LAST STONE

Some of you are, I presume, waiting with bated breath to learn more of my medical struggles and successes.  Being the kind and caring person that I am, here is an update.

On a pleasant Friday in late January, I was admitted to a secret hospital whose location will not be mentioned at this time.  The attending nurses and physicians, using their remarkable talents, bound me to a table (rather firmly I do believe – almost as if they were afraid I might try to escape) and administered mind-altering drugs in such quantities as to cause my brain to become disoriented (which is not that difficult) and unaware of any of my surroundings or experiences.

(This next part I only know from bits and pieces I heard as I came out of the drug-induced stupor).

Working under great duress, the medical personnel advanced me to an operating theatre (I can only imagine the horror or despair some of the student nurses and doctors must have had seeing my limp, bulbous, and seemingly lifeless body lying on the table) for the purposes of depriving me of one vital (or not so much) organ of their choosing.  There are a myriad to choose from but I am quite confident that the one chosen was of lesser rank (not up there with the heart or brain – both of which may already be gone according to some of my students).  Nevertheless, the surgeons and assistants performed their magic and removed what they wanted, stitched (well, really,they just taped the holes which seemed a little careless in my opinion. What happens if the tape falls off and my guts start to spew out all over the ground and such?) the incisions (of which there were four – the largest in the bellybutton area – guess there’s no more bikinis for me in the future) and sent me off to some other secret realm for recovery.

Isn't this cute?!!  It was the cause of much
pain but has been eliminated from my life.

Being the wonderful person she is, my sweet wife returned to my side immediately after the surgery in anticipation of my returning to normalcy (whatever that might be).  She was a little miffed that it took nearly five hours to wake this old body (which will reach six decades in a very short time) up but that was not my doing.  We both warned the anesthesiologist of my system which takes great offense to being attacked by sleep-inducing medicine and refuses to arise to consciousness in a reasonable time.

Three weeks have now passed since the attack on my system (though the events of many of those days are somewhat dim due to… well, I’m not really sure why but they are dim nonetheless) and I am feeling much better.  The constant pain that resided in my lower back (initially thought to be stones in the kidney but later diagnosed as the same entity in the gallbladder) has disappeared but has been replaced by a lack of energy (attributed to the ‘major’ surgery on my system and rebellion from other parts that were ignored when they wanted to play the ‘surgery’ game) and a complete loss of appetite (probably a good thing as I pass forward to future decades).

All in all, I would say the whole experience was………….. an adventure I would not like to repeat.  I did request they keep the stones for me (I was considering using them for earrings for my sweetheart for Valentine’s day or some other remembrance item) but they said it was against the law.  My counter proposal was trumped by the fact I was completely unable to stand up for myself while in the throes of slumberland.  One day I will win when it comes to doctors but this was not one of those days.

Thank you for your attention as I have recited my experiences at the hospital.  If you are a medical person or have one in your family, please don’t be offended by my flippant view of the profession.  I’m sure they are really nice people but, frankly, I really don’t remember that much about them so I have to make things up.  Next time I will have Teresa video everything so I can see what it was really like… or not!!

Until next time.