BONE WEARY 02/29/00

Date: Tue, 29 Feb 2000 19:05:21 EST
Subject: Bone weary

What a long morning. Preadmission testing started at 8:00 a.m. and it lasted until noon. Luckily, Elsa rustled up a wheelchair and zipped me from pillar to post. We really made tracks around that hospital.

I was supposed to go back at 2:00 p.m. for a preadmission physical by my GP, but decided I was too plumb tuckered out. That posed a problem - I need a general physical and my GP's seal of approval to have surgery, but there was no more time available the rest of the week.

What to do, what to do??

A light at the end of the tunnel - John goes to the same GP and had an appointment for a physical tomorrow. Had. The dear lad handed over his appointment time to me. My hero!

By the time we left Holy Redeemer, I was famished (blood work meant I had to fast). I craved a turkey hoagie, so we swung by Wawa and picked one up on the way home. It tasted to me like the best hoagie in the world!

After polishing off the last crumb, it was time for this well-fed Grammie to wend my way up the wooden hill for a well-deserved nap. I was so tired, I did not know if I could make it, even with help.

Ah, my bed felt so good. The joy of stretching out my legs and just being flat. Bliss.

After Wednesday's physical comes the arteriogram on Thursday. It turns out that it is a pretty big deal, which I had not expected. I was thinking it would be like a cardiogram.

Not so. More’s the pity.

The procedure itself is only about an hour, but I have to stay flat for 6-8 hours afterward. It is a little scary, with a remote but real chance of stroke, due to my age and physical condition, but if I am going to have the shoulder replacement, it has got to be done. It will start at approximately 8:30 a.m. (EST). Your prayers and kind thoughts most welcome.

This is nothing what I thought all day I was going to write tonight. It was going to be about tulips and the complexities & marvels of family and include a recipe for fudge.

Thanks for indulging - for some reason, putting what is happening into words makes it more real and somehow less scary.

I know this is already too wordy, but I MUST take a moment to welcome some extra special people to this merry little band of online friends and relations - Gerry & Linda, Shauna, JJ and Keilly Gallagher, our wonderful neighbors.

They are a great family to have next door and do so much to perk my spirits just by being (Linda's parents' property is catty-corner to their back yard, so there are lots of intergenerational comings & goings, which is dear to this family lover's heart).

This afternoon after my nap, I sat in the big chair and watched JJ playing basketball on the driveway while Linda did her best to give 2-year old Kielly some freedom without detours out onto the beckoning road.

I not sure who got the better work out - JJ or his Mom!

Love to you all - The Gramster

reposted in sweet memory of its author, KATHARINE REYNOLDS LOCKHART, by her scribe/daughter, Elsa Lockhart Murphy, in celebration of the 05/14 centenary of The Gramster's birth FYI - Mom never did have the shoulder surgery!