A New Heart

Well now, let's have us a little update shall we? It's been a while I know, I have been incredibly lazy.  What with my dad's surgery and work, and never being home on the weekends, who has the time?  I shouldn't say that though, it makes me sound like I don't care about this blog and I do.  I actually don't know what I would do without it.  I have been plugging away at it for almost 4 years now...Aug 19, 2008 was my very first post, so yeah, I have some love for this thing.

Anyway, my last and final post on my dad and his progress through his quadruple bypass.  It has now been 3 weeks since his surgery, and he is doing just fine.  But let's go back to that overwhelming, exhausting day in the hospital shall we?

Oh right, these pants, before they got perpetually hairy.  Either my cats have adapted to humans by growing everlastingly sticky hair, or my dryer sucks.  Not really sure here.  I decided to wear comfy pants because I knew we were going to be there forever.  That's how these things go right?

Trying to watch t.v in one of the many waiting rooms.  Looking back on this, you can really see how tired I am, and we had just got to the hospital.  I didn't sleep a wink the night before because I was so nervous.  None of us did.

These waiting rooms are so ugly and not inviting.  I think I need to get into the business of interior design specifically for waiting rooms.  You know, decorate them so that people are happy.  They are all so gray and brown and drab and make me want to stab my eyeballs out.  Not conducive to relaxing and not worrying!

The check in floor.  Only two people allowed in the room at a time.  Hospitals and their rules right? My dad had to shave his entire body...from his chest to his nether regions to his legs.  I asked him if he felt like a 16-year-old boy again, he just gave me a dirty look.

I asked him if Hamilton General was a teaching hospital and he said that it was.  I asked if students would be working on him and he said that yes, since his heart surgeon was a professor at the university, that students would be assisting in the operating room.  I responded with, "Damn! Right after a long weekend too! You better hope they don't drop anything in there!"

Even though he is just about to go in for surgery, he is a joker, my dad.

After he was taken into surgery, my sister and I found this 'quiet room' which would have been very quiet and relaxing indeed if it wasn't for the family of 50 whooping it up right outside the door.  Now, I am an understanding person and I get that everyone deals with their anxiety in different ways, but do you really have to be so loud?  This was obnoxious loud people, to the point where if the door was closed it still felt like you were at a party.  R-E-S-P-E-C-T!

Oh yeah, we turned the lights down low and tried to take a nap.  Surgery was almost 6 hours, and we had already been there for around 5.

I had a couple spoonfuls of soup for lunch.  This is how I felt about what I could choke down.

Finally after forever we were allowed to go and see him in the ICU.  They had warned us about how he was going to look, and that he would be in a drug-induced coma.  I was so nervous to see him I thought I was going to throw up.  My nerves were justified as he looked awful.  I pretty much got a glimpse of what my daddy will look like in his coffin, as morbid as that sounds.  But it was true.  He just looked very bad, but none of the hospital staff were overly concerned so I kept telling myself that it was probably normal.  He had tubes going into him all over the place and he was very swollen and yellow.  My poor daddy....I am surprised I didn't break down, but I think we were all too exhausted.

They woke him up the next day and slowly started taking tubes out, one by one.  He was up and walking after a few days (a couple steps at a time), and after a week in the hospital he was allowed to go home, where he has been recuperating and putting the weight back on (he lost 25 pounds in a week).  It's crazy what heart surgery can do to you, but also amazing what it can do FOR you.

So I thank you all for your thoughts and prayers, they meant a lot to me when I was so anxious about everything.  You are all amazing and if I ever met you I would give you all a big fat hug and your beverage of choice.  

What I am trying to say here is, I love you guys.