II: Hospital Life

I thought y'all might appreciate a description of what it's like to live in the hospital. Aside from surgeries and ICU and such, a typical recovery day went like this:

• Breakfast at 8 am. For most of my stay, I was on clear liquids, so my meals included jell-o, a popsicle, a bowl of chicken broth, apple juice, and a protein drink. (I eventually got to full liquids, which replaced the broth with soup, usually cream of mushroom, and then to regular food. Their food is actually pretty good; I was just completely lacking in appetite.)
• I usually had a tech come fetch me for a chest x-ray between 7 and 9 am. They'd put me in a wheelchair and take me down to radiology and then bring me back. I didn't particularly enjoy this; the x-ray itself required me to stand up, which was hard for me (though, there were things for me to lean against/hang on to, so that helped tons). And the techs were invariably very chatty. Super nice people who wanted to know where I was from, what I did for a living, on and on and on. Of course, I had neither the energy nor the inclination to talk, so that just bugged me. But still; nice people. Actually, all the hospital staff I interacted with were very nice. There were several who went above and beyond, but nobody really fell below the bar. Good people, all of them.
  
• Mom generally showed up around breakfast-time or a bit after and stayed until 9ish. Kyle would come around 10 or 11, depending on if he had class or not and how he was feeling (he's been sickly for part of this, too) and stay until I went to sleep for the night around 10 or 11. They entertained me throughout the day by reading to me. Mom's assigned series was Artemis Fowl, by Eoin Colfer, which we're both really enjoying. Kyle's never read Harry Potter before, so he's been reading that to me. While they read, I would often slip in and out of sleep, but that's ok 'cuz I know both storylines. They were still entertaining, though, and it's just very comforting to hear the voices of loved ones. (This is why I kept asking Tianna for "stories" when I first went in; it's just very good to hear people sometimes. I'm not sure I can explain it properly.)
• 2 or 3 times a day, someone from respiratory would come in and check on my breathing exercises. My lung capacity went waaaaaaaaaaaay down after each surgery, and I have a little doodah called an incentive spirometer I'm using to re-expand them. It measures how far my lungs are expanding when I breathe in, and I'm making great progress. The last few days I was in the hospital, they also had a tube with a stream of air coming out that I was supposed to exhale against. This one was significantly less painful, and lots easier, but I realized after the first session that I didn't like it: it gave me a headache. Dunno why, but I always told the respiratory guys after that that I couldn't do it for very long; when veins started pulsing in my head, I was done. Fortunately, they didn't have a problem with this.
• Every hour or two throughout the day (and night!), I got my vitals checked. Blood pressure cuff, thing on my index finger to measure oxygen levels, temperature. Good times.
• Lunch was at noon, and dinner at 6 pm. I almost never wanted to eat, and I often groaned when the nurse came in with the food tray. 
• Oh, we can't forget the alarms! About a billion times a day, one of my IV's would freak out and start an alarm. This meant I had to hit my button to get a nurse, tell them I had an alarm going off, and then wait for what seemed like ages with this horribly loud, high-pitched beeping going on. This could be caused by any number of things: an upstream occlusion, a downstream occlusion, or the bag just being empty. Usually, the nurse just came in and fiddled with stuff until it was happy. They tended to happen in clusters, though, so I'd have to call the nurse back in 5 minutes. That was always fun for everyone present. [rolls eyes]
• Once I had been out of ICU the second time for a coupla days, they started wanting me to get up and walk around. At first, this was a major production. I required a wheelchair to load up all the stuff attached to me, as well as my IV pole, which I would then push around. Of course, I had to hunch to reach the wheelchair, so it didn't do as much to help expand my lungs as it could have. Things got easier as they continued to remove tubes and such, though, and I was soon down to just the IV pole. Then Kyle could just walk with me around the floor, holding my hand or with an arm around my waist to support me, while I pushed the IV pole with my other hand. This also made it easier to go several times a day, and we eventually got up to 3 walks a day (though they were never very long). I remember being very excited when I finally got rid of all my IV's and everything; this made the walking even better.
• Like I said, Mom would usually leave around 9, then Kyle around 10 or 11, after tucking me in for the night. Of course, I never stayed tucked in: I had to get up in the night several times to go to the bathroom, and nurses continued to come in every coupla hours to check my vitals or hang a new IV bag. I actually didn't mind the interruptions too much, though, since I was generally having really bad nightmares, from which I awoke in a cold sweat, sheets and gown all soaked. Nights weren't my favorite time. (They're getting better, though. Since I'm home now, nurses are no longer waking me up all the time. I still wake up several times every night, but I sleep longer and longer almost every night. The nightmares have gotten lots better, too, since I'm on a lot less drugs. Hopefully, once I get off the lortab, my sleeping will get back to normal.)

Believe it or not, I was actually quite leery of leaving the hospital and coming home. I had thought I'd be further in my recovery than I was, and I was scared because I still couldn't function as a normal human being. There are so many things I still can't do, and that terrified me. But Mom's here and taking very good care of me. Kyle's here all day every day, too, so between the two of them, I'm managing just fine. I dunno what I would have done otherwise. Just imagine all the normal everyday stuff that you do, and realize that anything that requires you to stand for more than 5 minutes is out for me. I can't cook, I can't clean. I can't do laundry. At first, I couldn't even carry my stuff from my bedroom to the living room; it took all my energy just to move me. But I'm getting stronger every day, and I think I may survive when Mom goes home this weekend. I'll still need lots of help, but I've got the best friends in the world, so I'm not too worried. :)