get a new time on December 30 and already expects it will be canceled due to weather. Hopefully, we will not get snowed in, this year. My younger daughter got hers rescheduled for earlier in December.
I got my letter for my follow up appointment today. It’s in the middle of November, and past my driving restrictions. It’s not at the cancer clinic, which is not what I was expecting, given what I’ve been told until now. I’ve been to this other clinic before with my mother. It’s at the sane hospital, but the clinic is a separate building built in a parking lot next to the hospital. It’s early enough in the day that I hope we will find a parking spot in what’s left of the lot around it. I really don’t want to park blocks away and have to walk back, with still under recovery restrictions.
After going over the letter about our doctor leaving the area, my daughter looked up the clinic she is moving to. It’s in the city. She had thought our doctor was leaving the province or something.
The letter had numbers and instructions on how to follow her to the new clinic, which my daughter wants to do. I would rather find a doctor that’s closer, but she is a lot more selective than I am and wants to keep seeing this doctor. After talking about it, I told her if she’s going to stay with that doctor, then I will, too. It’s more convenient to share a doctor and we can book consecutive appointments to save trips. She offered to pay for the gas and do the driving. Cost if gas was another major factor.
So that got taken care of, too, with her making the calls for both of us, then bringing the phone to me only when the receptionist needed to talk to me in person. It’s not officially done, since the doctor isn’t officially there for another week or two. We will have to pay a fee to have our files transferred, but that can be paid when we come in to sign the appropriate consent forms. We’ll combine that with making new appointments, again just to save trips. She didn’t know what the fee was. Every time we’ve had to transfer files, the fee has been different.
So that is taken care of, too, as far as possible right now.
Tomorrow will be a test for me, as we do our first stock up shop since my surgery. At the closer Walmart. My daughter will be doing all the driving and lifting and bagging and unloading. As good as I’m feeling, we will still bring the walker. I was needing that for bad arthritis pain days before the surgery, anyhow. Aside from that, my biggest issue has been my injured left rotator cuff. I am having difficulties lifting it past a certain point, and the range of motion has become more limited. Likely because of the temperature fluctuations. My husband is having similar issues with his back injury being worse lately. He’s been using his TENS machine a lot more often. What a great investment that was!
The good thing about heading into winter with all these issues. We are getting into “hibernation” season, and slowing down in general, anyways. It will give all of us a forced rest and recovery time.
As long as we don’t end up having to shovel driveways.
I mentioned yesterday, how I had felt strangely sleepy all day.
Typically, when that happens, as soon as I lay diwn to try and sleep, I end up wide awake.
Not this time!
I lay down, planning to just rest a bit. I woke up some 8 or so hours later, having not moved the entire time.
It was coming up on 5am, and I figured I would just hit the heads, then lie diwn until my alarm went off for my meds.
The alarm woke me from a dead sleep. I shut it off, then passed out for another 3 hours.
Thankfully, I’m not on any meds that are strictly timed, anymore. Including my painkillers, which are back to “take as needed”.
Most of the day, for me, was pretty quiet. The girls started the laundry, which is one of the things I’m banned from doing. My younger daughter headed out when it got as warm as it would, in the afternoon, and started planting more haskaps. Adding more rows to where the previous ones are planted. By tye time she stopped, it was full dark. She says there are still some left. !!!
Meanwhile, the guy that bought a couple of scrap vehicles and dragged them out with his crane truck came back today, with a trailer. Staying out with him was my only real accomplishment.
He got one loaded and was expecting to cime back for the second one. When it got quite dark, I figured he would come back another day, but he still made it. His crane truck has flood lights on the back, it turns out.
It was about 7:30 and fully dark when my younger daughter came over. I hadn’t realized until then that they were both out still planting haskaps!! She stayed with me until the guy left, to help close the gate behind him.
So that is now done, though there are other vehicles he’s interested in. He’ll be talking to my brother about those, though. My brother knows more about them than I do.
As for me, I’m working myself up to eat something, before going to bed early again. I’m hungry, but have no appetite. 😒
I look forward to taking a walk outside tomorrow, and seeing what my daughters have done!
Much of it was spent doing some crochet. I got a walk in outside, with lovely weather to enjoy, as well.
My daughters got the one garden bed cleaned up and weeded. As usual, the north end of the bed was filled with elm roots. They got two rows of garlic planted, and will be adding a third row, tomorrow. Then it will be mulched and pretty much done for the winter.
When I went over to see them, I got a few comments on the colorfulness of my bruising that they could see. 😆 I got these pictures, yesterday.
The first one is the arterial line site. It went in and was removed while I was under anesthetic. Being arterial, it is the “riskiest”, but looking the best.
The second is the IV port location. The student nurse removing it had trouble with the tape and dig a fair bit of pulling and tugging.
The third one looks the worst, and should have been the mildest. That’s were the anti- coagulant was injected, in my tricep. It was also the only one that hurt.
Funny how it all seems backwards in severity.
Meanwhile, I finished off a crochet hanging storage bag I was working on. Then, I whipped up a little critter, more as a reason to use some safety eyes I got, but never started a project that needed them. I’ve always used buttons or embroidered eyes on things, previously. It had to be tiny, because I could find only a little handful of polyfil to stuff it with. A quick project is always satisfying.
The enforced reduced mobility should be a good time to catch up on various incomplete projects. Something to make the time feel less wasted!
When I had a laparoscopy done, some 15 or so years ago, the thing that surprised me most was how it basically wiped me out for a month. I felt so weak for so long, and completely drained.
Now?
I feel none of that. If anything, I’m feeling downright energetic! The fact that residual pain from the areas they worked in has reduced so much, so quickly, certainly helps. Basic biological functions that were painful yesterday are pretty much pain free now. I still have to watch myself, of course, but I’m really amazed by how quickly the pains are passing.
I will continue to sleep on the couch in the living room for some time, though. Which means that cats have my king size bed to themselves. You’d think they’d be happy with that, but it hasn’t stopped them from trying to tear down the door into the living room. This set up was made to be temporary and easy to remove. It’s basically just famed chicken wire, with a hook and eyelet on either side of the door to keep it closed. Last night, several different cats decided they absolutely needed to get through that door, because I was there, grabbing at the chicken wire with their claws and trying to pull it open.
My older daughter stayed up almost all night, so that she would be available in case I needed help, and she ended up luring the cats away with wet cat food, after which they finally stopped trying to tear down the door. Mostly. I did actually get some sleep, and found getting in and out of the low couch much easier than I feared. I’d still like to raise it up by about 4 or 5 inches but, for now, it is working. My daughters set up my walker near the couch so I could use it to help get myself up and down, and that worked out very well. By morning, though, I found I didn’t even need to use it.
My brother and his wife did end up coming over for a few hours today, making sure to let us know we didn’t need to even come out to greet them. They had some winterizing to do, and very little time to do it. My daughter did head out to return their container from the lovely turkey soup my SIL had sent home with us, though.
I spent much of my day in the cat free zone. Got some crochet done until I found myself being blinded by the morning sun once it cleared the spruce trees. My husband and daughters made sure I got my high protein meals and plenty of hot tea.
Temperature wise, today was a lovely day, but we had high winds again. In the late afternoon, the girls helped get my walker outside so I could do some walking around, and we were seriously buffeted. We found a lovely surprise on our compost ring; my brother had left a bag of their compost for us. I had been perplexed by this, when he brought us several buckets of compost in the spring but, while staying overnight and their place, they showed me their electric compost machine. I’d never heard of such a thing before, though I’ve seen other types of countertop composters. This thing cooks down the kitchen waste and the end result is a compost that looks a lot like course coffee grounds. I was very happy to see more of it.
When I first started walking around the yard, I checked out the vines on the chain link fence. I’d picked the tiny yellow winter squash a while ago, but those were easy to reach under the frost cloth I’d draped over them. I remembered the green one from nearer the middle of the fence. The wind had torn most of the frost cloth loose, so I could reach around and finally found it. As we walked around the main garden area, I ended up picking the muskmelons that were under the plastic all this time.
In among the frost killed bush beans, fresh onions are growing! I’d harvested the onions from there, but obviously missed a few. These are quite small, so it’s possible they are transplants that simply didn’t grow until the bush beans died back.
While walking around, the girls and I talked about where we could plant more of the little haskaps, and the various things that need to be taken down and put away for the winter. There’s no way we’ll be able to get all the beds cleaned up and prepped before winter. As long as we get one done, planted with garlic and mulched, I’ll be happy. The next while should have good daytime temperatures, so my daughters will be able to harvest the last of the carrots, beets, parsnips and the rest of the chicory root, little by little. That has priority over clearing beds for next year. They are also wanting to get as many more of those smaller pots of haskap as possible planted, too. Looking at the long range forecast, it doesn’t look like the ground will actually freeze until about mid-November. That is unsure, of course, since the forecast that far ahead is based entirely on averages, and this winter is not supposed to be average with that Super El Nińo. It’s entirely possible the ground won’t freeze until some time in December.
I’m rather okay with that.
The hardest thing for me right now is to not go out there and try to do stuff, because I’m feeling way too good and way too energetic!
Last night was a strange one. I kept getting nurses coming by, asking if I was ready to go home, pretty much until shift change. I was quite a mess, apparently. I took a selfie after my brother came and left with my daughter, sent it to my family, and even I could see how absolutely grey I was. They were still asking me about going home, though!
Pain levels were pretty much non-existent, unless I tried to move. I had to get help in and out of bed just to go to the washroom. Mostly lifting my legs for me, so that I didn’t strain my abdominal muscles in any way. The big concern is that I might tear an internal stitch.
Then there was my neighbour…
This ward has three recovery beds with just curtains for privacy, plus a bed in an isolation room. I was in the middle of the three curtained beds, and there was one other person who had the same surgery as I did. I know this because I could hear EVERYTHING. Surgical details. Discharge information. Who her transportation was. Several of her phone calls to that person. Then, hearing her throwing up in the bathroom, repeatedly.
She was still discharged, though they did ask if she wanted to stay overnight and she said no. That left me as the only patient on the ward.
Once she was gone, some people came to clear the space, take the sheets, sanitize the mattress, get the space ready for the next person…
Except it was done in small stages. I heard them banging around, then they’d be gone and I thought they were done, until someone else came over. More banging and crashing, then I thought they were done. Then someone ELSE came over, more banging and crashing, and finally they were done. At one point, I heard a woman start banging around, then another joined her and started talking about her… female problems, shall we say. I thought she was another patient at first, because of what she was talking about, only to find she out was staff. I could tell when she started using voice commands to use her phone to call the housekeeping department to come and finish the room.
Then the night nurse came and introduced herself and to do my vitals. She started to adjust the bed for me, then said I could do it myself, and tried to find the control pad. She eventually found it dangling near the floor. It’s supposed to clip into the arm bar, and she did try to put it in place, but it wouldn’t stay. So she left it on the bed beside me.
I was getting regular painkillers, regular vital checks then, at one point, she came with an anti-inflammatory pill, plus an anti-coagulant injection. No one told me I’d be getting these, so I had to ask her about it.
Eventually, things quieted down. I was able to get the bed completely flat (which took a surprising amount of fiddling) and could lie on my side and sleep. A couple of times, I had to call someone to help me get in and out of bed to use the washroom.
Then… something changed.
In the wee hours of the morning, I was able to get in and out of bed on my own, with no issues. Before getting back into bed, I walked back and forth in the hall, with no problems. I kept walking until I felt I was starting to risk overdoing it before going back to bed.
Even with the interruptions for more painkillers and vitals being checked, I actually got some real sleep.
Then breakfast showed up. Scrambled eggs, a hashbrown pattie, a bowl of oatmeal, fresh sliced apple, milk and coffee. It wasn’t as good as supper was, but I couldn’t complain about it, either.
I drank the coffee.
I was reminded why I don’t normally drink coffee. 😄
I was happy to see the doctor come in during one of my vitals checks. We talked for a while, as I really wanted to know what was going on with the scarring they found, because it couldn’t be from my appendectomy, when I was 12. He said, yes it could. I told him about the cyst I had removed. He asked which side it was on, and I told him they thought it was attached to my left ovary. The scarring was all on my right. Things were stuck to my right ovary. I told him, I had pictures of my cyst (taken after I was inflated, but before it was removed, so you could see quite a lot) and there were no scars. Plus, the pains didn’t start until about 6 months ago.
In the end, we have no idea what happened. He mentioned a few possible causes such as infections and such, but I’ve never had anything like that, that I know of.
They took out scar tissue and some lining I can’t remember the name of which, hopefully, will mean no more pains. It was too dangerous to take out any lymph notes but, by observation, they looked fine. So did my uterus – from the outside. The cancer was all on the inside.
I told the doctor how I was feeling, with some before and after comparisons. When I mentioned that I was able to walk until I finally stopped myself so I wouldn’t over do it, his response was, “there’s no overdoing it.”
…
I wasn’t going to say anything, but I’m notorious for overdoing things. When talking to my daughter about this later, she just laughed and said that he obviously didn’t know me, because I overdo things all the time! 😄
I got instructions in regards to the five incisions around my abdomen that the robot used to do the hysterectomy. What everyone kept forgetting about was my left arm. Before I was put under, I was told they’d be inserting a line there and told me what it was, but I have no memory of the name. When I woke in recovery, it was pointed out to me and I was told it was an arterial line, so I needed to be extra careful with it.
After the visit with the doctor and the nurse finished doing my vitals, I saw the ball of gauze under tape and asked what sort of care it needed. The nurse wasn’t sure, but said she would find out, then left.
She never came back.
Later, a nurse and student nurse came by to do my final checks and final explanation of things. I got my new prescriptions and an explanation of each one. It included Tylenol, but I’m already on T3s, so I didn’t need to fill those. It was mostly the student nurse doing everything, and she also removed my IV port. I asked about my left arm and she wasn’t sure, so she said she would ask and come back with an answer. They came back to reinforce one of my incisions and I asked again. She had forgotten to find out, apologized and said she would ask and come back.
She never came back.
I was all done by then and could get dressed and leave. I kept my daughter in the loop, since she and my brother were coming to get me. At first, I said I could meet them at the doors, but I was waiting for the student nurse to come back.
I ended up meeting my daughter at the registration desk for the ward, then we headed out.
It was a relatively quite drive to my brother’s and we didn’t stay long. With a long drive ahead, we made sure to use the washroom (the hospital really REALLY wanted me to poop!) and say proper thank you’s and good byes.
Since we had new prescriptions, our first stop was the pharmacy in town. Which meant my daughter could find out about her prescription that didn’t get delivered on Thursday, at the same time. As I reached out with my left arm while talking to the person about getting my new prescriptions, I saw my left arm.
The skin under the clear tape covering the gauze was bright red, with what looked like a red streak heading past the tape, towards my elbow. It was not red like that when I washed my hands at my brother’s, so this happened during the drive. It was also warm under the tape, but not on the skin around it, though that warmth did go away. Meanwhile, because part of the tape was over my wrist, every time I moved my hand, the tape there would twist and roll and was starting to come loose as far as the gauze. There was also a visible bruise under the gauze that looked darker.
The women I was taking to could see it, too, and asked if I wanted the pharmacist to take a look. I said yes, please!
By this time, my daughter had picked up her own prescription and we sat to wait the 20 minutes or so for my prescriptions. The pharmacist came by to take a look, and she seemed concerned. It could be an allergic reaction to the tape (I’ve never reacted to medical tape before, and it wasn’t on any of my abdominal incisions), or it could be the start of an infection. She recommended I go to the hospital to get it checked.
Better safe than sorry with something like this!
So we waited until I got my meds, which turned out to be completely covered. I got an anti-inflammatory, and something to protect my stomach from it. Not the same ones I took before that seems to have started all this. I was also given a non-prescription laxative, because these meds can cause constipation; so can the T3s I’m taking. They REALLY want me to poop!
That done, we paid for our stuff then headed for the ER.
I’m pretty sure the admissions clerk recognized us.
I showed her the redness and said I needed it checked, and that I’d just had surgery yesterday. As she asked more questions, I told her I’d had a full hysterectomy.
She looked at me in shock, saying “and you’re out already??” I told her, they wanted to send me home yesterday! She just shook her head in amazement.
Then, while the paperwork was still being done (and she cut off the city hospital bracelet to put on a new bracelet for this hospital), a nurse came by to see who was next to be brought in, and she was told about my arm. She took a look, we talked for a bit, and she ended up taking a picture to show the doctor. She was back before the paperwork was done, saying the doctor thought it might be an allergic reaction, but she would take a closer look when it was my turn.
We didn’t have very long to wait.
It was the same doctor I saw the other two times I was at the ER!
She remembered us.
I ended up telling her about the hysterectomy, the endometrial cancer, and the scarring they found, which would explain the pain she’s treated me twice before. The nurse was there was well, and both of them were looking at me, saying “I can’t believe you’re out already!”
After looking at my arm, she told me she’d have to take the tape off, and I said that I expected it. Between the redness and the bruising, I expected at least a big dark bruise under the gauze.
It’s hard to see in the first image above, but under the tape was quite red, and there’s a swoosh of red on the elbow side. There was some concern about removing the tape and gauze from an arterial line, but when they took everything off, it all looked really good! You can see that in the next image. The bruising turned out to only follow a vein. The site itself just looks like a little vampire bit, and was completely clean and clear.
Since I had no reaction to any other tape on me, their best guess was that I was reacting to whatever was used to sanitize the area before the line was put in. The nurse said a name, but I can’t remember what it was.
It looked so good, they saw no need to do anything to it. I just got a button bandage to cover the two little pokes.
Then I suggested, maybe my IV site needed to be done, too. The student nurse had a hard time with it, and the gauze under the tape (not a waterproof tape, like on my left arm) was saturated with blood that had already dried hard. They took the tape off and…
It looked fine. I just got another button bandage on it, just in case.
They were quite happy with how it all turned out.
I got instructions on what to look out for, and what to do if the redness got worse instead of better, and then we could go. My daughter went to bring the truck around while I updated the family. I was just heading out the doors when the nurse and doctor came back and caught me. The doctor wanted to give me a tube of allergy cream to use on my arm, if the redness got worse, so we wouldn’t have to go back to the pharmacy.
That was so sweet of her!
After that, we could FINALLY go home!
Through all this, I was doing really well. Obviously, there’s internal pain, which is a bit more extended because of all the scar tissue they had to deal with. It means having a full bladder hurts, having gas hurts, and eliminating hurts. Moving around, shifting, bumps on the road, all can hurt, but the pain is limited to just the surgical areas. I’m not feeling other pain. I’m not feeling sick or dizzy. All the long list of things to watch out for has not been an issue. Just localized pain directly related to the surgery.
I kept hearing from the family, how much better I was looking, too! I’m no longer grey, for starters.
Which means I’m going to really have to watch out. I feel “too” good, and it would be way too easy for me to … well… overdo things, regardless of what the doctor says!
I will have to sleep on the couch, though. In the cat free zone. The cats have a habit of parkouring off my belly at times, and I certainly can’t have that happen!! I’m not sure how well that will work, as the couch is quite low and hard to get up from. Not much choice in the matter!
So we are now home and I am in my 6 week recovery period. I’ll be getting a letter in the mail with my 4 week follow up appointment with the doctor. He’ll have the pathology results by then, which will tell him what stage the cancer was at. Once we have that information, we can know what needs to be done next, if anything, other than monitoring.
I’m also banned from driving for the next 2-3 weeks. No to using power tools or machinery. No to making any legal decisions. No to lifting anything more than 10 pounds.
Which means I’m going to have to get a lot of stuff done through my daughters. Normally, I focus on the outside stuff, they focus more on the inside stuff. Now, I can’t do any of it. So my daughters are going to do all the winterizing and finishing off with the garden, cleaning up and preparing beds and putting things away for the winter.
With all the haskaps we’ve got planted, my daughter and I have decided we should plant flower seeds in the loose soil around them now, so they’ll come up in the spring. My daughter also wants to plant a few more of the haskaps that are left in the little pots. We’ve got some warmer days for the next while, so it’ll be perfect for that.
Which reminds me. A few days ago, my SIL sent me a screen cap of a “this many years ago today” photo that showed up for her on Oct. 13. It was of my late father, sitting in his walker by the house, in the area in front of the old basement window. All around him was bright green grass. The picture was taken on Oct. 13, 2014. The last time we saw my father was a Thanksgiving road trip in 2015, another mild fall. We’re having another mild fall now. Talking to my brother on Thursday evening, he well remembers years when we had to make our Halloween costumes over snow suits, and my parents driving us in blizzards to houses to shout, “Halloween Apples” (we didn’t shout “trick or treat”, because that was mean).
I’m quite appreciating our mild weather, and we are expecting a mild winter, too, thanks to that Super El Nińo. Here’s hoping!
A mild winter will also make it easier on all of us, health wise, too.
